Dallas Mavericks owner and Shark Tank co-host Mark Cuban has sparked online discussions that he may be gearing up for a possible presidential run, which, if true, would be a reversal of his statements earlier this year.
On Monday evening, news broke that Mark Cuban, known for his appearances on Shark Tank spanning 13 seasons, would be stepping down and not returning for the show’s 16th season. The immediate following Tuesday, Cuban, who also serves as the governor of the National Basketball Association’s Dallas Mavericks, announced that he is selling a majority stake to billionaire and Republican Party mega-donor Miriam Adelson.
Given this significant shift in Mark Cuban’s public and professional life, coupled with the estimated $3.5 billion he would receive from his sale to Adelson, the internet quickly became abuzz with speculations that Cuban might be reconsidering a presidential run, including from news outlets like The Bulwark.
“Maybe he’s thinking of getting in 2024,” said Tim Miller, writer for conservative media platform The Bulwark, in a video on the topic, “and if he did that, that would be an earthquake in the race. It would, by far, be the biggest name that would be considered in this sort of third party, centrist, No Labels lane.”
While Cuban has yet to issue a statement on the matter, what makes his recent actions particularly noteworthy is his associations with third parties and third-party supportive organizations, as well as his willingness to consider an independent presidential campaign in the 2020 election cycle.
Earlier this year, Mark Cuban denied rumors of his interest in running for the presidency as a member of a third party, specifically No Labels. In an email correspondence with NBC News, Cuban stated that “[his] family would disown [him]” if he did.
At that time, Cuban also confirmed that he had been in touch with No Labels, an organization seeking to nominate a bipartisan fusion ticket in 2024 if Donald Trump and Joe Biden became their respective party’s nominees. “I like that they are trying a new path. I think the 2 party system is broken,” he wrote to NBC about the organization, adding that he viewed their work as “important.”
In the same interview, Cuban also expressed his support for the Center for Competitive Democracy, a legal organization that assists in ballot access for third parties and independent candidates.
Even before this, Cuban had flirted with the idea of an independent presidential campaign. During an Axios virtual event in 2020, when asked about the possibility of running for president as an independent, Cuban mentioned that the COVID-19 pandemic had brought about “a reset,” and while he hadn’t considered it just a month prior, “things are crazy, things are changing.”
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