Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan could take his time deciding whether to challenge President Donald Trump in a Republican primary next year.
Hogan may not make up his mind on running for president until the fall, The Washington Post reported Monday. He wants to see whether GOP voters push for an alternative and what special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation reveals about the president.
The former FBI director is wrapping up his probe into Moscow's efforts to influence the 2016 election and whether the Trump campaign coordinated with the Kremlin. Mueller is also looking into whether Trump obstructed justice.
In an interview with the Post, Hogan stressed that he does not want to give "the impression that [he's] sitting here like this vulture waiting for some bad news."
A Hogan spokeswoman did not immediately respond to CNBC's request to comment.
A sitting president rarely faces a primary challenger. But Trump, who is relatively unpopular among voters, has sparked concerns within the GOP about his policies and his temperament.
Already, former Massachusetts Gov. Bill Weld has declared his candidacy. Both Hogan and former Ohio Gov. John Kasich have set themselves up as potential challengers.
The question is whether Republicans want an alternative to Trump. Only 37 percent of GOP primary voters said they want to see another Republican challenge Trump, versus 59 percent who do not want another candidate in the primary, according to a late February NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll.
Hogan, 62, won a second term leading the blue state in November by about a 12-point margin. He carried Maryland even as Democratic Sen. Ben Cardin won re-election by more than 30 percentage points.
In the Post interview, Hogan billed himself as a traditional Republican with a more centrist bent. In an interview with CNBC last month, he said he disagreed with the national emergency Trump declared to divert federal money toward building a border wall.
"I thought the entire thing was mishandled from the beginning, but the most recent iteration of this declaration of emergency is a mistake. It's not what the Constitution had in mind," he said.