Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer has retreated from the national stage in recent months and privately expressed ambivalence about running for president in 2028 — moves that have stunned many top Democrats.

Why it matters: Some consider Whitmer a top-tier presidential candidate with her center-left approach and popularity in a key swing state.

📣 Driving the news: Eager to get an edge in the wide-open 2028 field, potential Democratic candidates are hopping across national media, spending big money to build digital followings, weighing in on debates, hiring experienced operatives and traveling to early primary states.

• Whitmer has done little of that since last spring.
• Her political team remains small with mostly Michigan experience. She's also spending less on digital messaging than many other potential candidates and doing much less national media than others.
• Whitmer privately has told people she feels obligated to focus on Michigan through the end of her term rather than take more steps toward a presidential campaign. (Her second term ends in January 2027, and she can't run again.)

Publicly and privately, she's said that she's keeping her options open. But many supporters and allies told Axios they're no longer sure she has the fire in the belly for a White House run.

• Some Whitmer aides have contemplated looking for new jobs because they haven't got a signal to plan for anything after her term ends.
• Whitmer told an interviewer in Canada last month: "I don't know if I need to be the main character in the next chapter, but I want to have a hand in writing it ... so I anticipate helping, but I don't know if I'm going to be the person."

🔮 The other side: Whitmer's pollster John Anzalone, who has worked on several presidential campaigns, played down questions about the governor's intentions — and polls suggesting California Gov. Gavin Newsom is the leading 2028 contender.

• "Gavin Newsom is gonna be no further ahead come January 2027 than anyone else because he put out videos in 2025 that got clicks," Anzalone said.
• "If you decide that your priority is running for president, you lose sight of both your elected position and also the presidential race."
• Longtime Democratic strategist Jennifer Palmieri said Whitmer "doesn't have to be the darling of 2025 to win in 2028."

Recently, some Democrats have sensed that Whitmer doesn't want her low-key approach to 2028 to be mistaken as taking herself out of the running.

• A senior Michigan Democrat told Axios: "She is not taking herself out. I think it's wishful thinking on behalf of some Democrats."

Keep reading.

— Alex Thompson and Holly Otterbein

A civil war is brewing between two heavy-hitting Democratic super PACs in the run-up to the next presidential election.

Why it matters: The battle will help determine how hundreds of millions of dollars are spent in the 2028 campaign.

• It represents a divide among Democrats over how best to reach voters — whether to emphasize highly tested TV and digital ads aimed at a broad audience, or a more instinctual, risk-taking approach in an effort to break through online.

💰 The dominant Democratic super PAC, Future Forward, and its affiliates raised more than $900 million in the race for the White House last cycle — and spent much of it on rigorously tested TV ads.

• Some top party officials believe Future Forward's leaders don't have sufficient campaign experience and weren't responsive enough to directions from Kamala Harris' campaign in 2024 because they were so certain of their strategy.
• There also has been frustration about how the uber-secretive Future Forward operates — including how much its leaders are paid.
• A Future Forward adviser said the group's leaders have worked with 25 of the top ad agencies in Democratic politics and include people from every presidential campaign since 2012.

Another liberal super PAC, the digital-focused Priorities USA, was the party's favored PAC in the 2012, 2016 and 2020 elections — and now is looking to knock Future Forward off its pedestal.

• 🛜 Priorities USA is calling on the Democratic Party to change its approach to super PACs and the internet with an improved digital strategy that better accounts for how a growing number of Americans receive political messages.

Priorities USA and its affiliates raised just $56 million last cycle — down from $258 million in 2020 — after top Biden adviser Anita Dunn surprised top Democrats by blessing Future Forward as the party's chosen super PAC for 2024.

Keep reading.

— Holly Otterbein and Alex Thompson

Democratic politicians and activists are quietly lobbying to upend the way the party picks its presidential nominee — by using ranked-choice voting.

• It's a tool that drew national attention when it propelled New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani to a decisive primary win.

🏎️ Driving the news: DNC chair Ken Martin and other top party officials have met privately with advocates who are pushing for the voting method to be expanded for the 2028 primaries, three sources tell Axios.

• Maryland Rep. Jamie Raskin, Joe Biden pollster Celinda Lake and the nonprofit FairVote Action pitched the idea at a recent meeting, the sources said.

🔎 Zoom in: Supporters say ranked-choice voting — which allows voters to rank candidates in order of preference — would prevent people's votes from being "wasted" after presidential candidates drop out and encourage coalition-building among contenders.

• Critics say it would increase waiting times at the polls and be a logistical quagmire. Others argue it would lengthen the primary, for better or worse.

The idea has gotten a mixed response within the DNC.

It would need approval by the party's powerful rules and bylaws committee, and then a majority of the 450-member DNC. States also would have to amend their election laws.

