(Politico)
DAVID SIDERS 04/08/2019 05:02 AM
DES MOINES, Iowa — Between the prom proposal from a young admirer, the long lines for photographs and the conservative tracker recording his every word, Beto O’Rourke had all the hallmarks of a top-tier candidate during his latest swing through Iowa.
Yet by the time he left the state on Sunday, it was also clear that the euphoria that greeted O’Rourke’s entry into the race three weeks earlier has started to subside. The inevitable slog of competing in a packed Democratic primary is underway, and O’Rourke has not yet drawn the wave of national adulation from the left that his Senate run against Ted Cruz last year received.
“He’s going to have to do the work,” said Scott Brennan, an Iowa Democratic National Committee member and a former state party chairman. “And it isn’t all breathless, 300-person crowds.”
O’Rourke has seen little movement in polls since he announced. He posted an impressive — but not first-in-class — fundraising total for the first quarter of the year. Another young, relatively inexperienced politician, Pete Buttigieg, has emerged as the Democratic upstart of the moment.
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