{"id":8844,"date":"2025-05-05T10:02:22","date_gmt":"2025-05-05T10:02:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/ruben-gallego-travels-to-pennsylvania-amid-2028-shadow-primary\/"},"modified":"2025-05-05T10:02:22","modified_gmt":"2025-05-05T10:02:22","slug":"ruben-gallego-travels-to-pennsylvania-amid-2028-shadow-primary","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/ruben-gallego-travels-to-pennsylvania-amid-2028-shadow-primary\/","title":{"rendered":"Ruben Gallego travels to Pennsylvania amid 2028 shadow primary"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

Ruben Gallego is setting off to a key battleground state to speak with voters this week, a sign the Arizona senator may have higher ambitions as some Democrats float him as a potential 2028 presidential candidate.<\/p>\n

Gallego will headline a May 10 town hall in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, a pivotal bellwether that President Donald Trump flipped in 2024, according to plans shared first with Blue Light News.<\/p>\n

\u201cNo one understands the struggles of working-class Americans like Ruben Gallego,\u201d said Gallego\u2019s chief of staff, Raphael Chavez-Fernandez. \u201cHe\u2019s heading to Pennsylvania to speak directly to voters about what it means to fight for working-class families \u2014 because he\u2019s lived their fight.\u201d<\/p>\n

Gallego is visiting the district held by Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.), a perennial Democratic target, as part of an effort by the party to spotlight vulnerable Republicans over possible cuts to Medicaid<\/u><\/a> and to pressure them to vote against Trump\u2019s budget bill.<\/p>\n

Gallego is the latest in a string of potential Democratic presidential candidates to hit the road in what is transforming into an all-out shadow primary years ahead of 2028. Former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg is traveling to hold a town hall with a veterans group in Iowa this month<\/u><\/a>, following his success in the presidential caucuses there in 2020<\/u><\/a>. Maryland Gov. Wes Moore is headed to the early primary state of South Carolina<\/u><\/a> to appear at a top Democratic dinner. Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker recently visited New Hampshire<\/u><\/a>, another early primary state, to keynote a dinner.<\/p>\n

Gallego is a rising star in the Democratic Party who won a state in 2024 that Trump carried in part by overperforming among Latino voters compared to former Vice President Kamala Harris. He previously told Blue Light News<\/u><\/a> that one reason for his victory is that \u201cwe rejected what people had assumed the Democratic position had been, which is a very loose, loose enforcement of the border.\u201d<\/p>\n

Gallego\u2019s allies have also argued his success stems from his ability to talk about his humble beginnings at a time when Democrats are struggling to win over working-class voters. Gallego grew up poor with a single mother, eventually making it to Harvard, where he worked part-time as a janitor, and enlisted in the Marine Corps and served in the Iraq War.<\/p>\n

In a statement, Democratic National Committee Chair Ken Martin called Gallego \u201ca critical voice for the Democratic Party.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ruben Gallego is setting off to a key battleground state to speak with voters this week, a sign the Arizona senator may have higher ambitions as some Democrats float him as a potential 2028 presidential candidate. Gallego will headline a May 10 town hall in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, a pivotal bellwether that President Donald Trump […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8844","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics"],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8844","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8844"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8844\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8844"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8844"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8844"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}