The 2028 race for John Fetterman’s seat starts soon — and one Pa. Democrat is getting a head start

Just under 300 miles from the Pittsburgh-area district where he was up for reelection in 12 days, U.S. Rep. Chris Deluzio smirked as he waited on the second floor of an Upper Bucks County periodontist’s office.

The Democrat stepped forward in the makeshift campaign space, standing near a dentist’s swivel chair and a folding table littered with campaign flyers, to address a small group of supporters before they went out to canvas voters. He blamed President Donald Trump for rising costs and corruption, then turned to Bucks County Commissioner Bob Harvie on his left. What he needed in Washington, he said, were reinforcements.

“This is a bellwether district in a bellwether state,” Deluzio said of the 1st Congressional District, where Harvie is in a heated race against Republican U.S. Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick. “I’m from a swing district. Believe me, I know what a competitive race looks like.”

Left unmentioned was that bellwether state’s next, much larger, competitive race — one that Deluzio has signaled he is highly likely to jump into some time after Tuesday’s midterms: the 2028 contest for John Fetterman’s U.S. Senate seat.

Fetterman has not said whether he will seek a second six-year term. But as he has alienated his former Democratic base and faced criticisms of being an absentee senator, a competition to replace him is anticipated either way.

Candidates are expected to launch or consider launching campaigns soon after this year’s elections. And more than anyone else who has publicly signaled an intention to run, Deluzio has positioned himself for a head start — frequently traveling and fundraising for candidates up and down the ballot, building his own campaign war chest, criticizing Fetterman, and becoming a leading Democratic messenger on issues like the war in Iran and affordability.

The 42-year-old Navy veteran and lawyer, in an interview after his speech for Harvie and state House candidate Tim Hayes in Dublin, said he is getting asked about the Senate race “all the time” as he campaigns for candidates across the state.

After a similar event the next day for Lehigh Valley congressional candidate Bob Brooks and other local Democrats at a Bethlehem union hall, Deluzio told The Inquirer he had no timeline for making a decision. He also said his “goals and ambition are not about a job” but about “what I want our country to be.”

The comment had echoes of a recent line from one of Deluzio’s colleagues whose future is also the source of widespread speculation. U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D., N.Y.), asked during a forum about a potential run for president in 2028, said people “assume that my ambition is a title or a seat” when her “ambition is way bigger than that. … [It’s] to change the country.”

Deluzio, who has carefully aligned himself both with progressives and moderates in his party, said the decision for him could be the House, the Senate, or “something altogether different.” The answer is not just about him, personally, though he weighed some of the personal factors that would determine whether he runs.

“Can my family support this? Can I win? And will I be the best damn senator possible?” Deluzio said. “If the answer to any of those things is not a resounding yes, then I won’t go do this. If it’s a yes, then maybe I will. But that’s how I think about it. And what John Fetterman does doesn’t affect it one bit for me at this point.”

Deluzio is seeking a third term in Congress this week in a slice of Western Pennsylvania once represented by Republicans.

His district, which covers Beaver County along the Ohio border and most of Allegheny County around Pittsburgh, flipped blue during Trump’s first term with a 2018 win by former U.S. Rep. Conor Lamb, who later gave up the seat to run against Fetterman in the 2022 Senate primary.

Fetterman, then the lieutenant governor, had barnstormed the state multiple times over more than six years and won all 67 counties in the primary. Lamb became a vocal critic as the senator went on to forgo parts of the job and increasingly support the Republican agenda. He has also remained active in Democratic politics across the state and has not ruled out running again in 2028.

Other potential candidates to challenge Fetterman or run for the open seat are U.S. Rep. Brendan Boyle, who has represented a Philadelphia district since 2015, and State Rep. Malcolm Kenyatta, a Philadelphia Democrat who also ran in 2022 and is now a Democratic National Committee vice chair.

The list of contenders could grow long, including on the Republican side.

GOP U.S. Sen. Dave McCormick narrowly won the state’s last Senate race in 2024 in an upset against longtime Democratic U.S. Sen. Bob Casey.

But political observers and strategists say Deluzio has taken the early steps needed to create the kind of statewide network, donor base, and messaging for a successful bid.

“He’s had several fundraisers just in our zip code. He’s always been around. To the people who give money and to the activists, he’s never been a stranger,” said Larry Ceisler, a Philadelphia-based public affairs executive.

Ceisler said fundraising and making connections in the Philadelphia area — home to the largest bloc of Democratic voters — are imperative for Western Pennsylvania politicians looking to run statewide.

“A lot of people say, let’s get through this cycle,” Ceisler said. “But it’s not like he’s out there raising money and taking money away from the four competitive Democratic nominees. He’s just out there helping out, meeting people.”

Deluzio’s campaign said he has raised or directly donated $300,000 for congressional candidates in Pennsylvania this election cycle, when four tightly contested U.S. House races could help determine control of the chamber. With consequential state legislative races on the line, he has also raised or donated $350,000 for state candidates and $65,000 for the Pennsylvania Democratic Party, his campaign said.

