Former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg is expected to announce Thursday that he will not run for Michigan's open U.S. Senate seat, it was reported.
Instead, the 43-year-old former South Bend, Indiana, mayor has an eye on running for president, Politico reported.
Prominent allies said Buttigieg could not feasibly do both, even as some raised the comparison to Barack Obama, who was elected president just four years after becoming a U.S. senator.
Politico reported Thursday that people in Buttigieg's inner circle said the decision put him in the strongest possible position to seek the presidency, and was based on the belief that successive campaigns in 2026 and 2028 would be exceedingly difficult.
Democrats in the key battleground state are seeking to hold onto the seat being vacated by retiring Sen. Gary Peters, D-Mich.
The openly gay Buttigieg, who ran for president in 2020, moved to Traverse City, Michigan, with his young family, after four years of working in former President Joe Biden's Cabinet.
"He wanted to decide quickly enough to give other folks a chance to mobilize if they wanted to run," Sen. Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii, said, Politico reported.
"He handled it responsibly. He's a rising star in the Democratic Party."
The Associated Press contributed to this story.