Hey, good morning. I'm playbook co-author Rachel Bade. It's Wednesday, June 28th. This morning I've got

some buzz for you on one of the most powerful Republican relationships that I've certainly

covered since coming to Washington. That's the relationship between Speaker Kevin McCarthy

and former President Donald Trump. You've probably already heard about this already, but McCarthy

kind of shocked us all yesterday when he went on CNBC and dissed Trump in an interview. Despite

their longtime friendship and alliance, the speaker appeared to question whether Trump would be the

best nominee to face Biden in 24.

He was asked about a matchup between Biden and Trump, and McCarthy said, yes, the former president,

could win that election, but he continued to say this, quote, the question is, is he the strongest

to win the election? I don't know the answer to that, end quote.

Could he win an election? Can he win that election? Yeah, he can. You think he can't?

The question is, is he the strongest to win the election? I don't know that answer.

Now, why is this shocking? For anybody who has covered Kevin McCarthy for a period of time,

I mean, even just a couple of weeks, you would know that this guy owes most

of his career success to one person, and it is Donald Trump. I mean, I covered Kevin McCarthy

before Trump came to town when he was trying to get the gavel to succeed John Boehner.

Conservatives hated him. They called him a rhino. Conservatives would keep him from

getting that dream job of being speaker just a few years ago. He made an alliance with Trump,

and Trump basically shielded him from the scorn of the far right for years. And then when McCarthy

ran for speaker in January, Donald Trump made personal calls to a lot of his own

allies who were critics of McCarthy on Capitol Hill, people like Matt Gates, and ultimately

convinced a lot of those people to let McCarthy have a shot. So naturally, when McCarthy said this,

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