The 2028 Democratic Presidential Power Rankings: Return of Woke Edition, Part II

Going over the top five 2028 Democratic contenders in light of the ever-increasing struggles of the Trump administration.

On November 4th, 2025, everything we thought we knew about the politics of the second Trump administration changed. Prior to the elections held on that day, it seemed as if Democratic messaging and leadership failures had doomed the upcoming midterms to be a race to the bottom, where neither side would hold a truly meaningful advantage. Now, after Democrats last month massively outran the polling averages en route to tearing off huge chunks of the 2024 Trump coalition, everything is different. According to both those results and the most recent polling averages, 2026 appears set to be something closer to a bona fide blue wave, where Democrats will have the opportunity to compete beyond the blue and purple states where their horizons have been limited for so many years.

How will this new state of affairs change the outlook of the 2028 presidential primary for what appears to be America’s new majority party? Last week, I went over the bottom half of the race’s leading candidates, reviewing the prospects of both the former frontrunners who have seen their appeals become limited by the party’s newly expanded horizons and the currently-obscure red staters in a position to ride a wave to national stardom. Now, I will go over the top of the list: both those set to soar because of the new opportunities available and those in such a strong position that they have managed to maintain their strength even in a completely new political environment.

#5: Gov. Josh Shapiro (🔻2)

Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro has been a favorite on these lists since their conception. Ranked nothing less than #1 overall all the way back in March, he has been in the top three in every iteration of my power rankings since they began, a distinction shared by no other presidential hopeful I have ever listed. This is not because of his current polling numbers, which are remarkably low. It’s not because of any innate political skills, at least while he still sticks with that cheap Obama impression. And it goes without saying that it has nothing to do with his policies or overall political approach, which present absolutely nothing new to a liberal base that is angrier towards its leaders than it has been in decades. The sole reason he has looked formidable in any capacity is because he is beloved by liberal elites, who universally believe that his moderate record and electoral success in Pennsylvania make him no-brainer presidential material.

Even now, this still means something. If the reporting on elite Signal group chats is any indication, America’s leading centrists have a remarkable ability to coalesce around a single message. As things stand, there is very little reason to doubt that this will eventually lead them into a united front for a Shapiro candidacy after the 2026 midterms. Once they do so, they will have a lot of ammunition. Electorally speaking, the overwhelmingly popular governor is in as solid a position as ever heading into his re-election campaign; recent polls have found him still leading by massive margins even when put up against the GOP’s star recruit for the race. Simply put, no other Democrat running in a major election in the country is set to put up as dazzling of a performance as he is.

His problems—and the reasons why he has fallen out of the top three for the first time—are twofold. The first is that, by definition, an expanded map in 2026 will move attention away from the core purple states that just so recently appeared set to dominate coverage of the midterms. The second is that elite liberals have already dipped their toes into pushing Shapiro, and it isn’t going as well as planned.

Here, the place to look is a New York Times opinion piece published just after this November’s elections: “Mamdani Isn’t the Future of the Democrats. This Guy Is.” Written by Binyamin Appelbaum and referring to Governor Shapiro, this piece stood as the fourth installment in an ongoing series by the Times about the future of the party. Prior to Appelbaum’s article, the entries in this future-focused series had been met quite positively by Times readers. But when Appelbaum stood up to make the bread-and-butter pro-Shapiro argument that contrasted his approach and electoral successes with that of the progressive left, the top-ranked comments were as follows:

• “You seem to think Mr. Mamdani’s message will not appeal to voters outside places like New York. I disagree strongly. Nobody outside of Pennsylvania is going to care that Josh Shapiro can get a bridge built in ten minutes. Everybody in this country cares about affordability, and that was Mr. Mamdani’s primary message. It may be extraordinarily expensive to live in New York, but, when you have a job that pays minimum wage it’s expensive to live just about everywhere. Mamdani is just a younger Bernie, and maybe it’s time the punditocracy figures out that it’s a good message and stops saying ‘it won’t work for most of the U.S.’ Yes, it will.” — SA, Massachusetts

• “‘There is no evidence anywhere that progressivism has a real impact on the efficacy of government.’
  Eight hour work days, women’s suffrage, overtime wages, minimum wages, FHA, VA, GI Bill, social security, OSHA, Medicare, Medicaid, unemployment insurance, Labor Review Board, consumer protection, green energy, prison reforms, regulations on Wall Street, the ACA, pre existing conditions rule for insurance companies, etc, etc, etc.” — Jim Taggart, Louisiana

• “What separates a Gov. Shapiro from a Mayor Mamdani? Is it just stylistics? Would Gov. Shapiro fight for affordable housing, universal Pre-K, a move toward single-payer healthcare? Those are not radical positions. They are in sync with most of what “Western” society values. Our government has drifted so far toward individual “freedom” and greed that it will take a major prod to put us back in line with our allies (such as Canada) on these issues.” — Kate, Massachusetts

I’m not cherrypicking here. Go to the article yourself. If you sort by “Reader Picks,” you have to scroll for some time before you find a reply that actually agrees with Appelbaum’s thesis. Given that the success case for Shapiro—who has been thoroughly unable to garner any attention for himself so far—has always hinged on people like Appelbaum being able to sell him to their readers, this reaction isn’t encouraging at all for his future campaign. The piece itself was a succinct-enough summarization of the governor’s career and electoral successes that truly did try its hardest to make the Pennsylvanian’s brand of centrism something to believe in. Times readers just didn’t buy it, which says quite a lot given that the newspaper’s comment section was one of the few online spaces that was at least somewhat open to Joe Biden back in 2019.

#4: Senator Jon Ossoff (🔻3)