Ruben Gallego is setting off to a key battleground state to talk with voters this week, an indication the Arizona senator might have greater ambitions as some Democrats float him as a possible 2028 presidential candidate.
Gallego will headline a Could 10 city corridor in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, a pivotal bellwether that President Donald Trump flipped in 2024, in accordance with plans shared first with POLITICO.
“No one understands the struggles of working-class Americans like Ruben Gallego,” mentioned Gallego’s chief of workers, Raphael Chavez-Fernandez. “He’s heading to Pennsylvania to speak directly to voters about what it means to fight for working-class families — because he’s lived their fight.”
Gallego is visiting the district held by Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.), a perennial Democratic goal, as a part of an effort by the occasion to highlight weak Republicans over attainable cuts to Medicaid and to stress them to vote towards Trump’s finances invoice.
Gallego is the newest in a string of potential Democratic presidential candidates to hit the street in what’s remodeling into an all-out shadow major years forward of 2028. Former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg is touring to carry a city corridor with a veterans group in Iowa this month, following his success within the presidential caucuses there in 2020. Maryland Gov. Wes Moore is headed to the early major state of South Carolina to seem at a high Democratic dinner. Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker not too long ago visited New Hampshire, one other early major state, to keynote a dinner.
Gallego is a rising star within the Democratic Social gathering who received a state in 2024 that Trump carried partly by overperforming amongst Latino voters in comparison with former Vice President Kamala Harris. He beforehand informed POLITICO that one purpose for his victory is that “we rejected what people had assumed the Democratic position had been, which is a very loose, loose enforcement of the border.”
Gallego’s allies have additionally argued his success stems from his skill to speak about his humble beginnings at a time when Democrats are struggling to win over working-class voters. Gallego grew up poor with a single mom, ultimately making it to Harvard, the place he labored part-time as a janitor, and enlisted within the Marine Corps and served within the Iraq Warfare.
In an announcement, Democratic Nationwide Committee Chair Ken Martin referred to as Gallego “a critical voice for the Democratic Party.”
