Buttigieg Surprises with 1st Place in US Iowa Caucus, Not Sanders or Biden

38-Year-Old LGBTQ+ Storm
Secures 36.2% in Midterm Counting
Sanders Ranks 2nd... Biden Falls to 4th Place

Pete Buttigieg, former mayor of South Bend, Indiana, and a Democratic presidential primary candidate in the United States, traveled to New Hampshire on the 4th (local time), following Iowa, for the second primary contest and the first primary election. He is campaigning in Hampton. [Image source=Yonhap News]

[Asia Economy New York=Special Correspondent Baek Jong-min] Can the Barack Obama myth be recreated? A 38-year-old LGBTQ Democratic presidential candidate took a "surprise" first place in the Iowa Caucus, known as the "weathervane."

On the 4th (local time), in the Democratic Iowa Caucus partial count (62%), Peter Buttigieg, former mayor of South Bend, Indiana, recorded a leading 26.9% of the vote. He narrowly surpassed Senator Bernie Sanders (25.1%) and pushed former Vice President Joe Biden (15.6%), who was leading the momentum, down to fourth place, causing a stir. Former Vice President Biden also trailed Senator Elizabeth Warren (18.3%).

Accordingly, the Democratic presidential race's "top two" is expected to shift from Sanders-Biden to "Buttigieg-Sanders," with a new secondary rivalry forming between Warren and Biden.

Former Mayor Buttigieg claimed he was in the lead even when the caucus results were not announced the previous day, and his claim proved correct.

Although it is a partial tally, his rise recalls the case of former President Barack Obama, who won the Iowa Caucus and went on to become the first Black president.

Buttigieg is the youngest among the Democratic presidential candidates. Aside from being South Bend mayor, he has no other public office experience but entered the race advocating generational change based on his success in revitalizing the city's economy. He has steadily built a support base by rejecting Sanders' radical progressivism.

He was selected as a Rhodes Scholar while attending Harvard University, studied at Oxford University in the UK, worked at the consulting firm McKinsey & Company, and took a leave from his mayoral position to serve as a naval intelligence officer in Afghanistan.

Since the final vote count has not yet been released, there is no guarantee he will maintain first place in the Iowa Caucus. The gap with Senator Sanders is only about 1%. While a reversal is possible, he is considered to have succeeded in focusing the attention of the U.S. political world on himself.

This primary result is expected to influence the New Hampshire Primary on the 11th. In New Hampshire, polls show Sanders in the lead with Buttigieg in second place. However, there are views that former Vice President Biden will perform strongly in the Nevada and South Carolina primaries.

The Democratic Iowa Caucus was marked by a major fiasco, with results announced 21 hours after it began at 8 p.m. the previous day (Eastern Time). Despite intentions to conduct the complex caucus transparently, the application introduced for tallying failed to perform its role.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.