Will the Democrats Finally Have a Primary in 2028?

Democrats haven’t had a real primary since 2008, and I’m not bullish on the chances for a real contest in 2028, either.

By contrast, Donald Trump took the Republican Party by storm in 2016 and 2024, and he has reinvigorated the party and reshaped American politics, becoming the most influential political figure since … the last guy to win a contested primary—Barack Obama.

Having a truly competitive primary can do wonders for a political party.

Obama

Obama surprised Democrats in 2008, especially since so many of them thought it was Hillary Clinton’s turn to run for the White House. It may be hard for us to remember now, but Obama was the upstart with the funny name, challenging the Chappaqua heir apparent. His movement felt fresh and new. He won over the party, and Clinton stepped aside—with the clear expectation that she would be next in line.

He drove that party off a cliff with Obamacare, pushed the noxious narrative that police are systemically racist against black people, and moved full-steam ahead from “I support traditional marriage” to “marriage equality” to rewriting the Civil Rights Act to let boys into girls’ bathrooms.

Obama had a real knack for saying something insane in the most compelling way possible. He wrapped himself in the flag while laying the groundwork for demonizing our country and its history. He spoke about the better angels of our republic while unleashing the demons of Antifa.

The Great Awokening may have reached its fever pitch after the death of George Floyd during the Trump years, but Obama planted the seeds for it—and Trump got elected to pull out the weeds by their roots.

Not Feeling the Bern?

In 2016, the American people were sick of Obama. He had promised a new era of hope and racial reconciliation—but America got more division, Black Lives Matter protests escalated into riots, and a host of scandals erupted, from the IRS targeting conservatives to long lines for care at Veterans Affairs hospitals to the gunrunning scandal at the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.

Many Democrats were angry, too, and a self-declared socialist who hadn’t even formally joined the party started taking off in the Democratic presidential primary. Hillary Clinton wasn’t happy at having her turn passed over once again, and the Democratic Party elites gave her many advantages over the socialist upstart, Bernie Sanders. From financial arrangements to internal messaging to the support of “superdelegates,” the party rallied around Clinton in a way that felt “rigged” to Sanders’ supporters. Democrats also effectively prevented other candidates from entering the race, making Sanders the only real competitor.

The Democrats pulled the strings for Clinton, and it backfired on them, as Americans voted for change that Trump had promised instead.

Bidenmentum?

Bernie Sanders won the first three Democrat presidential primaries in 2020 as well, after each of the other candidates failed to take off. Only when Rep. Jim Clyburn, D-S.C., endorsed former Vice President Joe Biden did Obama’s former running mate pick up steam. One after another, candidates dropped out and endorsed Biden in a process that felt more orchestrated than organic.

Had more candidates remained in the race, Sanders or perhaps Pete Buttigieg, the upstart mayor of South Bend, Indiana, might have prevailed.

Instead, it seems the Democrats pulled the strings yet again, and they fell in lockstep behind Sleepy Joe—the guy even Kamala Harris viewed as easy pickings at the beginning of the primaries.

Biden only barely defeated Trump, after Big Tech buried the Hunter Biden laptop story and after local election officials weakened voting safeguards in the name of fighting the COVID-19 pandemic.

Another Aborted Primary

Biden said he would be a caretaker president, but then he decided to run for a second term. While many of us expressed concerns about his health long before his disastrous June 2024 debate against Trump, even the left-leaning media decided they couldn’t hide his infirmity any longer.

Rather than host a quick primary, Biden—and, ostensibly, Democrat leaders working with him—coronated Vice President Kamala Harris, who has recently made hay about the fact she only had 107 days to campaign for the presidency.

Democrats could have held a rapid-fire primary, as happens in special elections, but they chose Harris instead. Let’s just say the “vibes” election her supporters envisioned never actually materialized.

What About 2028?

After 2024, the Democratic Party has come to represent the old Silicon Valley woke elite consensus that Americans had firmly rejected coming out of the COVID-19 pandemic. Sure, some “Karens” are still biking with masks on during the summer and the Left’s dark money network is bankrolling ironic “No Kings” protests, but the wind of the woke movement has petered out.

Some Democrats know their party needs to tack to the center and return to reality, but the nonprofit activist apparatus that called the shots in the Biden administration is putting off its come-to-Jesus moment, likely perpetually.

While truly competitive primaries can be messy—Trump proved a wrecking ball to the old Republican establishment—they often breathe new energy into a party, energy the tired old Democrats sorely need. Unfortunately, that energy seems most likely to come from outright socialists like Zohran Mamdani, who will only champion more of the destructive policies Obama pioneered.

The entrenched elites in the Democratic Party may not look the same as they did in 2016, but I suspect the 2028 Democrat presidential nomination will look more like a coronation than a truly democratic contest.

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