ANKENY, Iowa — Democratic presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg urged Iowa voters not to remain divided like many in the party remained after 2016.
“Inside or outside this party, the less 2020 looks like 2016 the better,” Buttigieg said Thursday night at a Town Hall meeting he held in Ankeny, a northern suburb of Des Moines.
Buttigieg, Joe Biden and Andrew Yang campaigned in Iowa on Thursday. But three of the other high-profile candidates remain in Washington, D.C.
U.S. Senators Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren and Amy Klobuchar are jurors on the impeachment trial of President Donald Trump. Each of them scheduled events in Iowa on Friday night and Saturday.
“The GOP senators may be the jurors today but we’re the jurors tomorrow,” Buttgieg told applauding supporters.
Despite being on trial, Trump campaigned in Des Moines Thursday night, essentially crashing the Democrats' party in Iowa.
Trump lost the Iowa Caucuses in 2016 but he won the state in the general election.
The Buttigieg campaign said 574 supporters attended his Town Hall event Thursday night. It was a young crowd, but not diverse.
Buttigieg made the case to his supporters that it’s time for a younger generation of Democrats to take the lead in the party.
“I’ve seen VP Biden argue that we can’t afford to take a risk on a new person now. I would argue that at a time like this what we can’t afford to take the risk of is falling back on the familiar because history has shown us we have to look to the future in order to win.”