Buttigieg enters 2020 race, would be first openly gay nominee

He is a longshot candidate, but South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg said Wednesday he is jumping into the burgeoning 2020 Democratic field challenging Donald Trump, aiming to become the first openly gay presidential nominee.

Should he win, the 37-year-old wunderkind, a US Navy reservist who took leave from his mayoral duties to serve in Afghanistan, would also be America's youngest-ever commander in chief.

Buttigieg announced that he has formed a presidential exploratory committee, a key opening step to formally launching a bid.

He joins a growing list of charismatic Democrats seeking to carry the party's torch into 2020, including three female US senators -- Elizabeth Warren, Kamala Harris and Kirsten Gillibrand -- and Hispanic-American former Obama cabinet member Julian Castro.

In a nearly-two-minute video posted online, Buttigieg portrayed himself as a can-do reformer -- he has earned high praise for reviving his mid-sized Indiana city -- from America's millennial generation eyeing the future, not the past.

"Right now our country needs a fresh start," he says in the clip.

"There's no such thing as again in the real world. We can't look for greatness in the past."