After acknowledging during an interview on Tuesday that he is considering a bid for the White House in 2028, Pete Buttigieg stepped onto a stage in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, for a 45-minute town hall where he looked and sounded very much a candidate launching his presidential campaign.

The former U.S. Transportation Secretary warned that “we are being tested on nothing less” than the strength of America’s commitments to freedom and democracy over the next four years of President Donald Trump’s second term.

Rather than “hang back” while those in power “screw up,” he said now is the time to advance and articulate an agenda charting a new path forward for the country, including by restoring access to abortion and better addressing the challenges and meeting the needs of the nation’s veterans and with their families and communities.

As Democrats work to rebuild with an eye toward retaking control of the White House and both chambers of Congress, the party has wrestled with questions of whether and to what extent last year’s electoral defeat may have been attributable to the adoption of policy positions that were unpopular or out of step with views held by key parts of the electorate.

Buttigieg on Tuesday stressed the importance of identifying which parts of the platform should be revisited, the areas in which a greater diversity of viewpoints should be tolerated and welcomed into the Democratic coalition, and when to provide room for disagreement and debate. 

As an example, he took the matter of whether and in which circumstances athletes should be allowed to compete on sports teams that are consistent with their gender identity but inconsistent with their birth sex. 

“I think we do need to revisit some of the things that we have had to say policy-wise that haven’t kept up with the times as a party,” he said, adding, “Americans may have questions about how to make sure sports are safe and fair, which I get.” 

At the same time, “that doesn’t ever mean throwing vulnerable people under the bus,” Buttigieg said — and not just because that would be wrong, but also because it’s bad politics for Democrats. 

For example, “Americans understand that your gender identity shouldn’t affect whether you get to vote,” Buttigieg said, referencing policies passed by conservative lawmakers in Iowa and several other states that would render voters ineligible to cast their ballots in cases where there are discrepancies in the information listed on their official documents, records, and government-issued IDs. The rules are expected to disproportionately impact transgender people who are far likelier than their cisgender counterparts  to have updated the gender markers and names listed on their driver’s licenses, for example.

Buttigieg, a decorated U.S. Navy Reserve officer who was deployed to Afghanistan, also raised an example of unpopular anti-trans policymaking, the Trump-Vance administration’s ban on military service by trans soldiers: “Americans understand,” he said, “that if you are, for example, a soldier who is doing a good job, who is getting good ratings from commander who is contributing to the readiness of this mission, who is ready to put their life on the line, who happens to be transgender, you ought to be honored and not kicked out of the military.”

The line drew applause from attendees, who included a number of veterans including members and staff from VoteVets, the progressive advocacy group that organized the town hall.

Also in attendance on Tuesday were supporters who wore official merchandise from Buttigieg’s 2020 run, which began with his surprise first-place finish in the Iowa Democratic presidential caucuses ahead of then-former Vice President Joe Biden and U.S. Sens. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) — a transformational moment for the openly gay former mayor of South Bend, Ind., who thereafter emerged as a rising star in his party and quickly become a formidable force in American politics on the national stage.

Many elected officials and other influential stakeholders within the Democratic Party now consider Buttigieg the strongest or one of the strongest of its communicators. His name has often been floated as a strong choice to lead the ticket as the Democratic presidential nominee.And he seems well positioned for a run in 2028. Even so, this far in advance of the election candidates are more circumspect about discussing their plans or their thinking about a bid for the White House so far in advance of the election.

However, Trump’s second administration and the new Congress led in both chambers by Republican loyalists seems to have prompted a number of other top Democrats to dispense with the coquettishness. A report in Politico notes that Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear, Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, former Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel, and former U.S. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo have recently either made overtures signaling they are considering a run or declined opportunities to deny it.

California Congressman Robert Garcia on Wednesday asked Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem about the well-being of a gay asylum seeker from Venezuela who the U.S. “forcibly removed” to El Salvador.

The gay Democrat during a House Homeland Security Committee hearing asked Noem whether Andry Hernández Romero is “alive” and whether “we can check and do a wellness check on him.”

