Politics
Could 2028 be the ‘YouTube election’?
The 2028 presidential primaries are already unfolding on YouTube.
Amid the rapid decline of cable news, potential candidates and other elected officials are locked in a digital arms race to draw subscribers, boost their reach and build what amounts to their own broadcast networks.
Potential candidates like Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) and Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) are closing in on audiences that rival or surpass total cable primetime viewers for individual networks. Missouri Sen. Josh Hawley is racking up millions of views. Vivek Ramaswamy, the former 2024 GOP presidential candidate who is running for Ohio governor, dwarfs any other Republican but President Donald Trump on YouTube with more than 813,000 subscribers. Former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg’s channel started the year with just 28,000 subscribers, and now has 177,000, having generated nearly 10 million views and accumulated 500,000 hours of viewing time so far this year, according to a spokesperson. Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear saw a 448 percent increase in views from last year to this year, a spokesperson tells Blue Light News.
Taken together, it signals the arrival of a fast-changing attention economy that has scrambled what effective political communication looks like. The 2028 cycle has the potential to be the first post-cable TV election, heralding the dawn of a post-literate era in which technology fully displaces reading and consumption of news from traditional outlets.
“I think there are a lot of elected officials and their staff who are realizing that their viewers are not necessarily just on cable news, and if they want to reach more people, more diverse audiences, they really have to diversify where they’re talking,” said Emily Keller, a former Democratic National Committee social media director who now works with Democratic officials as a strategic partner manager for YouTube.
In this, Buttigieg’s thinking is instructive. In the past, his team turned to YouTube mainly to share clips from his media appearances. Their thinking is different now. “Looking ahead, we see the channel evolving into a destination of its own,” Chris Meagher, a Buttigieg spokesperson, told Blue Light News. Meagher went on to describe the platform as “a place for Pete to connect in a direct and unfiltered way with millions of Americans.” (One example: Buttigieg recently spoke to a rural health care provider about the impact of President Donald Trump’s budget cuts.)
The landscape has fundamentally changed since 2016, which some political observers memorably (and incorrectly) predicted would be the “Meerkat election.” That was a passing fad. But the switch to YouTube has staying power.
Just last week, YouTube hosted what it trumpeted as its “first-ever exclusive, global broadcast of an NFL game.” C-SPAN has landed there, too. Young men and disaffected voters are also flocking to the platform for their news.
“YouTube by far represents the broadest reach potential of any platform, especially among younger audiences and disengaged voters,” Meagher told Blue Light News.
YouTube says this is a boom time for politicians on the platform. “We’re seeing really significant growth in ways that I would not expect in an off year,” said Carly Eason, a former Republican National Committee official who works as Keller’s counterpart, focusing on YouTube’s outreach to GOP figures. “As they really invest in their channels, work on their channels, and follow a lot of YouTube best practices, they’re really reaping the rewards.”
YouTube views are surging among both Republicans and Democrats. “Verdict with Ted Cruz” has some 331,000 subscribers. His top video — an interview with Elon Musk— has garnered 1.2 million views. “This Is Gavin Newsom,” hosted by the California governor, has 187,000 subscribers. Beshear, the Kentucky governor, has a series of videos called “Andy Unplugged: The Lighter Side of Leadership,” in which he has taken on the drive-thru at Wonder Whip, shown off Churchill Downs and watched the 2024 solar eclipse.
Other political leaders have taken a different approach to YouTube’s rising influence, primarily focusing on outreach to existing creators on the platform. Rep. Ro Khanna’s (D-Calif.) recent push to improve child safety on Roblox, the online gaming platform, garnered more than 50 million views across 18 videos on other creators’ channels, said Marie Baldassarre, Khanna’s senior communications adviser.
That’s a deliberate choice.
“Our strategy with influencers, right-wing creators and non-political voices is reaching hundreds of thousands of first-time voters and letting them know that Democrats aren’t so bad after all,” Baldassarre told Blue Light News.
It’s not just potential 2028 candidates who are flocking to the platform.
More broadly, politicians are recognizing they need to build their own audiences. At 92, Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) — who, decades ago, was the first senator to adopt the fax machine — is kicking the tires on doing more podcasts, Eason said.
Few Democrats have done so well on YouTube as Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.). He began the year with 24,000 subscribers and now has nearly half a million. His straight-to-the-camera videos perform well.
“The nice thing about building up a following on YouTube is that it puts my content in front of people who aren’t necessarily looking for it,” Schiff told Blue Light News in an interview.
Not long ago, amid his YouTube experiment earlier this year, Schiff said a waiter at a restaurant complimented him on his “show.” He thought the person must’ve been referring to an appearance on BLN or another media hit. He thanked the man and then pressed further.
“He looked at me somewhat surprised, and he said, ‘Your show on YouTube,’” Schiff said. “And I thought to myself, ‘Wow, I’ve got a show.’ And now you know that we’re closing in on 500,000 subscribers, that really is like the following of a cable news show.”
