A Midwestern mayor running for the Democratic nomination for President, Pete Buttigieg held a town hall event in Washington Sunday. Nearly 400 people attended the event at the Washington Middle School. Buttigieg spoke about what he would address if elected, including efforts to unite the country, respect internationally, to offer Medicare for all who want it, livable wages and housing needs, veterans’ care, and climate change.

He spoke with KCII News about the role agriculture will have in climate improvements, “So I view agriculture as a huge part of the solution. It doesn’t get talked about enough. In fact, I think a lot of rural Americans feel like they’re being beat over the head with this issue and told that they’re the problem. But if you look at the potential of soil management, cover crops, and other agricultural techniques, agriculture can be taking out carbon from out of the atmosphere, and that is exactly the sort of thing that we need to be doing. I would like us to be as proud of the achievements of negative-carbon agriculture as we are about Norman Borlaug and the Green Revolution, to say that it started here in the American heartland and spread across the world. And I believe that deserves to be right alongside things like solar and wind energy and other techniques for fighting climate change, so that we can all stand proud of what each of us has brought to the struggle.” He explains that if elected, the way to accomplish this is by increasing funding for programs that already exist, including the Environmental Quality Incentives Program and Conservation Stewardship Program, as well as opening new channels to encourage and pay farmers to lead in negative-carbon agriculture.

The U.S. Navy veteran also visited Coralville on Sunday before having the chance to go home to Southbend, Indiana for the night along the busy campaign trail.