Keep reading.

— Holly Otterbein

A look at what potential 2028 Democratic presidential contenders are up to:

• Former VP Kamala Harris hit the campaign trail Tuesday in Tennessee for a closely watched House special election. Thanking Harris for making the trip to Tennessee and HBCU Fisk University, state Rep. Justin Jones called Harris "Auntie Madame VP." She also met with musician Jack White, who said Harris is "so cool."
• Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker paid a visit to Pope Leo in Vatican City and brought him a four-pack of "Da Pope" — a beer from Chicago's Burning Bush Brewery.
• Back home, Pritzker's lieutenant governor, Juliana Stratton was busy dissing California Gov. Gavin Newsom. Stratton penned an op-ed with actress Halle Berry arguing that Newsom's veto of California's Menopause Care Equity Act "represents a failure of Gov. Newsom's commitment to women."
• On Tuesday, Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear trekked to Nevada, where he told KTNV Las Vegas: "In '28, we need a Democratic governor as the head of that ticket, and we've got a lot of great Democratic governors."
• California Rep. Ro Khanna scored a huge win Wednesday when President Trump signed the bill Khanna co-sponsored to release the government's Jeffrey Epstein files. During his victory lap, which included an interview with New Hampshire-based WMUR, Khanna nodded to his ambitions: "Whatever role I have, I hope it's a role in shaping the national future of the Democratic Party and the country."
• Arizona Sen. Ruben Gallego traveled to a Latino neighborhood in Chicago where residents and immigration agents have recently clashed. Agents were "treating it like a war zone," he said. "These men were dressed in battle fatigues with, like, automatic weapons in an area that just doesn't need it."
• New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez signaled Monday that she wouldn't back left-wing New York City council member Chi Ossé in his potential primary challenge to House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries. Meanwhile, at the University of Southern California's Warschaw Conference on Tuesday, longtime Biden adviser Mike Donilon said AOC is being underestimated as a potential presidential candidate.
• Michigan Sen. Elissa Slotkin slammed Trump after the president accused her and a few other Democratic lawmakers of "SEDITIOUS BEHAVIOR, punishable by DEATH!" after they urged military members to refuse illegal orders. (ABC's Martha Raddatz grilled Slotkin this morning on what illegal orders she meant.)
• Slotkin also spoke at this week's private donor confab held by Democracy Alliance in Washington, as did Connecticut Sen. Chris Murphy, sources told us.
• Arizona Sen. Mark Kelly, another lawmaker Trump threatened, did several national interviews, and called the President's language "dangerous."
• New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker clipped Kelly's CNN remarks and posted on X: "Thank you Mark Kelly for continuing to speak up."
• At a Bloomberg New Economy Forum in Singapore, former Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo said Trump's tariffs will be difficult to end after his administration because "no one wants to be the American president accused of letting down the American worker."
• Former Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel said last Sunday at the Jewish Federations of North America's General Assembly in Washington that there will be "31 flavors" of candidates in the 2028 Democratic primary and "nobody is going to Jerusalem," a reference to Democrats' divisions over Israel.
• Maryland Sen. Chris Van Hollen gave the keynote conversation at an event in Washington on Monday hosted by Patriotic Millionaires. He brushed off a question about 2028, saying he plans to be "very engaged" in the Senate and around the country.
• Former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg canceled a planned trip to Wisconsin on Tuesday because of a family medical emergency.
• Washington Post columnist David Ignatius floated Colorado Rep. Jason Crow as a presidential candidate.
• Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro appeared on the liberal podcast MeidasTouch on Wednesday and railed against Trump's tariffs. Next month, Shapiro is holding a conversation in Philadelphia with South Carolina kingmaker Rep. Jim Clyburn during Clyburn's book tour.

Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker, a potential contender for president in 2028, is a self-proclaimed "Star Wars" fan.

• 📺 When Jimmy Kimmel returned to his ABC late night show in the face of threats from the Trump administration, Pritzker quoted the Star Wars show "Andor," posting on X: "Tyranny requires constant effort. It breaks, it leaks. Authority is brittle. Oppression is the mask of fear. Remember that."

So, we asked Pritzker to weigh in on the go-to debate for every "Star Wars" nerd: Which movies are the best? Here's his ranking of the 11 major films in the series:

1. "The Empire Strikes Back" (1980)
2. "Star Wars" (1977)
3. "Return of the Jedi" (1983)
4. "Rogue One" (2016)
5. "The Last Jedi" (2017)
6. "Revenge of the Sith" (2005)
7. "The Force Awakens" (2015)
8. "Solo" (2018)
9. "The Phantom Menace" (1999)
10. "Attack of the Clones" (2002)
11. "The Rise of Skywalker" (2019)