Will the 2028 presidential election look very different from what has so far been expected, with Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a member of the Squad and the party's radical wing, leading among Democrats, and Marco Rubio, who is not considered part of President Donald Trump's MAGA movement, holding a huge lead over Vice President JD Vance?
The national poll by the AtlasIntel polling institute showed that 26% of Democrats would vote for Ocasio-Cortez for president in two years, while former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg stood at 22.4% and California Gov. Gavin Newsom at 21.2%. Former Vice President Kamala Harris, who until recently led in all the polls, came in fourth with 12.9%.
Ocasio-Cortez, a member of the House of Representatives, belongs to the progressive wing of the Democratic Party and was previously considered the leader of the Squad, a group of progressive congresswomen known for their anti-Israel views, such as Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib. Ocasio-Cortez has undergone a degree of moderation and even voted in the past in favor of sending interceptors to Israel, a move that drew fierce criticism from her colleagues in the radical wing.
On the Republican side, 45.4% chose Rubio. Vice President JD Vance was the second-largest choice, with 29.6%, followed by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis with 11.2%. The fourth-largest choice was "none of the above," with 10.3%.
Last year, Vance led the AtlasIntel poll, with 37.3% of Republicans choosing the vice president as their top pick. Rubio was second with 18.7%, while "none of the above" came in third. The poll found that 8.8% of Republican voters wanted Donald Trump Jr.
Online users noted that both of the frontrunners identified by the poll are of Hispanic origin: Ocasio-Cortez comes from a Puerto Rican background, while Rubio is of Cuban background. Rubio sparked a storm on social media today when he was filmed wearing the same tracksuit that dictator Nicolás Maduro wore when he was captured by the US, during a flight on the presidential plane for a visit to China.
