United States presidential election, 2028 (Rubio, Buttigieg)

The 2028 United States presidential election took place on Tuesday, November 4, 2028. It will be the 61st quadrennial presidential election. Voters selected presidential electors who voted on December 14, 2028,[2] to select a new president and vice president. The election will occur simultaneously alongside elections for the House of Representatives, Senate, and various state and local-level elections.

Incumbent president Pete Buttigieg had a difficult presidency. Although the beginning of his presidency looked so promising, the economy collapsed in September 2026 and the Second Great Depression began. Although a great public speaker, Buttigieg lost a lot of trust among the American people during corruption scandals within his administration amid the economic recession. For this reason, many Americans started blaming the incumbent president for the economic collapse and for the high unemployment rate of 18%.

Moreover, Buttigieg's administration was hurt by the breakout of the Chinise-Indian war in 2025, which only hindered the American economy even more.

Despite Buttigieg running on a platform to help Hispanic and African Americans, due to the economic collapse, quality of life for minorities only further decreased under his administration. Republicans felt as if this was the perfect opportunity to sway minority voters their way and for this reason enthusiastic Hispanic American Florida Senator Marco Rubio was the easy favorite. Rubio gained enough delegates to become the party's nominee on 12th of May and selected Texas Senator Ted Cruz as his running mate.

In the meantime, Buttigieg faced a strong challenge for the Democratic nomination from a young activist and New York Senator Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who emerged from the progressive wing of the Democratic party. Despite a strong performance in debates by Cortez, Buttigieg was able to tightly clinch the nomination. Since his former vice president Andrew Cuomo passed away a year earlier, Buttigieg picked African-American New Jersey Senator Cory Booker in an attempt to win back some African-American votes.

Throughout the campaign, the main issue was the economy as Buttigieg defended his administration's policies and Rubio criticized them. Although Rubio held a strong lead over Buttigieg early on, good debate performances by Buttigieg helped the incumbent.

By election night, both Rubio was polling at 49% and Buttigieg was polling at 47%. Rubio ended up winning the election in a landslide getting 354 of the electoral votes. This was the first time a Republican won the state of Maryland since George H.W Bush in 1988. This was also the first time an incumbent president lost re-election since George H.W Bush in 1992.