The 2028 Democratic primary is already underway, and almost nobody is covering it. That's not an accusation — it's what Axios reporter Holly Otterbein told me on The Friday Reporter, and she should know. She writes the Axios 2028 newsletter, the closest thing Washington has to a weekly scouting report on the pre-primary field, and she's watching candidates test messages, travel to early states and quietly maneuver a full three years out. We talked about the fault lines splitting Democrats right now, why Kamala Harris might be more formidable than conventional wisdom admits, how Gavin Newsom turned himself into a one-man attention economy, and why the AI data center fight is already scrambling 2028 politics. Here's what stood out.
Key Takeaways
Holly Otterbein believes the 2028 Democratic pre-primary is undercovered, even though candidates are already testing messages and traveling to early states.
Democrats are split along more fault lines than progressive versus moderate: age, gender and Israel-Palestine are all live divides, visible right now in Maine's Senate primary.
Kamala Harris leads Black Democratic primary voters in early 2028 polling, a strength Otterbein says national Democrats keep underestimating.
Gavin Newsom's mastery of the "attention economy," from his social media style to his California redistricting fight, has made him a genuine frontrunner.
Republicans are experimenting more aggressively with AI in campaigns than Democrats, who are cleared internally to use only Google's Gemini.
Several 2028-adjacent governors, including Josh Shapiro, Andy Beshear, Wes Moore and J.B. Pritzker, have pulled back from courting AI data centers as public backlash grows.
What's Not Being Reported About the 2028 Democratic Field?
I asked Otterbein what part of the Democratic story isn't getting enough attention right now, and she didn't hesitate. "I feel like the 2028 presidential race, which is my beat, is not being reported on enough throughout the rest of the media," she told me. The pre-primary, she said, has started earlier than any cycle she's covered. Candidates are already making trips to New Hampshire, Iowa and South Carolina, well before most voters are paying attention.
Part of that is simple bandwidth. Trump dominates the news cycle, and Democratic coverage gets "a little bit of short shrift" as a result, Otterbein said. She expects that to shift as the midterms wind down. But she also sees an upside in the quiet: less scrutiny early means more room for candidates to experiment. Rahm Emanuel is ruling out policy positions "every other day." Others are testing lines on podcasts, watching what sticks before the field narrows and the stakes rise.
What Are the Real Fault Lines Splitting Democrats Right Now?
The party's divisions go well past the familiar progressive-versus-moderate split, Otterbein said, and Maine's Senate primary is the clearest proof of it. Graham Platner, the progressive oyster farmer endorsed by Bernie Sanders, was running against Gov. Janet Mills. It's a fight over ideology. It's also a fight over age, over gender, and over how the party handles a candidate accused of posting offensive comments about rape — an issue Mills made central to her campaign. Mills later ended her bid, and Platner won the primary.
Israel is its own fault line, and maybe the sharpest one in the party right now. "That is coming up again in these congressional primaries and in the presidential pre-primary," Otterbein said, and she doesn't expect it resolved before Democrats have a 2028 nominee. Add a party still relitigating why it lost in 2024, and you get a coalition that feels more fractured than it has in years. Not because any single race defines it. Because there's no longer one storyline that explains all of it.
Is Kamala Harris Actually the Underestimated 2028 Candidate?
Otterbein's answer here surprised me, and I think she knew it would. "A lot of DC Democrats kind of want to bury their heads in the sand and pretend that she's not keeping the door open to a White House run in 2028," she said. "But she clearly is." Harris is traveling to the South, visiting state party organizations, continuing her book tour and doing national media — the groundwork of someone actively running, not someone weighing it from a distance.
The number that makes Otterbein's case is a specific one: Harris leads by a wide margin among Black Democratic primary voters in early 2028 polling, a bloc that has decided nearly every recent Democratic presidential primary. Everyone talks about Gavin Newsom as the frontrunner, and he is one. But Otterbein thinks party operatives would rather not talk about the other candidate also leading the polls, and that silence is doing Harris a favor.
How Is Gavin Newsom Mastering the Attention Economy?
Newsom, Otterbein said, may be the only potential 2028 candidate who fully understands how attention actually moves through today's media environment. His social media voice mimics Trump's style — roll your eyes at it if you want, but it gets noticed. His California redistricting fight did something bigger. It landed at a moment when Democratic voters felt powerless and wanted to see someone fight back, and it "shot his pre-primary presidential campaign into space," as Otterbein put it.
That success has opened a real debate inside the party, one Otterbein hears directly from Democratic operatives: when 2028 primary voters weigh electability, do they reward someone who commands the attention economy the way Newsom does, or someone with a more traditional swing-state résumé — a Josh Shapiro, a Raphael Warnock, an Andy Beshear? Otterbein doesn't think that question has an obvious answer yet. Neither do I.
Is AI Already Reshaping How Campaigns Reach Voters?
This is the story Otterbein most wants to keep digging into. She and Axios colleague Alex Isenstadt found that Republicans are experimenting aggressively with AI in campaigns, willing to cross lines Democrats have been reluctant to touch. The DNC has cleared staff to use Google's Gemini. ChatGPT and Claude are off-limits. Ask Democratic strategists directly, Otterbein said, and they'll tell you plainly that the party feels behind.
The part that stuck with me is where this goes next: campaigns are starting to think about how they show up when a voter simply asks a chatbot who to vote for. Otterbein called it "kind of like the old school search engine optimization, but for LLMs." It's a discipline that barely existed two years ago, and it's already shaping how the next generation of campaigns will spend its money and staff its digital shops.
Why Are 2028 Democrats Rethinking Data Centers?
A few months back, I sat down with Axios's Madison Mills and made the case that AI data centers are becoming the new fracking — a political flashpoint states court aggressively until the costs show up on constituents' power bills. Otterbein has been watching the same shift play out from the campaign side. Democratic governors who once competed to land data centers with lavish tax credits, she said, have pulled back this year as public backlash intensified.
Josh Shapiro, Wes Moore and J.B. Pritzker haven't turned against data centers outright, Otterbein said, but all three are talking about them in a far more measured way now — acknowledging the tradeoffs, slowing the approval process, questioning whether the tax credits were worth what they cost. Watching that shift move across governors as different ideologically as Pritzker and Shapiro, Otterbein said, is "super interesting." It isn't close to finished.
Find Holly Otterbein
Holly Otterbein covers the 2028 Democratic presidential race for Axios, where she writes the Axios 2028 newsletter — search "Axios 2028" to find it, and it lands in inboxes every Sunday afternoon. Follow her reporting on X at @HollyOtterbein.
The Friday Reporter is hosted by Lisa Camooso Miller. Listen wherever you get your podcasts — and subscribe so you never miss a conversation.