WASHINGTON – Luke Robbins couldn’t hold back the tears when he introduced South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg as a featured speaker at the College Democrats of America’s 2018 convention.

Robbins told the gathering that Buttigieg’s 2015 public essay, “Why Coming out Matters,” helped persuade him – a gay teen from a conservative Indiana family – to come out. It also showed him that doing so wouldn’t mean giving up his love of politics.

As Buttigieg explores a bid for the 2020 Democratic nomination for president, “it just makes me so happy,” said Robbins, president of College Democrats of Indiana.

But Buttigieg isn’t necessarily Robbins’ top choice for the nomination. “I’m personally very feminist. I would love to see a female candidate,” he said. “I have no clue who I’m going to support.”

And there's the evolution in American politics. Buttigieg’s trailblazing role as the first presidential contender with a same-sex spouse is a milestone – maybe more so because it has not won him instant backing from the LGBTQ community, an important part of the Democratic base. Just as not all women supported Hillary Clinton because she was female, Buttigieg isn't getting monolithic support from LGBTQ voters.

Embracing, not defining

Buttigieg's exploratory campaign comes only about a decade after the 2008 Democratic presidential candidates did not get behind same-sex marriage. But it follows closely on a record number of LGBTQ candidates winning office in the 2018 elections in which the community provided some of the energy that helped Democrats take the House and many governorships across the country.

Activists are already excited about trying to defeat President Donald Trump in 2020.

The Human Rights Campaign Foundation, the educational arm of the nation’s largest lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer civil rights organization, will co-host a forum for 2020 Democratic presidential candidates this fall.

Like many other Democratic constituencies, however, they’re taking their time deciding who in the crowded field of hopefuls has the best chance of ousting Trump.

Buttigieg is navigating the advantages of his historic bid – such as getting media attention and an early fundraising boost – without letting it define his potential candidacy. He has been guided by how Barack Obama, who has called Buttigieg a gifted politician, handled the question of race.

“No one could ignore the historic nature of his candidacy,” Buttigieg told USA TODAY. “But he found a way of embracing that without letting it define him.”

In fact, MetroWeekly, a magazine for Washington’s LGBTQ community, asked Buttigieg if he’s worried that he appears to be “part of the status quo” as a “white cisgender man.”

“If that’s the case, then that represents progress,” Buttigieg told USA TODAY. “My lifestyle, if you want to use that word, is pretty conservative. Chasten and I live with our dogs, in our neighborhood, are building a marriage and hopefully eventually a family. That’s just who we are.”

Waiting to endorse

Buttigieg got a hearty reception in January when he stopped by the headquarters of the Human Rights Campaign. But the gay rights organization has not promised him an endorsement.

“HRC is going to consider all our options,” said JoDee Winterhof, senior vice president for policy and political affairs. “But we have a field of many pro-equality candidates.”

The LGBTQ Victory Fund, a group that supports gay and transgender candidates, is waiting for the race to develop.

Buttigieg will have the chance to impress the group’s backers when speaking at their main fundraising event in April. And the Victory Fund did activate its supporters to help him meet the Democratic National Committee’s donor support threshold for being invited to this summer’s debate.

“We will do our best to help him raise his profile,” said Annise Parker, the group’s president and CEO. “But in terms of an actual endorsement, he’s got to win that.”

More:Pete Buttigieg says he’s mayor of a turnaround city. Here’s how that claim stands up.

Who came before

Buttigieg is not the first openly gay presidential hopeful from a major party.

That would be Fred Karger, who seems a little miffed that people don’t remember him.

“My historic campaign in 2012 made me the first,” Karger recently wrote in The Advocate. “Then why all the mainstream media omissions of my historic candidacy and so many qualifiers when describing Pete’s run?”

Karger ran as a sort of party crasher for the GOP nomination. Passing out pins that crossed the American flag with the rainbow one, the gay rights advocate compared himself to Shirley Chisholm, the first African-American to run for president. He wanted to be an inspiration to young people and to pave the way for the next openly gay candidate.

“So, Pete, go for it,” he wrote.

'A little less of a long shot'

At this early stage, Buttigieg is an underdog in a crowded field of bigger names and longer resumes. But he gained significant buzz after his recent appearance at a CNN town hall in Austin at the South By Southwest conference, which helped expand his donor base enough to meet the DNC’s viability threshold for the debates.

“He’ll be a little less of a long shot tomorrow,” former Obama strategist David Axelrod tweeted after the town hall.

He was also a long shot when he ran in 2017 to head the DNC. He didn’t win, but he won the support of five former chairmen and made many other party insiders sit up and take notice.

