Politics

How top Democrats are already gearing up for 2028 online

Published

11 months ago

August 2, 2025

Several Democrats are already laying the groundwork for potential 2028 presidential runs, new campaign finance filings show, recruiting donors and running online ads that build their national profiles.

Former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg led the way among Democrats talked about as presidential contenders with $1.6 million raised for his leadership PAC in the first half of the year, and a few Democratic governors raising hundreds of thousands of dollars each.

Together, they have already raised and spent millions of dollars this year, according to disclosures filed Thursday with the Federal Election Commission. The bulk of the money was spent on fundraising activities, including acquiring donor lists and running digital ads, that would facilitate a presidential run.

“If you’re thinking about running for president in 2028, job number one is being seen doing everything you can to help Democrats win in 2026, which raising money for your leadership PAC allows you to do — to travel, to test out messages, to make contributions to other candidates, to build your online following,” said Pete Giangreco, a longtime Democratic consultant who worked on Barack Obama’s presidential campaigns. “Investing in your leadership PAC money now is critical because you have to build your fundraising operation now.”

Former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg led among the Democrats talked about as presidential contender, with $1.6 million raised for his leadership PAC.

While official campaign launches are likely to come after the 2026 midterms, several rumored White House contenders have leadership PACs, which allow them to raise and spend money not tied to a particular election. The PACs linked to these potential candidates largely focused on growing their digital presences over the first half of the year, the filings show, with governors who have less of a national profile running ads online nationally and spending money to build fundraising infrastructure.

Buttigieg and Govs. Andy Beshear of Kentucky and Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan spent to acquire donor lists — a top expense for their leadership PACs. Beshear recently stumped in the early voting state of South Carolina; Whitmer appears less likely to mount a presidential bid.

List-building signals candidates’ ambitions for higher office, particularly with online fundraising a key pillar of successful Democratic campaigns over the past decade. By purchasing or renting Democratic donors’ contact information, candidates can more effectively target potential supporters, introduce themselves to a national audience and convert some of those donors into their own.

“You want to build up a strong email and text list for a few reasons — it’ll increase your name ID, you can raise money for other candidates, and then raise money for yourself,” said Mike Nellis, a Democratic digital consultant. “If you’re not spending money on growing the biggest possible audience for yourself right now, then you’re being foolish. Frankly, all of them could be spending more money on it.”

Leadership PACs also allow political figures in blue states to steer money to competitive races, including by directly donating to vulnerable candidates or state parties, or by fundraising on their behalf. California Gov. Gavin Newsom, for example, has long tapped his extensive email and text lists to raise money for other candidates. Such efforts help blue-state Democrats build relationships across the country and engender goodwill within the party.

The PACs also run ads aimed at recruiting online backers. Newsom’s leadership PAC, Campaign for Democracy, invested another $1.5 million in digital ads in late June, according to its filing. The PAC, which launched in 2023 with a major transfer from Newsom’s gubernatorial campaign, reported $4.4 million cash on hand at the end of June.

Digital advertising helps candidates expand their name recognition and recruit donors outside their home states.

“It’s the small donations from folks like you that have the greatest impact,” read one ad that Beshear’s PAC, In This Together, ran on Facebook in June. “Your support helps us do what matters most: elect decent, compassionate leaders in Kentucky and nationwide.”

Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear ran digital ads this year that focused on his home state but also reached a national audience.

Beshear’s group, which has $496,000 cash on hand, spent $30,000 on digital advertising through the end of June, according to its FEC report.

While Beshear’s PAC has run Facebook ads that predominantly target his home state of Kentucky , it has also reached an audience across the country, according to data from Meta’s digital ad library. Similarly, Facebook ads from Whitmer’s group, Fight Like Hell PAC, have predominantly targeted Michigan users — but with some national promotion, too. Hers has $2.6 million cash on hand.

Both their PAC filings reflected their home-state advantage. Among itemized donors, those giving at least $200, each got more funds from their home states than any other — despite neither Kentucky nor Michigan being hotbeds of Democratic giving.

Buttigieg’s Win the Era PAC, which was largely dormant while he served in former President Joe Biden’s cabinet, also began spending on Facebook ads in July, according to the platform. It was the first time Buttigieg had run ads on his personal page since the former South Bend mayor ended his presidential campaign in 2020.

“While my name won’t be on a ballot in 2026, I am committed to doing the work that must be done to rebuild trust in our system: supporting emerging leaders, showing up in communities we too often ignore, and helping win more elections,” read one recent ad from Buttigieg on the platform.

A person close to Buttigieg said the former secretary will continue traveling to support Democrats in 2026 and host more of his own town halls , as he did in Iowa this spring. Buttigieg, who is not in elected office, employs a small staff through his PAC, which has $2.4 million on hand.

Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s leadership PAC also ran digital ads that targeted her home state while also reaching a national audience.

