Even before he is expected to attend this weekend’s Army–Navy college football game with Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL), Trump has reportedly spoken with his former political opponent about appointing his daughter-in-law to Sen. Marco Rubio‘s (R-FL) seat after the Senate confirms Rubio as the next secretary of state, which the upper chamber is anticipated to do after the president-elect’s inauguration in January.

Lara Trump’s potential appointment, which comes after she considered running for now-retired Sen. Richard Burr‘s seat in her home state of North Carolina in 2022, could be the first step in ensuring the Trump family’s political influence endures after the end of the president-elect’s second term in 2029.

Rubio’s former chief of staff, Republican strategist Cesar Conda, supports Lara Trump, wife of the president-elect’s second son, Eric, replacing his onetime employer in the Senate.

“She is a talented communicator with the ability to explain complex policy issues in ways that everyday Americans understand,” Conda told the Washington Examiner. “She would be the second woman to hold a U.S. Senate seat from Florida. I think if her office focuses relentlessly on casework and constituent services, as Marco did, she’ll be hard to beat in 2028.”

North Carolina Republican strategist Patrick Sebastian dismissed concerns regarding Lara Trump running for a Senate seat not in her home state, known as political carpetbagging.

“Lara Trump has become a household name among Republicans over the last few years,” Sebastian told the Washington Examiner. “Her political capital is at an all-time high, and if she wants to be a senator, now’s the moment to make her move.”

University of South Florida government professor emeritus Darryl Paulson was more skeptical, contending “it seems that the only qualification needed for an appointment to the Trump administration is loyalty to Donald Trump.”  

“The same is true to appointments to the U.S. House and Senate,” Paulson told the Washington Examiner, though he did note Lara Trump’s yearlong tenure as Republican National Committee co-chair. “Who can be more loyal to Trump than his daughter-in-law? Forget the fact that she is not a well-known commodity in Florida.”

Lara Trump’s resignation from the RNC last weekend stoked speculation with respect to the Senate seat after sources close to Donald Trump named DeSantis as a replacement for his secretary of defense nominee, Pete Hegseth, amid allegations against Hegseth of sexual misconduct, alcohol abuse, and financial mismanagement, in addition to news the governor will attend this weekend’s Army-Navy game with the president-elect. The speculation centered on DeSantis appointing Lara Trump and Donald Trump nominating the Florida governor for the Pentagon post instead.

The speculation has been paused after Sen. Joni Ernst (R-IA), considered to be another defense secretary option before she took herself out of the running, came out in support of Hegseth following a public pressure campaign, led by the Heritage Foundation, on her to endorse the former Fox News host.

A similar, though less intense campaign is being mounted on DeSantis to appoint Lara Trump as the governor reportedly considers his chief of staff and former campaign manager James Uthmeier, Lt. Gov. Jeanette Nunez, Attorney General Ashley Moody, and ex-Florida House Speaker Jose Oliva.

University of Central Florida politics professor Aubrey Jewett remained adamant DeSantis “has a choice,” joking that “this is not a classic Godfather situation where he’s been made an offer that he can’t refuse.”

“My thought, as a political observer here in Florida for many years, is that one of the main considerations for DeSantis will be what he thinks is best for his political future, running for the Republican nomination for president again, and so on,” Jewett told the Washington Examiner. “The more obvious choice seems like, if you do what Trump would like, which is appoint Lara Trump, his daughter-in-law, maybe that completely gets you back into his good graces.”

“Maybe [DeSantis will] just say, you know, ‘I’m gonna do what I think is best for the state of Florida,’” he said. “If DeSantis did get appointed defense secretary, he might actually leave the appointment of the new senator to incoming Gov. Nunez, particularly if it was going to be Lara Trump.”

DeSantis has acknowledged he has “already received strong interest from several possible candidates” for the Senate seat and would “continue to gather names of additional candidates and conduct preliminary vetting.”

“More extensive vetting and candidate interviews will be conducted over the next few weeks, with a selection likely made by the beginning of January,” he posted on social media last month. “Florida deserves a Senator who will help President Trump deliver on his election mandate, be strong on immigration and border security, take on the entrenched bureaucracy and administrative state, reverse the nation’s fiscal decline, be animated by conservative principles, and has a proven record of results.”

Lara Trump has also addressed the speculation, repeating that she never wanted to be RNC co-chair “long term” and underscoring how, under her leadership, her father-in-law was reelected president, Republicans will control Congress next year, the GOP turned “low-propensity voters out,” the party “had people voting early this election,” and it “prevented the cheating from happening.”

“Yes, of course, it’s an honor to be considered,” she told Fox News. “I have not talked to Gov. DeSantis about it. But if he calls me, if he asks me to do it, I would certainly think long and hard about it. It is a big consideration. But it is something that I truly would be honored to ask, to be asked to do, ultimately.”

Lara Trump’s ascendance coincides with the rise of her husband and his brother, Donald Trump Jr., in their father’s political operation, both being members of the president-elect’s transition team, after their sister Ivanka and her husband, Jared Kushner, were instrumental during the first administration. Pennsylvania Republicans encouraged Trump Jr. to run for their state’s U.S. Senate seat in 2022 after he declined a similar opportunity to run in Wyoming in 2020.

Donald Trump has already announced Jared Kushner’s father, Charles, as his presumptive nominee to become the U.S. ambassador to France, while naming his daughter Tiffany Trump‘s father-in-law, Massad Boulos, a Lebanese-American businessman who campaigned for the president-elect in the battleground state of Michigan, as his senior adviser for Arab and Middle Eastern affairs and Trump Jr.’s ex-fiancee Kimberly Guilfoyle as the next U.S. ambassador to Greece. Jared Kushner is also poised to reprise his role as a Middle East adviser, though in an informal capacity.

Donald Trump’s youngest son, Barron, his only child with incoming first lady Melania Trump, has also been praised for his role in his father’s campaign, in which he proposed interviewers to help his father appeal to young men such as himself.

“I’m very proud of him about his knowledge, even about politics and giving an advice to his father,” Melania Trump told Fox News last week during her first post-election interview about Barron. “He brought in so many young people. He knows his generation because nowadays the young generation, they don’t sit in front of TV anymore. They are all on the tablets. Their phones and all of these podcasts and streamers.”

Presidential historian David Pietrusza described President John F. Kennedy as the most prominent example of presidential nepotism, citing his “controversial” nomination of his younger brother Robert to become his attorney general.

“We are, however, entering something entirely new with this Trump transition,” Pietrusza told the Washington Examiner. “It seems more akin to something Napoleonic.”