Who could replace Biden as the 2024 Democratic nominee?

The Michigan governor said she wasn’t interested, at least when this was in the realm of the hypothetical. But pressure might be brought to bear, given how many boxes she checks for the party.

She’s a female governor who hails from a crucial state where a poll Sunday showed Biden trailing by seven points. (Democrats probably need to hold Midwestern swing states, given their problems in other swing states). She has won both of her races there by around 10 points. Polling this year has shown her approval rating in Michigan between 54 percent and 61 percent. And she’s more experienced and has more of a national profile than a lot of other rising-star Democratic governors, such as Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro and Maryland Gov. Wes Moore.

Harris aside, she probably makes more sense than anybody else — at least on paper.

Biggest pro: Swing-state popularity and experience.

Biggest con: Lack of apparent interest — at least yet.

The Pennsylvania governor, who endorsed Harris on Sunday, checks a lot of the same boxes as Whitmer — a popular governor from a crucial state who is almost universally respected in the party.

But there are some key differences, which could either be assets or liabilities, depending on your perspective: He’s a man; he’s less experienced (having just been elected in 2022); he carries a reputation as a moderate.

Shapiro would also be the first Jewish American to lead a presidential ticket, after Joe Lieberman’s history making vice-presidential nomination in 2000.

Because of his relatively new status on the national stage, many have posited that Shapiro is more of an option for 2028. But it would seem hard for Democrats to ignore polls like one earlier this year showing that more than 3 in 10 Pennsylvania Trump supporters approve of him.

If you want the most broadly agreeable candidate, he’s probably it.

Biggest pro: Could have highest appeal to voters.

Biggest con: Relative inexperience.

An undersold achievement on the transportation secretary’s résumé is that he nearly won both the Iowa and New Hampshire presidential nominating contests back in 2020, when he was just a mayor of a midsize Midwestern city (South Bend, Ind.).

And if the party is looking for the antithesis of Biden’s inability to drive a message against Trump, it’s Buttigieg. His jousting with Fox News hosts and Republicans at congressional hearings is often shared widely in Democratic circles, as was a clip this past weekend criticizing GOP vice-presidential nominee J.D. Vance. Buttigieg is a gifted messenger.

If there’s a big drawback with Buttigieg, it’s that he appears to be the wrong candidate to try to arrest the Democratic ticket’s budding problem with diverse — and especially Black — voters. He got very little support from such groups in 2020. And his tenure as transportation secretary hasn’t always been a smooth ride.

Biggest pro: Unmatched ability to take the fight to Trump and the GOP.

Biggest con: Record of appealing to disaffected diverse voters.

The California governor, who also endorsed Harris on Sunday, has long been mentioned in this context, owing to his efforts to expand his national profile by mixing it up with national Republicans and GOP governors. Late last year he even debated then-GOP presidential candidate Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) on Fox News.

Newsom has some of the same attributes as Buttigieg in terms of taking the fight to Trump and the Republicans.

But he previously said he wouldn’t challenge Harris. And it’s difficult to see the Democratic Party deciding that the recipe right now is a California governor and former mayor of San Francisco, a city Republicans would be only so happy to run against by pointing to its crime problem. It would be basically inviting Republicans to caricature the Democratic ticket.

Biggest pro: Central casting for a presidential candidate.

Biggest con: Easy to paint as a California liberal.

Perhaps nobody’s stock has risen more in recent months. That’s owing to the fact that the Kentucky governor was up for reelection in 2023 and won in a very red state.

He’d be a big contrast to Biden on the age front (he’s just 46), and he has intriguing bipartisan appeal, having succeeded in his state without straying too much to the right. (We often see that Democratic governors in red states and GOP governors in blue states marginalize themselves with the national party by having to take positions that are out of sync.) He even played up his support for abortion rights during the 2023 campaign — something previously unthinkable.

He also reportedly is taking the kinds of steps you would expect from someone with national ambitions. And he would be a pragmatic pick, perhaps even more than Shapiro. But it’s not clear how he would play with liberal base voters whom Democrats need to inject with enthusiasm.

Biggest pro: The broadness of his potential appeal.

Biggest con: Lack of national experience.

The Colorado governor and former congressman has some of the same bipartisan bona fides as Shapiro, and he’s also Jewish. The nation’s first openly gay man to be elected governor has crafted a compelling record and has largely avoided getting bogged down in potentially problematic liberal policies, despite running a blue state. He has also won big — by double digits in 2018 and nearly 20 points in 2022. And he has clearly expressed interest in going national one day.

But he doesn’t give Democrats a swing-state pick, and it would be bypassing Harris for a White man without the apparent potential electoral upside of a Shapiro.

Biggest pro: A record — both as governor and electorally — to run on.

Biggest con: A lesser-known White man who isn’t from a swing state.

Not many Democrats across the country will be familiar with the Illinois governor, and he doesn’t pack near the buzz factor of the other candidates on this list.

But he has shown some interest in going national. And one potential advantage he has if the race expands beyond Harris: He’s very wealthy — as in, in the billions. There are questions about just how practical it would be for a candidate to enter the race this late and be able to put together the funds to run a national campaign. The ticket apparently can’t get the Biden campaign’s money unless Harris is on it.

Biggest con: Not an exciting pick.

The senator from Arizona doesn’t give Democrats a woman or a diverse alternative, but he combines some of the assets of Whitmer and Shapiro with a compelling personal biography.

Kelly is a former NASA astronaut and the husband of former congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.), who survived a shooting in Tucson in 2011. He also won in both 2020 and 2022 in a crucial swing state — a state that favors Trump right now but that Democrats would love to put back in play.

Kelly doesn’t have much of a national profile, and he hasn’t been mentioned alongside many of the above names, at least until recently. He might make more sense as a running mate. But if the name of the game is a relatively safe pick — the kind of candidates who were doing better than Biden in Senate races across the country — he makes some sense.

Biggest pro: Broadly agreeable and hard to attack.

Biggest con: Low profile.

The senator from West Virginia, who recently became an independent and is retiring from the Senate after the 2024 election, is considering rejoining the Democratic Party and running, The Washington Post reported late Sunday.

It’s difficult to see how Democrats would go with a pretty conservative Democrat — someone who, after all, saw fit to leave the party just two months ago. But perhaps there’s an argument to be made that nobody could have more crossover appeal. And Manchin has plenty of executive experience as a former governor.

It would be pretty shocking, though, and you could be forgiven for thinking Manchin is trying to make a point about not having a coronation.

Biggest pro: He apparently might actually run — the only person on this list who has indicated as much.

Biggest con: He’s out of step politically with the vast majority of Democrats.

Other possibilities: If this process is swung open somehow, you could see other names pop up. Among them would be North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper, Maryland Gov. Wes Moore, Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz and Sen. Raphael G. Warnock (Ga.). (Warnock, though, has a major problem in that a Senate vacancy in Georgia would be filled by Republican Gov. Brian Kemp, and the battle for control of the Senate could be very tight.) Then there is Michelle Obama — the fantasy option for Democrats. The odds of her actually stepping forward appear minuscule. But Obama is the most popular recent former first lady in the United States, according to a late-2023 YouGov poll. And unlike other Biden alternatives that have been polled head-to-head with Trump, she actually performs significantly better.