A potential 2028 Democratic kingmaker has advice for candidates

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New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham has a message for the potential 2028 Democratic presidential candidates who are passing through her state: Focus on the children.
Lujan Grisham, a Democrat who’s set to leave office after this year, told Semafor the candidates “absolutely should” be running on universal childcare proposals. Her state has enacted its own universal childcare program, though she acknowledged a national program could be “challenging” without tax increases.
“What I would do in that position is make it really clear that you’ll create incentives and grants so that states have real opportunity,” she said.
Lujan Grisham said she’d met or spoken with many of the possible presidential aspirants who have visited the state, including Maryland Gov. Wes Moore and former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg.
Their conversations were “less introductory and more policy,” she said.
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New Mexico has been added to the early primary states, following the familiar trio of South Carolina, Nevada, and New Hampshire, and it could shake up Democrats’ strategies in the presidential primary. Lujan Grisham said she plans to endorse, depending on how the field shapes up. “It depends on who’s in that primary, doesn’t it? I mean, I would like to be in a position to get to do that,” she said.
Lujan Grisham also weighed in on the criticism that the Democratic Governors Association has received for not investing more in the Texas gubernatorial race.
“I think the DGA in this climate should be spending everywhere, and they’re raising to do exactly that. I mean, they’ve never done an expanded map like this,” she said.
The DGA’s chair, Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear, a potential 2028 presidential candidate himself, has faced criticism from other Democrats for not putting more resources into the expensive Texas race. But Lujan Grisham said that “picking on the DGA is not the best strategy.”

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