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Although the 2028 presidential election is still two years away, Americans are already making choices about who they want to be the 48th president.
The latest Focal Data for Financial Times survey found that Vice President JD Vance led eight Republican candidates in a hypothetical primary matchup, receiving 40 percent support.
President Donald Trump’s son, Donald Trump Jr., placed second with 15 percent, subsequently followed by Secretary of State Marco Rubio at 14 percent.
Other Republican candidates who received support include Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (eight percent), Robert F. Kennedy Jr. (a registered Independent, five percent), Texas Sen. Ted Cruz (three percent), 2026 Ohio gubernatorial candidate and businessman Vivek Ramaswamy (two percent) and Kentucky Rep. Thomas Massie (one percent).
Meanwhile, surveyed Democrats said former Vice President Kamala Harris would be their primary preference, with 39 percent supporting her.
Harris was followed by California’s Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom, who received 16 percent.
Additional hypothetical candidates who earned Democrats’ backing entail New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (nine percent), former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, Arizona Sen. Mark Kelly (six percent), Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro (five percent), Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker (three percent), Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear (two percent), talk-show host Jon Stewart (one percent) and Georgia Sen. Jon Ossoff (one percent).
A Vance primary win and, potentially, a general election victory will likely be contingent on voters’ approval of the Trump administration. The same can be speculated about the other speculative administration-member candidates, as 2028 will conceivably be a referendum on President Trump’s second term.
This was already the case with Kamala Harris, whose defeat in 2024 against President Trump was, in part, a rejection of Joe Biden’s presidency.
The 2028 election is still far away and could unfold very differently over the next two years.
Regardless, if Harris and Vance were to run against each other, the race would be historic. Only twice in U.S. history have two people who served as vice president faced off in an election, with John Adams and Thomas Jefferson in 1800, and Richard Nixon against Hubert Humphrey in 1960.