Amanda Stitt, who led Whitmer’s 2022 campaign, said in a statement that the governor “is hard at work serving her constituents, helping to lower their costs, grow jobs, and protect their freedoms. She’s proud to support candidates throughout the country with the same goals, especially in the toughest districts like the ones she won in Michigan.”

Representatives for Beshear and Newsom declined to comment.

Leadership PACs have also covered travel and other expenses to help candidates set up 2028 bids. Beshear’s group, for example, spent $18,000 on polling in March and April.

Not all potential 2028 candidates are raising money federally right now — Govs. Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania and Wes Moore of Maryland, both of whom are seeking reelection next year, do not have federal leadership PACs. And billionaire Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker is funding an advocacy group set up as a 501(c)(4) nonprofit that does not face stringent campaign finance reporting requirements.

Politics

A drag queen, a rainbow festival and a game FIFA can’t control

Published

40 minutes ago

June 26, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

SEATTLE — FIFA has not endorsed the Seattle host-city committee’s “Pride Match” designation, which will not be part of the official branding when Iran and Egypt meet tonight at Lumen Field.

“I think they’ve always been aware of what we’re doing,” said Louise Chernin, who as chair of the organizing committee’s Pride Match Impact Council began planning for the day nearly a year and a half ago.

Chernin began her match day at Rough & Tumble, a women’s sports bar in Ballard, a historically Scandinavian neighborhood where a crowd had gathered to cheer on Norway against France. The bar was notably free of FIFA’s commercial imprint: The World Cup posters on the walls and the merchandise for sale were all drawn by local artists without any official logos.

It all reflected the extent to which the “Pride Match” has become a gentle challenge not only to FIFA’s record of clamping down on some expressions of LGBTQ+ rights but also the corporate monoculture it creates in host cities through its restrictive sponsorship rules.

“If there’s going to be revenue spent, let us bring it to LGBTQ-owned businesses,” said Chernin, a longtime head of the Greater Seattle Business Association, an LGBTQ+ chamber of commerce.

Just down the street, fans had gathered at a “regnbue” street festival — the word is Danish and Norwegian for “rainbow” — organized by a local Ballard business association. The Norway-France match was being shown on an oversized screen, but when halftime hit attendees did not listen to any of the ads on the Fox broadcast.

Instead DJ SummerSoft took the stage as Sativa the Queen, a local drag performer, vamped through the break.

Politics

The world’s not big on the US. The World Cup might help.

Published

55 minutes ago

June 26, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

America’s stint hosting the World Cup is drawing mostly positive reviews to date — and it couldn’t come at a better time.

According to a new report from the Pew Research Center, views of America across the world are worsening and confidence in President Donald Trump’s leadership is dropping.

Pew surveyed 42,000 people across 36 countries between February and May, and found that America has a largely negative impression on the global theater. Only 23 percent of surveyed adults expressed confidence in Trump’s leadership — eliciting less confidence than Chinese leader Xi Jinping (34 percent) and Russian President Vladimir Putin (31 percent).

Foreign policy is the biggest pain point for Trump’s international critics, who take issue with his handling of tariffs, Gaza, Iran, Greenland and the Russia-Ukraine war, according to Pew’s findings.

Meanwhile, fewer countries — and longtime allies — believe the U.S. is a reliable partner. In Canada, where 83 percent of respondents described the U.S. as reliable in 2022, that number is now down to 35 percent.

In 2023, 60 percent of Germans said the U.S. considers international interests in its foreign policy decisions. That share has now dwindled to 23 percent — Germany’s public opinion of the U.S. is “now similar to or more negative than what was measured during George W. Bush’s presidency, when many people in Europe and elsewhere strongly opposed the war in Iraq and other major elements of U.S. foreign policy,” writes Pew.

There are only seven nations where a majority rate the U.S. well — Israel leads the pack, with 81 percent of respondents viewing America favorably. Some of the country’s lowest ratings come from predominantly Muslim publics, “such as Malaysians, Pakistanis, Turks, and Palestinians in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.”

Over the past decade, Pew’s polling has found growing concerns about the health of American democracy. A 2013 Pew survey, just as Barack Obama entered his second term, an all-time high of 75 percent of respondents in Australia, Brazil, Canada, France, Germany, Israel, Italy, Japan, Poland, the Philippines, South Korea and the U.K. said the U.S. respects its citizens’ personal freedoms.

Since then, declining shares of world respondents believe the U.S. respects its citizens’ personal liberties — and this year, 56 percent of respondents said the U.S. does not.

Politics

Envoy’s pharaoh well party

Published

55 minutes ago

June 26, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Egyptian Ambassador Motaz Zahran and wife are hosting an informal farewell party tonight for close friends and family at his Washington, D.C. residence tonight, according to an attendee, hours before Egypt faces off against Iran in a closely watched game in Seattle. Ambassador Mohamed Hamdy Mohamed Mokhtar El-Molla will replace Zahran as the new Egyptian envoy to the U.S.