Welcome to the online version of From the Politics Desk, an evening newsletter that brings you the NBC News Politics team’s latest reporting and analysis from the White House, Capitol Hill and the campaign trail.
In today’s edition, Henry J. Gomez interviews Vice President JD Vance in Rome. Plus, Steve Kornacki breaks down the latest polling showing Andrew Cuomo in the lead in the Democratic prim for New York City mayor.
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JD Vance on meeting the new pope, his foreign policy role and his relationship with Marco Rubio
By Henry J. Gomez
ROME — Vice President JD Vance shuffled between presidents and prime ministers this week, tending to complicated relationships with U.S. allies and puzzling over two wars.
But it was his meeting Monday with newly installed Pope Leo XIV that could prove to be most consequential on the world stage, Vance said in an interview with NBC News.
Vance, who is Catholic, said he found the pope to be “extremely sweet.” He described their conversation as substantive — a promising sign given how Leo had, in his previous service as a cardinal, signaled disapproval of Trump administration immigration policies.
Here are some of the highlights from our interview with Vance.
Seeking a diplomatic partner: Vance spoke of Leo as a key potential partner in President Donald Trump’s efforts to broker peace between Russia and Ukraine and in other conflict areas.
“We talked a lot about what’s going on in Israel and Gaza. We talked a lot about the Russia-Ukraine situation,” Vance said of the nearly hourlong audience he and Secret of State Marco Rubio had with Leo. “It’s hard to predict the future, but I do think that not just the pope, but the entire Vatican, has expressed a desire to be really helpful and to work together on facilitating, hopefully, a peace deal coming together in Russia and Ukraine.”
An expanding portfolio: Vance has now been to Italy twice as vice president. He has also visited India, represented the White House at conferences in Paris and Munich and touched down in Greenland to reinforce Trump’s interest in annexing the island from Denmark. And the White House nearly sent Vance from Rome on a last-minute mission to Israel, but said the logistics could not be worked out in time.
“I definitely think the president has a lot of trust in me, and I’m honored by it, and I think it makes me a more effective vice president,” Vance said. “A lot of people always asked me between the election and the inauguration: What would my role be? I would always say … I think it’ll be being an extra set of eyes and ears for the president, doing the things that he thinks that I need to do, and that’s largely how it’s worked out.”
Relationship with Rubio: Vance’s expansive role has placed him alongside Rubio, the administration’s chief diplomat, as a face of Trump’s foreign policy. But Vance dismissed any notion of competition or friction.
“My attitude is, if I do end up running in 2028, I’m not entitled to it,” Vance said. “But I really think that Marco and I can get a lot done together over the next few years. That’s how I think about our friendship and our relationship. And I would be shocked if he thought about it any differently.”
Read more from the interview →
The coalition fueling a potential Andrew Cuomo comeback
By Steve Kornacki
Andrew Cuomo’s political comeback attempt is on track, at least for now.
With just over a month until New York City’s Democratic mayoral prim, the former governor retains a commanding lead over a crowded field of candidates. And he may stand to benefit further from the recent surge of one of his rivals, Assemblyman Zohran Mamdani, a democratic socialist who is drawing from a demographically narrow set of voters.
The latest poll from Marist University shows Mamdani separating from the rest of the pack but still trailing Cuomo.