Surrounded by high school students, Presidential candidate Rep. Dennis Kucinich, D-Ohio, spoke strongly against the American occupation of Iraq in a campaign stop Monday at Ames High School.

Amid 125 people present, Kucinich voiced his opposition to the Bush administration’s handling of Iraq, calling for full withdrawal of American troops and the turnover of all reconstruction duties to the United Nations.

“Here’s how it works,” he said. “Number one, we go to the U.N., and we tell them, ‘You handle the oil assets on the behalf of the Iraqi people’ so there’s no question about whether the U.S. is in there for oil. Number two, hand over the contracts to the U.N. on behalf of the Iraqi people until they can reach self-governance. No more war profiteering, no more Halliburton deals.”

Kucinich said the United States must give up any efforts to privatize Iraq. The United Nations should handle the cost of governance, a constitution and to help the Iraqis with elections.

“That’s my message: U.N. in, U.S. out,” he said.

If elected president, Kucinich said he would create a cabinet- level Department of Peace that would work to make non-violence an organizing principle in society. He said the department would promote peace from the family and community level to the international level.

“The Department of Peace would use education and work with non-government organizations and student and community groups to look at the real issues of violence in our society and work to change them,” he said.

Responding to a question about corporate influence in government, Kucinich denounced the North American Free Trade Agreement and the World Trade Organization and said he would repeal both.

“Global corporations want to have slave labor, prison labor and even child labor. They want to be free to ruin the air and the water, and as long as they have trade laws that let them do it, they will, because it means more profit,” he said. “Your generation presents the possibility for real integrity in our commerce around the world.”

Kucinich also touched on several domestic issues, including gun control, which he supports, and the war on drugs. As president, he said, he would decriminalize marijuana and offer drug rehabilitation as part of a universal health care program.

Throughout the speech, Kucinich emphasized his working-class roots and his career in public service that began at age 22, likening his early political activism to the opportunities of his audience of first-time caucus participants and voters.

“My campaign for the presidency is about transforming the vision and harnessing the power that you have as young people,” he said. “[It’s about] the power of that rebellious spirit of youth that took me into politics at an early age. That’s what powers this campaign.”

Though the congressman stood in fifth place in a Reuters/MSNBC/Zogby poll released Monday, he said he was confident about his chances in next week’s Iowa caucuses.

“I think there’s definitely been a surge in my direction because Iowans want a candidate who is going to stand strong to bring U.N. peacekeepers in [to Iraq] and bring our troops home,” he said.

His support in the poll was at 3 percent, up from 2 percent in the previous poll. Dean leads all candidates with 26 percent.