Wes Moore should take his talents to the White House
In 2022, I identified two rising stars who could redefine America’s political future: Wes Moore and Kari Lake.
I was half-right.
In 2022, Lake was the Republican candidate for governor in Arizona. She was a well-respected television journalist with high name identification, and great communication skills. She seemed poised to win, but her campaign violated a cardinal rule of politics: Campaigns are about addition, not subtraction.
Tying herself closely to Donald Trump, she demanded that any John McCain supporters “get the hell out.” That’s hardly the right formula for a Republican candidate to win in Arizona.
In 2024, Lake ran another losing campaign — this time against Sen. Ruben Gallego (D-Ariz.), for an open U.S. Senate seat.
Today, the former journalist is Trump’s choice to supervise the dismantling of Voice of America.
So I was wrong about Lake. But I think I was right about Moore.
In 2022, Moore won a competitive Democratic primary to succeed two-term Republican Gov. Larry Hogan. Facing a Trump 2020 election-denier, Dan Cox, Moore won in a landslide.
There are three things a candidate needs to win the presidency. First, to hold the right office at the right time. In 2016, Trump did not hold any elective office, but he presented himself as a successful businessman who could fix Washington, D.C. around a time when fewer than one in five Americans trusted the government to do what was right. Right candidate, right background.
In 2020, Joe Biden was the insider the country wanted to end the COVID-19 pandemic. Having been a long-time U.S. senator and two-term vice president, Biden’s governmental experience was viewed as an asset. Right background, right time.
Today’s voters are not looking for candidates hailing from the halls of a dysfunctional Congress. Although some members are positioning themselves to mount a 2028 presidential campaign, I doubt they will succeed.
My bet is that voters will want someone who can cut through red tape and solve problems. Governors are ideally positioned to deliver results.
Moore is holding the right office at the right time. And he presents himself as a problem solver.
When the Francis Scott Key Bridge collapsed in 2024, Moore got to work and quickly mobilized the government to remove the debris paralyzing the vital port of Baltimore. Today, the bridge is being rebuilt.
In another crisis situation engendered by Trump’s massive layoffs of federal workers, Moore is using the state’s resources to find them employment, especially in the state’s classrooms. And as governor, Moore has encouraged more apprenticeships that promise good paying Maryland jobs.
A second requirement for a winning candidate is the ability to tell a compelling personal story. Moore has that. In his autobiography titled “The Other Wes Moore,” he recounted his life’s story and contrasted it with another man named Wes Moore who took a different path and is serving a life sentence for murder.
Moore’s story begins with the untimely death of his father in 1982, thanks to a lack of proper medical care. Raised by his mother and grandparents, he was a rebellious child who by the age of 11 was in trouble with the law.
When Moore turned 17, his mother signed him up to join the military. That decision helped to turn Moore’s life around. He was a member of the Army Reserve and was deployed to Afghanistan, where he later received a Bronze Star for “meritorious achievement.”
Running for governor in 2022, Moore repeated a lesson he learned during his military service: “Leave No One Behind.” As governor, he has devoted himself to making sure no one is left behind, particularly veterans.
That is in sharp contrast to what Moore describes as Trump’s message to voters: “You’re on your own.” In what is likely to be another change election in 2028, voters will be looking for something very different from Trump.
Moore’s story has a patriotic cornerstone that will resonate with voters. As the nation’s third elected African American governor, he recently told graduates of Lincoln University how his great-grandfather, a minister in the Dutch Reformed Church, was chased out of South Carolina by the Ku Klux Klan and returned to his native Jamaica.
But his son, Moore’s grandfather, returned to the U.S. because, in Moore’s words, he “loved America too much to let the cruelty of others determine his destination.”
Moore’s evocation of a liberal agenda combined with a devotion to country is reminiscent of Robert Kennedy’s 1968 presidential candidacy. In a recent treatise, authors Richard D. Kahlenberg and Ruy Teixeria noted that Kennedy’s call for equality for all, together with his deeply personal commitment to American ideals, resonated with voters.
The third requirement for a successful candidate is charisma. Barack Obama had it. Trump had it. And Moore has it.
Actor George Clooney, who knows something about how to command an audience, describes Moore as “levitating above” other governors who may aspire to the presidency, including Kentucky’s Andy Beshear (D) and Michigan’s Gretchen Whitmer (D).
Not every presidential aspirant possesses the three qualities needed to be successful. But those that do win.
Today, Moore denies any interest in running for the presidency. His disclaimers should not be taken at face value. In 2006, Barack Obama told Tim Russert that he would not run for either president or vice president in 2008. One year later, Obama changed his mind.
Twenty years later, Moore is running for reelection as governor — a shoo-in in heavily Democratic Maryland. Voters are jealous creatures; they want you to focus on them, not run for office while casting your eye elsewhere. Moore gets that.
But the presidency comes around only once. Obama knew it in 2008. Trump knew it in 2016. And there are many ambitious politicians for whom the presidency never comes around. The 2028 cycle is Moore’s time. He should go for it.
John Kenneth White (johnkennethwhite.com) is a professor emeritus at The Catholic University of America. His latest book is titled “Grand Old Unraveling: The Republican Party, Donald Trump, and the Rise of Authoritarianism.”