As the results of the Iowa caucuses came in Monday night, former Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley — who performed worse than expected — said he would be suspending his campaign.
The underdog Democratic candidate told reporters he would be addressing supporters in Iowa on Monday to officially make the announcement. Though O’Malley never gained much traction or attracted many supports since launching his campaign in Baltimore last May, he was able to push both Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders by putting forward progressive, bold commitments in areas like immigration and climate change.
On immigration, O’Malley said he would make comprehensive reform a priority on his first day in office. He vowed to expand President Obama’s executive actions on immigration and, putting him farther left than the other two candidates, vowed to extend health care to undocumented immigrants.
And O’Malley was the first Democratic candidate to issue an aggressive plan to tackle climate change.
During his eight months in the race, he also proposed a “21st century worker bill of rights” which brought workers’ chaotic schedules into the presidential campaign. And he showed his commitment to supporting minorities, immigrants, and workers by meeting with hunger strikers to prove a point about immigrant detention and rallying with workers of the Trump Hotel in Las Vegas attempting to unionize.