There’s an inverse relationship between Donald Trump’s approval rating and activity leading up to the 2028 presidential race. The lower his approval rating goes, the more intense the Democratic race for the White House becomes. Right now, Trump’s approval sleeps with the fish, deep underwater. So, my party’s presidential wannabees are hard at work raising big bucks and courting party insiders across the length and breadth of our great republic during the “invisible primary.”
The main beneficiary of the early in activity in presidential politics has been California Gov. Gavin Newsom. The Trump administration illustrated its indifference to the coming climate catastrophe by boycotting the United Nations Climate Summit COP 30 in Brazil. Newsom saw the opening and ran with it by going there himself.
His early efforts including the passage of the Proposition 50 redistricting ballot question in his home state and an aggressive national midsummer social media branding effort put him in the Democratic driver’s seat. A way-too-early November 2025 Emerson University national poll of Democrats indicates that he enjoys an early lead over possible Democratic opponents.
His support has tripled in the last year. He now has a quarter of the vote and leads his closet rivals, former Vice President Kamala Harris (10 percent) and former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg (9 percent).
The California governor has been the most active candidate so far and it shows up in his advantage over Harris, Buttigieg and Govs. Andy Beshear (D) of Kentucky, Josh Shapiro (D) of Pennsylvania and JB Pritzker (D) of Illinois. They lag, but they know it’s still early in the process. But it gets late early now, as Trump slowly sinks into the sunset. They must watch Newsom and wonder if it isn’t time for them to get a bigger piece of the red-hot media limelight.
The blowback against congressional Democrats who gave up on the fight on the shutdown created much energy for youthful dissident Democrats. They are willing to take on the Democratic Party establishment for failing to keep the lid on health care insurance premiums under the Affordable Care Act. Their champion following in the big footsteps of progressive hero Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) is another possible presidential contender, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.).
But AOC has a momentous decision to make. Wins earlier this month by young progressive big city mayoral candidates — Zohran Mamdani in New York City and Katie Wilson in Seattle — might encourage AOC at age 36 to make a presidential race. To the consternation of many Democrats, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) failed to keep his caucus in line during the shutdown, and that could tempt her to run against him instead in the 2028 Senate primary.
There are female Democratic presidential candidates looking at a presidential race besides Harris and AOC. In fact, 2028 could be the year that the U.S. breaks the glass ceiling. The sizzling headlines about the Jeffrey Epstein files have focused the spotlight on criminal male sexual activity and most Americans are horrified.
The victories of two Democratic women in gubernatorial races earlier this month — Abigail Spanberger in Virginia and Mikie Sherrill in New Jersey — should encourage women who have presidential aspirations. Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D) will be a prime contender if she runs.
Then there are the Republicans. Vice President JD Vance told the press that he would discuss his presidential ambitions with Trump after the midterm elections. First, he must break the news to Trump that he is constitutionally ineligible to run for a third term. I would love to be a fly on the gold-gilded walls of the Trump White House for that conversation. Then the veep has to secure an endorsement which may still be valuable with MAGA diehards.
The radioactive fallout from the Epstein files, the sad state of the economy and the growing splits within MAGA make a Trump blessing of Vance problematic in the extreme in the fall of 2028.
We’re still two years away from retail campaigning, televised debates and glitzy political ads for president. But time flies, and so do the candidates, as they rapidly accumulate frequent flier miles in their travels. The hopefuls are meeting and greeting high end financial donors in Los Angeles, New York City and Dallas. They are schmoozing party activists in exotic political locals like Dubuque, Iowa; Reno, Nev.; Columbia, S.C.; and Derry, N.H. The moose is loose. Don’t get caught in the stampede.
Brad Bannon is a national Democratic strategist and CEO of Bannon Communications. He writes weekly for The Hill and hosts the popular progressive podcast on power, politics and policy, Deadline D.C. with Brad Bannon. Brad is a political analyst for News Radio KNX in Los Angeles and the Times of Delhi News Network.
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