Jason Chaffetz Is Maybe Considering Running for President in 2028

Earlier today, House Oversight Committee Chairman and Benghazi enthusiast Jason Chaffetz announced that he would not seek reelection to public office in 2018. While this is surely a blow to fans of incompetent investigations and ineffectual letter writing, the Chaffetz-heads out there need not worry quite yet. Because judging by the web domains his campaign committee registered about a week and a half ago, Jason Chaffetz just might have his eye on the White House… a little more than a decade from now.

According to the WHOIS domain name directory, Friends of Jason Chaffetz secured both Jason2028.com…

… and JasonChaffetz2028.com on April 6, 2017.

At the time of publication, both URLs redirect generic GoDaddy landing pages.

In a Facebook statement announcing his decision not to run in 2018, Chaffetz did say that he “may run again for public office, but not in 2018.” While Chaffetz made sure to let his constituents know that he is both “healthy” and confident that he would “continue to be reelected by large margins,” Chaffetz did not make any mention of the fact that he had publicly declared interest in a 2020 bid for governor of Utah just last year.

Assuming Chaffetz still has gubernatorial ambitions, then, in a best-Chaffetz scenario, our beautiful Benghazi boy hopes to enjoy a solid eight years as governor of Utah before finally making good on what appear to be presidential aspirations. Though planning this far ahead presents some political challenges. If he assumes that Trump wins reelection in 2020 (which, as a Republican, he ought to, right?) then Chaffetz seems to be planning to run against an unknown future president seeking a second term. If he is banking on Trump losing, then perhaps he assumes that there will be two terms of his Democratic successor, leaving the nation hungry for conservative leadership once more. Regardless, Chaffetz likely (correctly) assumes that America will be in ruins by 2028, giving him the perfect opportunity to swoop in, save the country, and finally get the recognition he so very much deserves.

We’ve reached out to both Rep. Chaffetz and Friends of Jason Chaffetz for comment, and will update if and when we hear back. In the meantime, here’s to a Chaffetz-Nunes ticket 11 years from now. It will be a miracle if any of us make it that far.

Update 5:41 p.m.:

Daryl Acumen, Friends of Jason Chaffetz’s chief data strategist, has responded with the following:

You probably won’t want to post this because the truth is pretty boring but no, my buying the Jason2028.com domain does not indicate that Jason is running for President. I didn’t even know 2028 was an election year till I read your article.

I try to keep a stable of domains 10 years out just as a digital best practice. I’m anal about domain real estate because I used to work for Network Solutions / Verisign back before the dot-com crash. I picked up 2028 (late) as a matter of simple housekeeping BEFORE Jason called to tell me we were shutting the campaign down and not mounting a race in 2018.