Buttigieg took people by surprise when, at age 29, he became the youngest mayor of a city with more than 100,000 residents.

Now 37, Buttigieg would be the youngest person to take the oath of office if elected president.

“I see a moment that’s kind of crying out for generational change,” he has said when talking about the standing he would bring as a millennial and Afghanistan war veteran to issues such as gun control, climate change, income stagnation and fighting terrorism.

“I think that’s actually the most significant thing, more so than where he’s from or his sexual orientation,” said John Bauters, an openly gay member of the Emeryville, California, City Council who supports Buttigieg. “Electing young people is critical at all levels of government right now.”

Standing out by coming out

While Buttigieg has emphasized his millennial status, executive experience and industrial Midwestern roots much more than his marriage, his sexual identity has helped him stand out.

“If his husband happened to be a wife and not a husband, he’d look really boring,” said Andrew Reynolds, a political science professor at the University of North Carolina and author of “The Children of Harvey Milk: How LGBTQ Politicians Changed the World.”

The New York Times covered his marriage to teacher Chasten Glezman last June under the headline: “Pete Buttigieg Might Be President Someday. He’s Already Got the First Man.”

In February, CNN promoted that it was airing the first joint interview with the campaigning couple.

"I'm a gay man from Indiana. I know how to deal with a bully,” Buttigieg responded when asked by CNN how he would handle attacks from Trump.

In his recently published memoir and in interviews, Buttigieg talks about what is was like coming out in a state headed by then-Gov. Mike Pence who signed a “religious freedom” law viewed by critics as a license to discriminate against gay people. Buttigieg calls the vice president “fanatical” in his beliefs.

“I think it chills a lot of us, especially in the LGBTQ community, to see that somebody like that can be in that kind of position of power,” Buttigieg told BuzzFeed News – after drawing headlines at the CNN town hall for calling Pence the “cheerleader of the porn star presidency.”

Buttigieg said his status has helped in recruiting and mobilizing supporters. And it gives donors a way to contribute to keep him in the mix while avoiding committing to one candidate this early in the process.

"It takes a little pressure off potential backers," he said, when the pitch is "we recognize that it will take a little time to close the deal on who your preferred nominee is going to be. But can we all agree that you want to see somebody like me on that debate stage?"

Not all positive

While he’s regularly thanked on the campaign trail for inspiring others in the LGBTQ community, Buttigieg has also dealt with “some unpleasant things in my inbox and in our mailbox sometimes.” He declined to elaborate about that and whether he has had concerns about his personal safety.

“It’s something that obviously we’ve talked about, taking steps to make sure we’re paying attention to that,” he told USA TODAY. “We take it in stride and deal with it. There’s always an ugly side in politics no matter where you’re coming from. But you can’t let that dominate your attention, because it’s part of what we’re trying to do away with.”

Still, he longs for the day when his sexuality won’t be considered noteworthy and gay politicians won’t have to publish essays announcing their identity.

“Ideally, I should have just showed up at a chicken dinner with a dude,” he said at a February reading of his best-selling memoir, “Shortest Way Home.”

Authenticity sells

The self-described introvert is candid in his book and at public events about feeling humiliated to have been in his 30s with no clue of what it was like to be in love because it had taken him so long to come out.

That kind of openness can help him with voters, even if they’re uncomfortable with his sexuality, said Parker of the LGBTQ Victory Fund.

“There’s a dynamic where a voter will say, internally, 'You’re honest with me about your sexual orientation, which is something of which I disapprove, (so) you’ll probably be honest with me about everything,’” she said. “What voters are hungry for right now are authentic, honest candidates.”

A record number of openly gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people were elected across the country in November, including two in the Senate and eight in the House.

Parker expects the trend to continue in 2020 because “success breeds success.”

“And having someone from the community running for president will help fan the flames as well,” she said.

Still a liability?

Research, however, shows there’s still a residual prejudice against gay candidates, said Reynolds, the political science professor at the University of North Carolina. That’s not necessarily because of the candidate’s sexuality. But it also could be because of the fear they can’t win. Plus, voters like experience, and openly gay candidates have not been competing as long.

“It’s not a death knell,” Reynolds said. “But it’s still a hurdle.”

Buttigieg knows his electability is on the minds of some Democrats. But when his party has focused on who is viewed as having the best chance of winning, rather than “someone we believed in,” he said, “we wound up generating somebody who was less electable.”

His blunt response for the multiple interviewers asking if the country is ready for an openly gay president?

“There’s only one way to find out.”

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