The race for the 2028 presidential nominations is already taking shape, with a fresh Reuters/Ipsos survey showing Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Vice President JD Vance as the strongest Republican contenders, while Democrats are rallying around Pete Buttigieg and Jon Ossoff.
According to the poll, conducted Nov. 6-9 among 477 registered Republican voters and 538 registered Democratic voters, 45% of Republican respondents said Rubio would make an excellent president, with another 23% calling him a good candidate. Only 5% rated him poorly. Vance closely followed, with 43% seeing him as excellent and 28% as good, cementing his status as a leading figure despite recent efforts to distance himself from unpopular administration positions. After the midterms, Vance was quick to blame the Iran war for GOP losses, a move seen as an attempt to shore up his appeal.
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis placed third, with a combined 60% saying he would be excellent or good, but support drops sharply after that. Donald Trump Jr. sits in fourth, though his numbers are deeply polarized—38% of Republicans view him as a poor candidate, exceeding the share who consider him excellent or good. The president's approval rating in the same poll held at a near-record low of 32%, which may be weighing on his son's prospects.
On the Democratic side, the field is wide open, with several contenders drawing moderate backing. Former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg and Georgia Senator Jon Ossoff each received 29% of respondents saying they would be an excellent candidate. Another 27% said Buttigieg would be good, while 20% said the same for Ossoff. Buttigieg, who ran in 2020 and narrowly won the Iowa caucus, remains a known quantity, but Ossoff's strong reelection in battleground Georgia—by nearly 20 points—has boosted his standing.
However, more than a third of Democratic voters said they had not heard of Ossoff or skipped rating him, and over 20% said the same of Buttigieg, indicating that name recognition remains a hurdle. Former Vice President Kamala Harris, who is widely known, drew polarized views: 23% said she would make an excellent candidate and 30% good, but a combined 45% rated her fair or poor—the highest negative share among Democrats surveyed.
The top six Democratic candidates are largely moderates, with the only progressive on the list being Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York. She received 15% saying she would be excellent and 33% good, suggesting a solid but not dominant base of support.
No major candidates have formally declared for 2028, but history suggests announcements could come soon after the midterms. In 2022, Donald Trump launched his comeback bid just one week after the elections. With the open-seat dynamics favoring Democrats, both parties are jockeying for position early. The Reuters/Ipsos poll has a margin of error of 5 percentage points.
As the political world turns toward 2028, the early numbers suggest a competitive GOP primary between Rubio and Vance, while Democrats appear to be coalescing around fresh faces like Buttigieg and Ossoff, though Harris's high unfavorable ratings could complicate her path. The Democrats' post-midterm momentum may be tested by legislative battles, but the presidential race is already capturing attention.
