Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) and failed former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg now lead among Democrat presidential primary voters in New Hampshire.
This poll of 648 primary voters released on July 22 shows AOC at the top with 22 percent support. Buttigieg is right below her with 21 percent. Everyone else is in single digits.
U.S. Sen. Mark Kelly (D-AZ) earns nine percent support. Failed Gov. Gavin Newsom (D-CA) is at eight percent. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) earns just six percent. Former Vice President Kamala Harris is at five percent.
Other candidates who seem seriously interested in running are in even worse shape. Gov. Josh Shapiro (D-PA) gets just two percent of the vote, while Gov. J.B. Pritzker (D-IL) is at one percent.
In this same poll, going back to October of 2025, there has been some notable movement. AOC increased her support from 14 percent to 22 percent.
Even more notable are those who have lost support. Kamala Harris took a dive from 11 percent to five percent. Newsom also lost about half his support, going from 15 percent to eight percent.
Newsom must be discouraged. He’s been actively running for president for three years, and the higher his profile, the lower his numbers. Well, he does suck.
We don’t yet know how vital New Hampshire will be in the 2028 Democrat primary process. While New Hampshire had been the first primary state (after the Iowa caucus) for many election cycles, it was demoted in 2024 in favor of South Carolina, Nevada, Michigan, and Iowa after some complained that the predominantly white state had too much influence.
Democrats have not yet nailed down their 2028 presidential primary schedule, so where New Hampshire will sit in the pecking order is anyone’s guess. My guess is that New Hampshire will once again get demoted.
In the national polling, according to the RealClearPolitics poll of polls, Kamala is in first place, up by 11.3 points over second-place Newsom (27.9 percent to 16.6 percent).
From where I sit, it’s going to be pretty difficult for the Democrat Party to deny Kamala Harris another shot at the Oval Office, or what will be argued is a “fair shot,” which she didn’t get in 2024 because it took so long for Democrats to realize Joe Biden was about to lose and then bully him out.
Democrats are also captured entirely by an obsession with identity, and Kamala ticks off three of those vital boxes: She’s black, she’s a woman, and although no one will say so, she’s a useful idiot.
This means that South Carolina is most likely to come first because it has a large black population.
The Democrat Party simply cannot afford to alienate black voters in 2028, especially black women. You can ask James Talarico about that.