Netflix has released the first The Politician Season 2 images, offering a first look at the new season of the Ryan Murphy original series. The first season of the Netflix dramedy followed a precocious high school student named Payton Hobart (Ben Platt) with aspirations of one day becoming President of the United States. That initial season found Payton treating his high school president race with the importance of a national political race, but Season 2 ups the ante. The Season 1 finale jumped ahead in time, aged Payton up, and found him running for State Senate. Indeed, that’s the race that’s the focus of Season 2, and the more mature race is reflected in the more mature aesthetic teased in these first-look images.

Payton’s opponent for the New York State Senate seat is Dede Standish (Judith Light), with Bette Midler joining the cast as Dede’s chief of staff.

Murphy recently told Collider that his plan is to take a significant break between Season 2 and Season 3 so that Platt can age into what may be the show’s final season, as The Politician Season 3 will find him running for President of the United States:

"I would like to do, and I think all of us involved in it, would probably like to do three seasons total. And I think where season two ends, what I would love to do is take a couple of years off and have Ben Platt get a little bit older for his final race. That would obviously be a presidential race, right? That’s always what we had designed, and I think that’s what our plan is. I’m going to wait. Ben is young, so I want to wait a couple of years to figure out how we age him up a little bit. But that’s always been my plan."

For now, though, we still have The Politician Season 2 to look forward to. Check out the first photos below ahead of the new season’s June 19th premiere date on Netflix. The series also stars Gwyneth Paltrow, Zoey Deutch, and Lucy Boynton.

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Photo by Giovanni Rufino/Netflix
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Photo by Netflix
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Image via Netflix
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Photo by Nicole Rivelli/Netflix
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Photo by Giovanni Rufino/Netflix
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Photo by Nicole Rivelli/Netflix
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Photo by Netflix
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Photo by Giovanni Rufino/Netflix
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Photo by Netflix
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Photo by Giovanni Rufino/Netflix

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Here’s the official synopsis for The Politician Season 2:

Payton Hobart (Ben Platt) fights to unseat Dede Standish (Judith Light) in the New York State Senate race. As a long-time incumbent and greatly admired Senate Majority Leader with no-nonsense Chief of Staff, Hadassah Gold (Bette Midler) at her side, Dede’s re-election was supposed to be easy, but Payton - who sees this as the next step on his path to the Presidency - must decide what kind of politician he ultimately wants to be in order to succeed, even if that means exposing secrets, lies, and a throuple. Meanwhile, his mother, Georgina Hobart (Gwyneth Paltrow), makes a momentous decision that threatens to upstage him and everything he's hoping to accomplish. But if Payton wants to rise above petty politics and succeed without compromising his character, he must find his voice and strengthen his political message to inspire and excite the voters. Created by Ryan Murphy, Brad Falchuk, and Ian Brennan, The Politician offers a comedic and satirical glimpse into just what it takes to be a politician.