Ahmed Moor filed with the Federal Election Commission on Monday and became the first declared candidate for U.S. Sen. John Fetterman’s seat in 2028. The 42-year-old West Philadelphia resident is launching an unusually early campaign that gives the race its first marker before Fetterman has even said whether he will seek a second six-year term.
The timing matters because the end of the 2026 midterms last week effectively opened the 2028 election cycle, and Moor moved first. He plans to host a launch event at Renata’s Kitchen next week and has hired Rasha Mubarak as finance director, a signal that the campaign intends to turn quickly from paperwork to organizing.
Moor is a Palestinian American writer born in Gaza who has never held or run for political office beyond a recent stint as a committeeperson within the Philadelphia Democratic City Committee. That makes him a very different kind of entrant from several Democrats who have already weighed bids for the seat, including U.S. Rep. Chris Deluzio, who has built a statewide network, and U.S. Rep. Brendan Boyle, who consulted with senators before saying Wednesday that he would stay in the House as chairman of the Budget Committee.
He is also making no secret of the issues driving him. Moor said he was motivated by what he sees as national crises around corruption, the cost of living, constitutional authority, and foreign policy, and he said he wants to take that message to all 67 counties. He cast the race as an outsider campaign rooted in good government and the rule of law, and said he was inspired by State Rep. Chris Rabb’s win to become Philadelphia’s first democratic socialist in Congress.
That framing comes with an obvious contradiction. Moor says he is not really running against Fetterman, even as his campaign is built around a Senate seat that Fetterman occupies and around a break with the senator’s positions. Fetterman has drawn criticism from many Democrats over his support for Israel’s military actions, his votes with Republicans and his absenteeism, and Moor’s campaign is entering that terrain before the incumbent has even announced whether he plans to run again.
Moor says the point is larger than one senator. “I’m running for good government. I’m running for the rule of law. I’m running because I believe in America. And I believe in our capacity for renewal. I believe in our capacity for redressing wrongs in our midst,” he said. For now, he is the only named candidate in the race, and the next question is whether Fetterman will make the field bigger by deciding to seek another term.
