Jason Kander became one of the first big (well, bigish) names to pull himself off the long list of potential 2020 Democratic presidential candidates Monday, announcing he will instead run for mayor of his hometown, Kansas City, Missouri.

Kander, an Afghanistan veteran and former Missouri secretary of state, spent 2017 and 2018 crisscrossing the country to campaign for Democrats and speak to local progressive groups, making more visits to the early presidential primary states than perhaps any other potential 2020er.

By late April, his team boasted to NBC News that Kander had visited 39 states to participate in 156 Democratic events, including 10 trips to New Hampshire and 13 to Iowa. The 37-year-old also has a book coming out in August, which draws on his experience in the Army and as one of the first millennials elected to statewide office.

But Kander, who lost a Senate bid in 2016, decided to aim further down the ballot and vie for Kansas City's open mayorship in the off-year 2019 election. “The next mayor has the opportunity to shape the future of Kansas City for generations,” Kander said in a statement. “I’m running because I am up for that challenge.”