Former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said he wouldn’t have run for president if he didn’t believe the country was ready for a gay president.
“My experience in South Bend, Indiana, in getting reelected with 80% of the vote after coming out,” Buttigieg said on Meet the Press. “And my experience, right now, traveling the country, shows me that what’s important, and what’s really on people’s minds, isn’t about you, your identity as a candidate; it’s about them. It’s about their lives.”
Buttigieg ran for the 2020 presidency in April 2019, where he ultimately lost the Democratic nomination to former President Joe Biden. He was the first openly gay man to make a bid for the Oval Office.
Former Vice President Kamala Harris said he was her first choice of potential running mates. In her book, she said he would have been the perfect candidate “if I were a straight white man.” She ultimately decided it was too big a risk for 2024, and felt that asking voters to accept a black woman, married to a Jewish man, with a gay man as her running mate was too risky, Harris wrote in her book.
In an interview with Kristen Welker, Buttigieg said “of course” the country was ready for a gay president, although he dodged repeated questions on whether he was going to run for the 2028 presidential campaign.
“I don’t think now is the time to even be talking about that,” Buttigieg said. “We are about 50 days away from a critically important midterm election; I believe Democrats are going to win.”
