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NEW YORK — A fear of losing again is already shaping how Democrats think about 2028.

Chants of “run again!” reverberated through the packed room as Kamala Harris spoke Friday at the National Action Network convention, a gathering of Black voters, lawmakers and power brokers that saw drop-ins from a steady stream of potential presidential candidates. But several Black attendees openly questioned whether anyone other than a straight, white man can win the White House.

“The Democratic Party, they’re going to have to consider … who can win? Who can win, Black, white, who can win?” the Rev. Kim Williams, 63, a New Yorker and registered independent said in an interview.

“I don’t think [the country is] ready for another different type of person,” said Annette Wilcox, a 69-year old New Yorker.

It’s an open question the party is grappling with in the wake of Harris’ decisive 2024 loss to President Donald Trump. Conversations with a dozen people on the sidelines of the Rev. Al Sharpton’s gathering found some lingering concerns that America remains too bigoted — and that as a result, the desire to diversify the highest reaches of government is in tension with the desire to win.

In interviews, several of the prospective 2028 Democrats themselves argued that anyone can win. They poured into the midtown Manhattan ballroom over the week to build their relationships with Black voters for what became a barely-hidden shadow primary.

Sen. Ruben Gallego, a first-term Democrat who won statewide in Arizona despite Harris losing the state, told POLITICO on the sidelines of the convention that the party shouldn’t let fear narrow who ultimately runs.

“If you got stuck into this idea of what an ideal character is … you could potentially miss some really great talent,” said Gallego, who leaned intohis identity as a Latino veteran in his 2024 campaign.

Maryland Gov. Wes Moore, another possible 2028 candidate, said that he doesn’t “know many people back in 2022 who thought that an African American who had never held political office in his life was gonna be the next governor of Maryland.”

“People want to know, does your message meet a moment,” he added.

On stage with Sharpton on Friday, Harris seemed to agree. She made her most explicit overture at running again for the presidency, telling the audience she was “thinking about it” — to loud cheers and applause. Her appearance at the convention energized an otherwise largely staid event.

But even Harris, the first Black and South Asian woman to become vice president, has tacitly acknowledged the limitations of the country.

In her latest book, she divulged that former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg — another 2028 contender who also made a pit-stop at NAN — was her top vice presidential pick in 2024. But she didn’t select him because she didn’t believe the country was ready for both a woman of color and a gay man in the White House.

A spokesperson for Harris declined to comment.

Some women, from former first lady Michelle Obama to various convention attendees disappointed by Harris’ 2024 loss, have said the U.S. isn’t ready for a female president.

“I believe the current climate of this country is not ready for a Black woman as president,” Aaliyah Payton, 30, a middle school teacher in the Bronx, said while waiting to see Harris speak on the third day of the convention in a line that spanned far outside the convention room.

“If Kamala Harris is running as a Democrat, and there is another white man also running as a Democrat, she would have a tough time winning,” said 60-year-old Donna Carr, who lives in New Jersey. “It’s a man’s world.”

“I’m not going to lie, it may be too soon,” said 27-year-old New Yorker Justina Peña when asked if Harris should run again.

The same handwringing roiled the 2020 Democratic presidential primary, and voters ultimately selected Joe Biden — a more moderate straight white man — to block Trump from winning a second consecutive term.

The debate within the Democratic Party over what kind of candidate is electable played out again most recently in Texas, where the Democratic Senate primary was defined by tensions over race and concerns over which candidate could unify enough Democrats, independents and disillusioned Republicans to flip the red state. Voters chose seminarian James Talarico, a white man, over political firebrand Jasmine Crockett, a Black woman, in the end.

“We saw it with the race with Crockett, and I saw a woman say she wanted to vote for Crockett, but she knew she could not win against [a] white male Republican,” said Williams, the 63-year-old reverend.

Now, those conversations are already emerging for 2028 before a single Democrat has officially announced a bid for the White House. The question over 2028 ambitions hovered over Moore, Gallego, Harris, Buttigieg, Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker, Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro and California Rep. Ro Khanna this week — and while nobody said they officially are, nobody ruled it out. Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear and Arizona Sen. Mark Kelly are slated to speak on Saturday.

Buttigieg has dismissed concerns over his viability, including in a direct response to Harris’ revelation of why she didn’t choose him as a running mate in 2024.

“My experience in politics has been that the way that you earn trust with voters is based mostly on what they think you’re going to do for their lives, not on categories,” Buttigieg told POLITICO in a September interview.“Politics is about the results we can get for people and not about these other things.”

Some of the Black voters at the conference similarly expressed frustration with the idea that candidates’ identities should be a consideration in the looming 2028 primary.

“My concern — biggest concern — is when we get into a crisis like this in this country, people want to go to the ‘center,’ which usually is right of center in my view. A lot of people get kind of left out,” said Wilcox, the 69-year-old New York voter.

“In my experience, or history I’ve had with the Democratic Party, I feel like when that happens, Black people get tossed to the side.”

​Politics