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Dem Star’s Allies Fire 2028 Starting Gun Days After Rout

Ro Khanna has made no secret of his presidential ambitions.

Allies of Rep. Ro Khanna are urging the Democratic rising star to launch a presidential bid, just two days after the midterm elections.

Former Rep. Jamaal Bowman and progressive strategist Nomiki Konst have launched a new draft committee, “Run Ro,” which will solicit donations and other financial support for Khanna, a California Democrat on the party’s left wing.

The move comes just two days after sweeping Democratic electoral gains in Tuesday’s midterms, with progressive candidates scoring several high-profile wins, including Senate campaign victories for Abdul El-Sayed in Michigan and Troy Jackson in Maine.

“By launching now, we are trying to ensure that the presidential primary debate is framed from a progressive populist perspective,” Konst told NBC News.

Khanna has not yet confirmed he’s running, though he has already toured early nominating states and said in August he was “thinking seriously” about a bid. He told Politico Wednesday he’d make a decision “sometime over the holidays.”

In an NPR interview in August, he said he believed the 2028 election would be a “breaking point in America” that could lead to revolution or a new economic order.

Rep. Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez, the most prominent progressive in the House, has also been discussed as a possible 2028 presidential candidate. She told The New York Times in September that she would decide whether to run after the midterms.

Khanna’s allies’ move is an attempt to build on Sen. Bernie Sanders’ presidential bids in 2016 and 2020, with the party’s progressive wing boosted not just by the midterms, but by democratic socialist Zohran Mamdani’s win in last year’s New York mayoral race.

In the wake of the crushing Democratic defeat to Donald Trump in 2024, the party has been torn between those who want to take it in a more progressive direction and its centrist wing, which argues left-wing policies could alienate swing voters.

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Khanna co-chaired Sanders’ presidential campaigns and has called for the release of the Epstein files, higher taxes for billionaires, and raising the national minimum wage.

Other Democrats touted as potential 2028 candidates include Gavin Newsom, the governor of California; Jon Ossoff, who just won his race for the U.S. Senate in Georgia; and former Vice President and 2024 Democratic nominee Kamala Harris. All are centrist Democrats.

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