Deluzio’s public reports with the Federal Election Commission, meanwhile, show he has raised $3.8 million total this cycle, which is more than any of the state’s other six House Democrats. His fundraising numbers spiked last year after Trump denounced him and five other Democrats — including U.S. Rep. Chrissy Houlahan of Chester County — who invoked their backgrounds in the military and intelligence agencies to call on service members to “refuse illegal orders” from the administration. Trump accused the Democrats of “seditious behavior” that was “punishable by death,” leading to threats and an attempt to indict them.

Deluzio’s fundraising has also outpaced that of Fetterman — who has a much larger public profile — as the senator’s Democratic donor base dried up. Fetterman’s fundraising rebounded slightly in the most recent quarterly reports, a period that covered his more overt fundraising appeals to Republicans.

Fetterman, who has said his future will become more clear after this week’s midterms, also revamped his campaign website in recent weeks. It now includes a recurring donation option that is described like a subscription service called “Fetter Nation,” with rewards including merchandise and virtual conversations with the senator, depending on the donation level. His campaign and Senate office did not return a request for comment.

At the same time, Deluzio has highlighted his donations from every part of Pennsylvania.

“I’m building an operation that’s helping me help candidates like Bob Brooks, Bob Harvie, and would be something you’d want in a race like that,” Deluzio said, referring to a Senate race that will cost tens of millions of dollars.

Before the recent two-day swing in eastern Pennsylvania that primarily supported Brooks and Harvie, Deluzio posted a photo of himself eating a cheesesteak at Tony & Nick’s Steaks in South Philadelphia. Not mentioned was the fundraiser he also headlined nearby.

Dustin Dove, a Philadelphia lawyer and president of the Fairmount Civic Association, met Deluzio for the first time at the fundraiser that night and left impressed. Dove said that he voted for Kenyatta in the 2022 primary and that Fetterman has been “an embarrassment.” He is hoping for another robust field of candidates in 2028, he said, but Deluzio’s record of winning in a competitive area, even if Lamb flipped it first, indicates he might be able to win statewide.

“For me, it’s important to have someone who has experience doing that,” Dove said. “It’s not important that they must have that, but it’s definitely a good experience.”

Deluzio has developed a consistent stump speech on the trail.

Trump’s reckless war with Iran has cost innocent lives and billions of taxpayer dollars, he says. Instances of corruption in the administration are too lengthy to rattle off in anything less than several hours.

He starts every speech by asking for a show of hands from those whose lives became more expensive since Trump took office, then works toward a broad vision for “restoring the American dream” and revisiting the country’s “founding ideals.”

In Congress, Deluzio has leaned into economic populism — becoming a founding member of a band of Democrats calling themselves the New Economic Patriots and describing their party as “spineless” for not pushing back hard enough early in Trump’s term. He has taken on a distinctly anti-corporate message, railing against special interests and the role of money in politics in a way similar to how State Rep. Chris Rabb, the democratic socialist who is almost certain to win one of Philadelphia’s congressional seats on Tuesday, has also spoken about them.

Both he and Rabb appeared together at a gathering of progressives on Capitol Hill in June. After Rabb talked about the momentum around leftist Democrats and referred to Fetterman’s name only as “the F word,” Deluzio agreed with his argument that voters are expressing a deep desire for disruption.

“They don’t want us tinkering on the edges, and God help us if Democrats are lucky enough to take power in 2028 and don’t fundamentally change things,” Deluzio said at the time. “I think people expect us to fix it and turn it around, and that’s not going to happen if you’re just doing some nonrefundable tax credits here and there. It’s not enough.”

Deluzio did not speak of radical change in brief remarks in Bucks and Northampton Counties earlier this month. The swing-district candidates he boosted have run campaigns that stayed clear from aligning themselves with democratic socialists like Rabb.

But both candidates said Deluzio has been an invaluable and active supporter, stumping in public and taking frequent calls to provide advice and motivation.

“He knows this is his fault,” Brooks, a 53-year-old retired firefighter and union leader whom Deluzio had recruited to run, joked in an interview. “When I leave the campaign for the night, if I need to talk to somebody, or vent a little bit, Chris is good for that.”

Brooks, a first-time candidate, declined to say if he thought Deluzio should run for Senate but said he would “support Chris in whatever decision he makes.” Harvie similarly said: “If he wants to take that next step, I think it certainly makes sense and I think it would be good for everybody.”

U.S. Rep. Morgan McGarvey, a Kentucky Democrat who cochairs the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee’s “red to blue” program that aims to flip GOP-held House seats, accompanied Deluzio on the swings through both districts. In an interview, he said Deluzio was an early and authoritative advocate for the national party to invest in the Pennsylvania races — which have now all seen significant investments as polls show the Democratic nominees on the verge of victory.

Asked if Deluzio could mount a winning Senate campaign, McGarvey said that he had only seen Deluzio be successful and that “any opportunity he has to serve is a good thing.”

“For me personally, man, I’m gonna miss him,” he said.