Out former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said in an interview published Monday that he is “more inclined than not” to run for president again in 2028, furthering long-held suspicions that he may do so.
“I think I’m more inclined than not, but there’s so much we don’t know,” Buttigieg told British business podcaster Steven Bartlett on the Monday installment of Bartlett’s show, The Diary of a CEO. “There’s so much I don’t even know about what’s going to happen this year, let alone … what we need to know later.”
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Buttigieg then said that, every time he runs for office, he assesses what the position presently needs and what skills he can personally provide that differ from what others are offering. He also said that his decision whether to run must weigh all sorts of considerations that he has not fully made yet.
He admitted that he is often hesitant to make a clear announcement about 2028 because such statements would likely dominate the headlines and overshadow anything else he does in the following days.
While speaking in Provincetown yesterday at a fundraiser for the re-election campaign of Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey (D), Buttigieg warned that the current U.S. president will try to undermine this year’s midterm elections.
Healy agreed, saying, “We’ve got to win, and we’ve got to win here and across this country in such big numbers, by such big margins, so that there can be no doubt cast on the validity of the election results.”
Buttigieg has suggested in the past that he plans on running for president. He has been touring the country, holding town hall events, speaking at local Democratic functions, and showing his support for candidates up for reelection this year. These appearances have notably included several early primary states, like Iowa and New Hampshire.
A poll from May showed that Buttigieg and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) are the Democratic frontrunners among Americans who were asked about voting in a 2028 presidential primary. An early poll of New Hampshire Democratic primary voters also showed Buttigieg coming out on top of other potential Democratic candidates — Buttigieg spent three days during February in the state, holding town hall events and campaigning with local Democrats.
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