Schiff said his party still has work to do in checking Republicans’ rise on alternative platforms.
“We as a party still have a lot more catching up to do in the digital realm, both in terms of the different platforms, but also with digital and social media influencers,” Schiff said.
“The best time for Democrats to care about YouTube was 2018,” Stefan Smith, a Democratic digital strategist, told Blue Light News. “The second-best time is now.”
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Nexstar Media Group will continue to preempt “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” on its ABC affiliates, the company said Tuesday, effectively pulling the late-night show from dozens of local stations as the comedian prepares to make his return to the airwaves.
The company noted it would “monitor” the show as it returns to ABC, but said its stations would “focus on continuing to produce local news and other programming relevant to their respective markets.” The move makes Nexstar the second broadcasting company to preempt the show, following suit after the Sinclair Broadcasting Group announced Monday it would not air the talk program on its nearly 40 ABC affiliates.
“We made a decision last week to preempt ‘Jimmy Kimmel Live!’ following what ABC referred to as Mr. Kimmel’s ‘ill-timed and insensitive’ comments at a critical time in our national discourse,” the company wrote in a statement Tuesday. “We stand by that decision pending assurance that all parties are committed to fostering an environment of respectful, constructive dialogue in the markets we serve.”
Nexstar, the country’s largest local broadcasting group, owns roughly 30 ABC affiliates across cities like Nashville, Tenn., New Orleans and Salt Lake City. Sinclair also owns dozens of affiliates, including the ABC station serving Washington and its suburbs.
ABC parent Disney announced Monday it would resume airing “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” after deciding to suspend the show last week to “avoid further inflaming a tense situation at an emotional moment for our country.”
The show’s suspension sparked a flood of criticism from lawmakers and party leaders across the aisle, citing concerns about censorship — particularly after Federal Communications Commission Chair Brendan Carr threatened to look into affiliates because of the comedian’s comments.
Nexstar is currently seeking a merger with Tegna, which requires FCC approval.
“We have spent the last days having thoughtful conversations with Jimmy, and after those conversations, we reached the decision to return the show on Tuesday,” Disney’s statement on Monday read.
House Democrats are going on the offense with tariffs and shutdown politics in swing districts, dropping TV ads against 10 vulnerable Republicans as Congress barrels toward an October government shutdown.
House Majority Forward, a nonprofit aligned with House Democratic leadership, is spending $3 million on broadcast TV and digital ads attacking Republicans on cost-of-living increases and cuts to Medicaid. Details of Tuesday’s ad buy were shared first with Blue Light News.
“They promised to lower prices, but you’re not imagining it — Republican tariffs are making everything more expensive,” one of the ad’s narrator says, over flashing images of grocery items. “Juan Ciscomani voted to let Trump make tariffs even worse and voted to make healthcare even more expensive. Now, Republicans in Congress are threatening to shut down the government, causing economic chaos.”
Ciscomani, a Republican member first elected in 2022, holds an Arizona House seat that Donald Trump also narrowly won last year.
The ads come as Congress faces a government shutdown stalemate, after the Senate rejected dueling short-term government funding proposals from both parties on Friday.
They also preview Democrats’ attack lines against Republicans ahead of the midterms. Public polling finds most Americans disapprove of Trump’s tariff policies. But Republicans maintain an edge over Democrats when voters are asked who they trust more on the economy, according to a Washington Post-Ipsos poll released over the weekend.
In addition to Ciscomani, the ads go after Reps. David Valadao of California, Gabe Evans of Colorado, Mariannette Miller-Meeks and Zach Nunn of Iowa, Tom Barrett of Michigan, Mike Lawler of New York, Rob Bresnahan and Scott Perry of Pennsylvania and Derrick Van Orden of Wisconsin.
The ad airing against Van Orden features a Wisconsin-based influencer, Kate Duffy. Styled after a social media post, it will air vertically on broadcast TV, a first for the group.
Disney announced “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” will resume airing on Tuesday, ending Kimmel’s short-lived suspension following comments the host made on his show about the killing of Charlie Kirk.
In a statement released Monday, Disney said it suspended Kimmel last week “to avoid inflaming a tense situation.” The company received intense pressure from Trump allies, including Federal Communications Commission Chair Brendan Carr, over Kimmel’s comments.
“Last Wednesday, we made the decision to suspend production on the show to avoid further inflaming a tense situation at an emotional moment for our country,” Disney said in the statement. “It is a decision we made because we felt some of the comments were ill-timed and thus insensitive.”
“We have spent the last days having thoughtful conversations with Jimmy, and after those conversations, we reached the decision to return the show on Tuesday,” the statement continued.
Kimmel’s suspension set off a wave of criticism from leaders in both parties who were concerned about political censorship.
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