Potential Democratic presidential candidates already are using the party's election victories to position themselves for the 2028 primary — throwing elbows at possible primary opponents and basking in Tuesday's results.
Why it matters: No one admits it, but the next presidential primary is already in motion for Democrats.
Driving the news: Several potential 2028 candidates used Tuesday night's wins to not-so-subtly cast themselves as being on the right side of the party's debate between progressives and moderates.
- California Gov. Gavin Newsom celebrated state voters' passage of a redistricting plan to create perhaps five more Democratic seats in the U.S. House by calling on other Democrat-led states to follow his lead.
- He singled out Maryland, Illinois, and Colorado — states led by governors who are possible rivals for the 2028 presidential nomination: Wes Moore, JB Pritzker and Jared Polis, respectively.
- "Meet this moment head on," he urged them.
At the victory party for New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani, progressive Rep. Alexandria Ocasio Cortez told MSNBC that Mamdani had to fight both Republicans and the "old guard of the Democratic Party that essentially led us to many of the perils of this moment."
- Ocasio-Cortez — whose team is positioning her to run for president or U.S. Senate in 2028 — said establishment Democrats either need to get on board or they would be "left behind."
- She also warned that for Democrats who pay lip service to party unity, the election of Mamdani — a 34-year-old democratic socialist — "puts those folks on notice."
- Those comments were viewed as a shot at Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), who didn't endorse a candidate in the New York mayor's race, and other potential 2028 contenders who distanced themselves from Mamdani before the election.
Zoom in: Several possible 2028 candidates made sure to remind Democrats that they had worked as surrogates for moderates Abigail Spanberger of Virginia and Mikie Sherrill of New Jersey, who won their races for governor by larger margins than expected.
- Some moderate and establishment Democrats poised to run for president notably didn't congratulate Mamdani, another sign of the moderate vs. progressive lanes that have formed within the Democratic Party.
- Former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, who had kept his distance from Mamdani while campaigning for other candidates, congratulated Spanberger and Sherrill but not the mayor-elect in a post on X.
- Progressive Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) jabbed at his potential future opponent by posting in return: "And New Yorkers chose well by electing @ZohranKMamdani. We are a big tent party, and that includes progressives!"
Moore and Gov. Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania did the same as Buttigieg, posting pictures of themselves alongside Spanberger and Sherrill.
- Shapiro also released a memo highlighting the campaign muscle he had put behind the state Supreme Court race in Pennsylvania, where three Democrats retained their seats after a GOP effort to unseat them.
- Shapiro's team argued that Pennsylvania is "key" to "defining how commonsense Democrats can win by wide margins in 2026 and 2028."
