Senator Mark Kelly (Democrat-Arizona) has suddenly entered the conversation for 2028. Photo / Marvin Joseph, The Washington Post)
While no one has officially declared their candidacy just yet, the unofficial 2028 United States Democratic presidential field is taking shape - and it’s sprawling.
The possibilities include former presidential candidates, governors, senators, House members and even celebrities. And some of them are sending strong signals that they’re ready to run for president.
Here’s how the field is shaping up. This is our second ranking so far.
The standouts
Gavin Newsom: California’s Democratic Governor is often a foil when there’s a Republican in the White House. Newsom has embraced that role and used it as a launchpad to introduce himself to the rest of the country.
He has sued US President Donald Trump for sending the National Guard to Los Angeles and led a successful push to redraw California’s congressional map to counter Trump’s pro-GOP redistricting effort.
He gave Trump some of his own medicine on social media by mocking the US President, including going there about Trump’s age. Trump is 79, Newsom is 58. There isn’t much polling this early on, but Newsom - who has a new memoir out this month - is at, or near, the top in most polls asking Democratic primary voters who they’d like to have as their nominee.
He has said he hopes to reshape his brand, casting himself as more of an everyday man than a slick, liberal state governor.
“I’ve become a caricature of myself and contributed to it,” he told the Atlantic recently. “As it relates to this perception of privilege and wealth that has dogged me - and at times infuriated, not just frustrated, me”.
Josh Shapiro: The popular Pennsylvania Governor is in many ways Newsom’s opposite. He comes from a swing state, is lesser known nationally and sometimes criticises the most liberal wing of the party, especially on issues relating to Israel. Shapiro is Jewish and talks extensively about his faith.
Shapiro also talks a lot about working with the Republican legislature in Pennsylvania and has appeared side by side on television with Utah’s conservative, Republican governor - who recently said Shapiro would make a good president. Like any serious contender, Shapiro also has a memoir.
The middle of the pack
Kamala Harris: Harris is a top choice among Democratic primary voters, some early 2028 polling finds. She’s still on a book tour about her shot-out-of-a-cannon presidential campaign.
Interestingly, the former vice-president and presidential nominee has recently appeared to take on an outsider pitch. “Both parties have failed to hold the public’s trust,” she told Democratic officials recently.
Mark Kelly: The Arizona senator is fresh off a showdown with the Trump Administration over a video where he and other Democratic lawmakers remind service members they don’t have to obey illegal orders. Trump said the video was “punishable by death”, while Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth tried to censure Kelly, who is a retired Navy captain.
A judge rejected that effort, and ruled Hegseth had “trampled on Senator Kelly’s First Amendment freedoms”. Also, a grand jury in Washington DC declined to indict Kelly and the other lawmakers in the video with federal crimes.
Kelly, a former astronaut, recently told the BBC he will “seriously consider” running for president. “We’re in some seriously challenging times,” he said.
Pete Buttigieg: Former President Joe Biden’s transportation secretary is frequently cited by Democrats as one of the party’s best messengers.
He has been laying relatively low since the end of the Biden administration, but he was the top pick over even Newsom in a November poll of New Hampshire primary voters, who are traditionally some of the earliest Democrats to vote. Though that could change. At 44, he’s one of the youngest potential candidates.
JB Pritzker: The Illinois Governor, like Newsom in California, has positioned himself as someone willing to fight Trump. His battles with the Trump Administration over immigration actions and the President’s attempted National Guard deployment to Chicago raised his national profile.
Pritzker is a billionaire from the family who owns Hyatt Hotels, and his wealth could prove to be a boon, allowing him to self-fund a campaign.
One of his biggest applause lines at the party’s 2024 convention was that voters should “take it from an actual billionaire” that Trump was rich in only one thing: “stupidity”.
He has argued for increased taxes on the rich, but his wealth could be a liability at a time in which some in the party are casting billionaires as political foils.
Wes Moore: The first-term Maryland Governor is the only sitting black governor and has frequently clashed with Trump in recent weeks, including about a massive sewage spill in the Potomac River.
Moore signed a bill making it harder for Immigration and Customs Enforcement to detain people in his state. He is trying to eliminate the last remaining Republican congressional district in his state to push back on Republican gerrymandering, though Moore has been unable to convince fellow Maryland Democrats to do it.
Andy Beshear: Kentucky’s Governor talks often about how he has won in a state that voted for Trump three times. He’s subsequently pitching himself as someone who can turn rural America against Trump.
“We still have to grapple with the fact that the Democratic Party has lost ground in many parts of the country, especially in rural America,” he wrote after Democrats won big elections last November.
His national profile is relatively low, but he could get some more traction with a book coming out later this year about his Christian faith.
Rahm Emanuel: The former Chicago mayor has experienced a successful presidential campaign - he was President Barack Obama’s chief of staff. He’s been vocal lately about Democrats’ need to find moderate solutions to problems.
He has hit the road to share headline-grabbing policy ideas: a national social media ban for children, a mandatory retirement age for federal politicians and judges of 75 and bringing back accountability systems for teachers.
The dark horses
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez: The New York lawmaker is one of the best-known liberal leaders in her party, and her star power could instantly change the race if she decided to run.
Another option, should she decide to leave the House, is the US Senate. She recently went on a major international trip, attending a Munich security conference where she faced numerous questions on foreign affairs and appeared to stumble over a question about Taiwan.
Gretchen Whitmer: The Governor of another swing state - Michigan - is often talked about as a potential candidate but has suggested she is uninterested in running.
“I don’t know if I need to be the main character in the next chapter, but I want to have a hand in writing it,” she’s said recently of what will come after her second, and final term as governor, ends in 2027.
Ro Khanna: The California House member drew national attention for his role in advancing legislation that led to the release of the federal Government’s Epstein files. And he is trying to get his party to talk almost exclusively about how to improve life for the working class: “I call it ‘economic patriotism,’” he has said.
Any number of US senators: The Democratic field is so wide open that it’s hard to count out anyone at this point.
Senator Cory Booker, of New Jersey, ran for president during the 2020 cycle; questions about whether he might run again intensified after he broke the record for longest floor speech in the Senate in modern history last spring.
Like Kelly, Senator Elissa Slotkin, of Michigan, took part in the video on refusing illegal orders. She said she’s received 1000 threats for her role in the video, but that she refuses to back down from its message: “The intimidation is the point, and I’m not going to go along with that”.
Senator Chris Murphy, of Connecticut, has been a prominent Democratic voice on foreign policy for many years. He also regularly says Trump is trying to steal the Midterms.
Senator Chris Van Hollen, of Maryland, travelled to El Salvador to support illegally deported Kilmar Abrego García, who lives in Maryland.
Stephen A. Smith or another celebrity: The ESPN commentator is no fan of Trump, but he said he’s considering running for president, pitching himself as a centrist.
He recently told CBS he’s “giving strong consideration to being on that debate stage for 2027”, and that he plans to make a decision on running this year.
Democrats I’ve talked to say to leave room for surprise candidates.
“There may be someone running we’ve never thought of,” a senior national Democratic strategist said.
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