Democratic governors are diverging in their approaches to President Trump amid mounting speculation that some of them are gunning for the White House in 2028.

Some are digging their heels into resistance efforts, as in Illinois, where Gov. J.B. Pritzker (D) this week trolled Trump’s plan to rename the Gulf of Mexico. Others are taking a softer approach, as in California, where Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) is working with Trump to help the Golden State recover from wildfires.

Pritzker and Newsom are among several Democratic governors — along with Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, Maryland Gov. Wes Moore and others — who have generated early 2028 chatter. Their varied engagements with Trump underscore the complexities of navigating a Republican power trifecta in Washington, and the high stakes for Democrats as they look toward the next presidential election.

“There’s a pretty marked dichotomy between those Democratic governors in swing states and those in safe states,” Dan Schnur, a political communications professor at the University of Southern California and the University of California, Berkeley. “Someone like JB Pritzker in Illinois can afford to go out to Trump with both barrels at every opportunity. Gretchen Whitmer is a governor in a much more purple state, so she has to be much more careful.”

Democrats have been looking to the governors of blue states as a line of defense against the barrage of executive actions and controversial policies coming out of the Trump White House, from pledging to protect progressive policies to urging party leadership to get more aggressive with Trump.

“I think the Trump strategy of flooding the zone with chaos is making the Democratic Party leaders probably reorganize and figure out how to resist,” said Democratic strategist Alvina Vasquez. “They’re going to have to get creative in how they’re resisting.”

So-called resistance efforts are further complicated for governors who may be gearing up to for their own Oval Office runs. Several — including Newsom, Whitmer and Shapiro — were floated last year as potential contenders to join former Vice President Harris’s 2024 campaign, and they’re already filling out the party’s........

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