Ossoff And AOC Tipped As Favorites For The 2028 Democratic Presidential Nomination At Progressive Convention

Following a series of stunning Democrat victories in Republican strongholds in Tuesday's midterm elections, speculation about who the Democratic party will pick as their presidential nominee in 2028 is growing.

At Crooked Con, a post-midterms progressive political convention held in Washington D.C. between Thursday and Saturday which gathered a variety of progressive and generally Democrat-aligned activists, politicians, strategists, and journalists, attendees voted in a straw poll asking them who their first choice would be for the Democratic presidential nomination.

The results, declared on Saturday, showed newly re-elected Senator for Georgia Jon Ossoff leading the poll with 38.4% of votes, followed by Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez with 16.6% and former U.S. Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg with 13.9%. The remainder of the candidates, including California Governor Gavin Newsom, Illinois Governor JB Pritzker and 2024 presidential candidate and former Vice President Kamala Harris, all gained less than 5%.

Although the poll is an informal one, it offers insight into which candidates enjoy the most internal support within the Democratic party and which are seen as the most capable political contenders against the GOP.

Ossoff topping the poll is unsurprising; with 99% of votes counted, AP reports Ossoff having won his re-election to the Upper House by a margin of 18 percentage points.

The size of the victory is notable as Georgia is a swing state that traditionally leans red, having only voted for two Democratic candidates in the last 11 presidential elections.

"He won by what was like 16, 17, 18 points or something. He seems like the uniformly 'compromise candidate' between the progressive and the more centrist factions of the party. And he seems very talented," statistician and election analyst Nate Silver told Crooked Con.

However, Ossoff ruled out running for the top office as recently as October, stating during a Senate election debate with his Republican challenger Mike Collins that he had "zero interest in running for president."

Ocasio-Cortez, known commonly as AOC, is also an unsurprising runner-up.

The New York representative is a popular voice firmly on the progressive wing of the party, which was buoyed in the buildup to the midterms by primary victories for many of its prominent candidates, including Abdul El-Sayed in Michigan and Angie Nixon in Florida.

Ocasio-Cortez's $1 million donation to El-Sayed's campaign was also widely seen as proof of her presidential intentions.

"When you write a check for $1 million, the assumption is she's running for president. [Michigan] is one of the first primaries, and giving a million means she has a national agenda,"one Democratic insider told the New York Post

Ocasio-Cortez also said as recently as September that she was, amongst other things, considering a run for the presidency in her political future.