While thousands came out to see the 22 Democratic presidential candidates who converged on Columbia this weekend, there were no seismic shifts in the 2020 race for the White House that is far from the finish line.

Content to focus on introducing themselves to voters in the state that will hold the South's first primary next February, the candidates refrained from attacking each other, opting instead to hurl insults at Republican President Donald Trump. They also avoided any damaging missteps before leaving South Carolina to prepare for the next test on the campaign trail — a two-part debate that will be held Wednesday and Thursday in Miami.

“Nothing happened this weekend that changes the landscape of the candidates and where they stand," said state Sen. Karl Allen, a Democrat from Greenville.

The one thing that did change, Allen said, was the degree of enthusiasm that the state's hard-core Democrats are feeling after attending a party dinner and U.S. Rep. Jim Clyburn's World Famous Fish Fry on Friday night and Saturday's daylong convention.

“There is an attitude afoot, a climate change," Allen said in an interview. "It is one the excites me."

Here are some key takeaways from this weekend's events:

Joe Biden, Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren stay at the head of the pack

Thanks to the eight years that he spent as Barack Obama's vice president, Biden is the best-known Democratic presidential candidate and he will head into the debate in Miami as the field's clear front-runner.

Biden's poll numbers have fallen over the past month, however. And he was roundly criticized for his remarks at a fundraiser last week about how he worked in the past with two segregationist senators. After an uninspired speech that barely lasted a minute at Friday night's fish fry, Biden rebounded Saturday when he took the stage as the last speaker at the state Democratic Party convention.

Biden went on the offensive against Trump, accusing him of encouraging white supremacists, embracing dictators and weakening American's global alliances.

“Four more years of Donald Trump will permanently change the character of this country. We can’t let that happen," Biden said. He also ticked off a laundry list of proposals that many of his Democratic rivals have already endorsed such as providing funding for universal pre-kindergaren, tuition-free community college and re-instituting a ban on assault weapons.

Sanders, a U.S. senator from Vermont who came up short in his bid to topple Hillary Clinton in 2016, and Warren, a U.S. senator from Massachusetts, are jockeying for second place behind Biden.

Warren was one of the best-received candidates at the fish fry. Sanders appeared Saturday with several black members of the South Carolina House of Representatives, which his campaign hopes will help him make inroads with black voters who are expected to cast a majority of the ballots in next year's Democratic primary.

In a feisty speech, Sanders said that the corporate wing of the Democratic Party has deemed him to be an "existential threat" because he will fight the insurance and drug companies, break up major banks and promote sustainable energy.

Strong showings for Beto O'Rourke and Kamala Harris

Of the throng of candidates who came to South Carolina, O'Rourke may have had the best weekend.

Clyburn praised the former congressman from Texas on Friday night, saying his live-stream of a 2016 sit-in at the U.S. House of Representatives helped set the stage for the Democratic takeover of the chamber last year.

On Saturday afternoon, O'Rourke entered the Columbia Metropolitan Convention Center with scores of youthful supporters chanting his name and clanging cow bells. Instead of taking the stage like other candidates, he gave his speech standing amid those supporters.

O'Rourke focused on the plight of children who have been caught up in Trump's effort to stem illegal immigration on the Mexican border.

“In my hometown of El Paso, in a border patrol detention center, there are children sleeping on cold concrete floors with aluminum foil for blankets," he said.

Allen said he heard positive reviews of the speech that Harris gave at the convention Saturday morning. A former prosecutor, she is a first-term U.S. senator from California.

"We have in this White House a president who says he wants to make America great again. But what does that mean?" Harris asked.

"Does that mean he wants to take us back to before schools were integrated? Does that mean he wants to take us back before the Voting Rights Act was enacted? Does that mean he wants to take us back before the Civil Rights Act was enacted? Does he mean he wants to take us back before Roe v. Wade was enacted?"

Fatal police shooting sidetracks Pete Buttigieg

Buttigieg, the mayor of South Bend, Indiana, has been one of the surprise stories in the Democratic presidential race.

But he left the campaign trail for several days after a white South Bend police officer fatally shot a black man. Buttigieg missed Clyburn's fish fry on Friday night so that he could take part in a March in his city. CNN posted a video on its website showing angry residents confronting the mayor, including one who asked whether he is a racist.

Buttigieg traveled to Columbia on Saturday to speak at the convention. He also joined 19 other Democratic candidates at a forum hosted by Planned Parenthood's political arm.

His community "will become stronger in the broken places," Buttigieg said at the convention.

No major breakthroughs for lesser-known candidates

The candidates trailing those in the top tier didn't capture any major headlines in Columbia.

Michael Bennet, a U.S. senator from Colorado, raised some eye brows at the fish fry by questioning whether Trump loves America.

Eric Swalwell, a congressman from California, compared his party's White House hopefuls to the Avengers, saying, "We are here to save America." He also received a positive response at the convention after calling for bold measures to reduce gun violence.

A small but vocal group of supporters cheered for businessman Andrew Yang, whose tagline is "the opposite of Donald Trump is an Asian man who likes math.”

Allen said the candidates lagging in the polls may have to sharpen their rhetoric during the debate in Miami "because it is now or never."

Democrats face a steep climb in GOP-dominated South Carolina

Buoyed by Joe Cunningham's hard-fought win in the 1st Congressional District last fall and the big crowds that turned out for this weekend's events, state Democratic leaders talked boldly at the convention about turning South Carolina blue.

But the reality is that Trump remains popular in the Palmetto State. Republicans continue to have a stranglehold on both chambers of the General Assembly, every statewide elected office, both U.S. Senate seats and five of the seven U.S. House seats in South Carolina.

State GOP Chairman Drew McKissick issued a pair of statements mocking his Democrats rivals over the weekend, including one that compared the visiting presidential candidates to a "clown car."

In what could be seen as a metaphor for the challenge facing the party, an escalator in the convention center stopped working after Biden's speech Saturday, forcing Democratic delegates to make a steep climb to the building's exit.

Follow Kirk Brown on Twitter @KirkBrown_AIM