Buttigieg drops out of Democratic presidential nominee race

Washington: Pete Buttigieg, the former Mayor of South Bend, Indiana and also the first openly gay contender to launch a major presidential campaign in the US has dropped out of the Democratic nominee race. “Tonight I am making the difficult decision to suspend my campaign for the presidency,” Efe news quoted the 38-year-old as saying in a speech in South Bend on Sunday.

“We sent a message to every kid out there wondering if whatever marks them out as different means they are destined to be less than.

“To see someone who once felt that exact same way can become a leading presidential candidate with his husband at his side,” he added. Buttigieg had stood out as the youngest candidate in a race dominated by men over 70 and just a month ago he had been reported to be the favorite for the Democratic presidential nomination among voters in the party’s moderate center after winning the February 3 Iowa caucuses by a narrow margin, the first state to vote during the Democratic primary season.

However, Buttigieg was unable to broaden his base of voters and win the support of Latinos in Nevada or the African-Americans in South Carolina in the states’ primaries held last week. “The truth is that the path has narrowed to a close,” Buttigieg said in his speech on Sunday.

The former mayor’s prospects for the contests on Super Tuesday on March 3 were not very promising, given the fact that voter surveys have indicated that Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders would win in California and Texas.

Buttigieg’s withdrawal will surely benefit the rest of the moderates vying for the Democratic nomination, particularly former vice president Joe Biden, who on February 29 won the South Carolina primary. (IANS)

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