“This individual is in El Salvador, and the appeal would be best made to the president and to the government of El Salvador,” Noem told Garcia.

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The Trump-Vance administration in March “forcibly removed” Hernández, who asked for asylum because of persecution he suffered due to his sexual orientation and political beliefs, and other Venezuelans from the U.S. and sent them to El Salvador.

The White House on Feb. 20 designated Tren de Aragua, a Venezuelan gang, as an “international terrorist organization.” President Donald Trump on March 15 invoked the Alien Enemies Act of 1798, which the Associated Press notes allows the U.S. to deport “noncitizens without any legal recourse.”

Alvaro M. Huerta, director of litigation and advocacy for the Immigrant Defenders Law Center, a Los Angeles-based organization that represents Hernández, said officials with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and U.S. Customs and Border Protection claimed their client is a Tren de Aragua member because of his tattoos.

The Washington Blade on April 17 reported Hernández was sent to El Salvador’s Terrorism Confinement Center, a maximum-security prison known by the Spanish acronym CECOT.

Garcia, along with U.S. Reps. Maxwell Alejandro Frost (D-Fla.), Maxine Dexter (D-Ore.), and Yassamin Ansari (D-Ariz.) last month met with U.S. Ambassador to El Salvador William Duncan and embassy staffers in San Salvador, the Salvadoran capital. The lawmakers did not visit CECOT, but Garcia told the Blade that the embassy agreed to ask the Salvadoran government to “see how (Hernández) is doing and to make sure he’s alive.”

The cuts to federal spending in a reconciliation proposal published on Monday by the U.S. House Energy and Commerce Committee’s Republican majority could jeopardize critical programs that disproportionately serve LGBTQ communities, the Human Rights Campaign warned.

As lawmakers were set to convene for a markup on Tuesday, the country’s largest LGBTQ advocacy group said in a press release that the bill would “pose significant threats” particularly for those that might be “low-income, living with HIV, or facing food insecurity.”

HRC added that conservative members have added provisions that would (1) prohibit the use of federal Medicaid and CHIP funding to support guideline-directed, medically necessary healthcare interventions for transgender youth (2) prevent “states from defining that care as ‘essential health benefits’ for transgender people of all ages,” and (3) block funding for health providers like Planned Parenthood that “have worked diligently to create welcoming, affirming environments for the LGBTQ+ community and that are committed to reproductive freedom and providing care to all who need it.”

Since reconciliation is carved out as an exemption to the Senate filibuster, which typically requires a 60-vote threshold for legislation to pass, Republicans would need only a simple majority in the upper chamber.

In a statement, HRC President Kelley Robinson said:“People in this country have been clear — they want policies and solutions that make life better and expand access to the American Dream. Instead, anti-equality lawmakers drafted a handout for billionaires built on the backs of hardworking people — with devastating consequences for the LGBTQ+ community.

“Proposed cuts to programs like Medicaid and SNAP or resources like Planned Parenthood clinics, all of which  disproportionately support LGBTQ+ Americans, are not just numbers on a page. They would mean families forced to choose between seeing a doctor and paying the rent. They would mean people forced to skip check ups and testing. They would mean kids missing meals.

“And attempts to load up the bill with attacks on access to health care for transgender youth drive home the point that this bill is not about the American people, but inflicting harm for political gain. This country deserves better, and we’re going to fight for it.”

Per HRC’s press release, the Congressional Budget Office estimates the Republican led proposal “could kick 13.7 million people off of Medicaid,” a program that covers “a disproportionate share of low-income LGBTQ+ people, including 21 percent of transgender individuals and 40 percent of people living with HIV.”

Along with the threat of withholding access to medicines for individual patients living with HIV, the proposed cuts could also undermine public health goals with respect to America’s decades-long effort to combat the epidemic, along with the work of community health centers that provide “services like mental health support, gender-affirming care, and STI testing.”

The group notes that LGBTQ populations — especially women, younger individuals, and LGBTQ people of color — tend to experience higher rates of food insecurity, the group noted, which means they are likely to suffer greater harm from the “stricter eligibility requirements, work mandates, and benefit reductions” targeting the SNAP program.