Mayor Pete Buttigieg, often cited as the first potentially gay US President, claims he would not be the first.
In an interview with Axios on HBO, the South Bend, IN Mayor and Democratic Presidential Candidate based the assumption on statistical probability rather than the innuendo which has become part of political lore. Buttigieg made the observation in response to allegations he’s “too gay” to be president.
“People will elect the person who will make the best president,” Buttigieg said. “And we have had excellent presidents who have been young. We have had excellent presidents who have been liberal. I would imagine we’ve probably had excellent presidents who were gay—we just didn’t know which ones.”
Related: Writer questions if Pete Buttigieg is “gay enough” to be the first gay president. Cue the outrage.
When pressed about which presidents were gay, Buttigieg punted. “My gaydar doesn’t even work that well in the present, let alone retroactively,” he quipped. At 37, the Afghan war veteran has come under fire from Republicans for both his age and sexuality.
Historically, scholars have debated the sexualities of several US Presidents. Rumors about James Buchanan dogged the President even during his lifetime, and several historians generally accept that he likely had an affair with William Rufus King. A number of biographers have also suggested Abraham Lincoln had gay affairs, including playwright Larry Kramer.
truthseeker
Joan Rivers said we already did with Obama
Cam
As per usual one of the accounts that always defends anti-LGBT bigots tries to derail a thread about the U.S. possibly having presidents that weren’t straight by trying to bring up Obama.
You got your nickle for mentioning Obama, now quick, say “Fake News” and make it an even Dime the RNC will pay you for this post.
Hdtex
Trump is a methwhore. A pass-around party bottom. PROVE ME WRONG!!!
Kangol2
Barack Obama is the most pro-gay and pro-trans president we have ever had. Unlike this current racist, narcissistic, treasonous moron, he advanced equal rights gay people including you, @truthseeker. I wish Obama were gay, but he’s straight and a longtime ally, going back to his years as an Illinois State Senator. Meanwhile, your fave Drumpf is empowering right-wing Xianist homophobes as fast as he and alleged closet queen Mitch McConnell can cram them onto the federal court system.
Aires the Ram
Obama & Hillary Clinton were never in favor of same-sex marriage until the tide of opinion in the Democratic party shifted that way. You have to remember back a bit further than last week to understand that.
flinnte
Larry Kramer is not as old as Abe Lincoln! Lol
Heywood Jablowme
Almost!
james7
Rumors have circled for years about “bachelor” Lindsay Graham, who has never married. Now that Pete is out and hasn’t been stoned; maybe Ms. Graham will come out too.
Kangol2
I could be wrong, but I believe that Queerty outed or reported on the outing of US Senator John Barrasso (R-Wyoming), who has repeatedly voted for anti-gay legislation. Why he remains under the radar is beyond me. But he and Miss Lindsey probably aren’t the only ones in the US legislature who are hanger banging.
CMarks
I had a college professor who insisted that Abe Lincoln was gay. Of course he had no “proof” but his knowledge of history was amazing.
sfmike64
Lincoln was not gay. Or even homosexual.
James Buchanan though was probably gay. His longtime “dear friend” was a Senator from Alabama.
OzJosh
There is absolutely no way of saying Lincoln was “definitely not” gay. He spent years sharing the same bed with a man and clearly had a deeply emotional relationship with Joshua Speed. While there is no way of proving that the relationship was also sexual, there’s no way of proving that it wasn’t. There’s certainly enough evidence to speculatively join the dots.
graphicjack
The thing is, you can have a non-sexual romantic relationship or attraction with someone of the same-sex and still be gay. Whether or not Lincoln slept with Speed or not, it’s pretty clear he was in love with him. Being gay doesn’t mean you have to act on it sexually. There are many ways to be gay. Look at all those sad little ex-gays out there who eventually become ex-ex-gays. Did them not having sex with men stop them from being gay? Nope.
OzJosh
Totally agree, graphicjack. And that was very likely the case with Lincoln if you read between the lines. Equally, in an era where men frequently shared beds for pragmatic reasons, it’s a fair bet that a lot of opportunistic sex happened between guys who would otherwise have been totally heterosexual. So whether any sex occurred actually isn’t the issue.
Aires the Ram
One must remember that the term, the “concept” of “gay” didn’t even exist prior to the late 1890’s. The trial of Oscar Wilde brought about the idea in the public sphere that homosexuals were a “third sex”, so-to-speak. Guys who were horny messed around together, many of them having been married to procreate. Whole different set of sexual mores and social mores back then. We cannot take the views and social order of today and overlap it onto society over 100 years ago, it just isn’t relevant.
Cam
@Aires the Ram
Except that’s a lie. The fact that it is mentioned in the BIBLE and Britain, our colonizer, had SPECIFIC laws against homosexuality shows that your phony “Oh, guys just used to mess around it’s the LGBT IDENTITY that is the problem is wrong.
So, there’s that.
Aires the Ram
@Cam: No, it’s not a lie. You just missed my point. Of course ‘homosexuality’ always existed, and was mentioned in the OLD testament of the Bible, and other religious writing. But, the concept we have today, and have had since the turn of the last century, of a “gay community”, didn’t exist. Today, we in the western world have the option to form communities. These options didn’t exist much prior to 1900 because the average person did not travel, did not get magazines, gay ones didn’t exist. Homosexual men only knew of other homosexual men through their daily interactions with the community directly around them. There were statistically as many homosexual men around then, as now, it’s just that they had no way of finding one-another. The first ‘notion’ of ‘gay community’ began in certain forbidden bars in large cities like Paris, London, New York, but most homosexual men didn’t live in the big cities, and didn’t even know about such goings on. The concept of ‘gay community’, gay neighborhoods, etc., that we have today in this country, began upon the return of soldiers after WWII. All these guys were thrown together in close quarters, most of having never left the farm or their small town before. All of a sudden homosexual men found their own kind in this all-male military environment. Many of them, the ones lucky enough to live through WWII, came back and stayed in places like San Diego, Los Angeles, San Francisco, New York, Jacksonville, Houston, Miami, rather than return to the isolation of their family farms and/or small towns (think Hooterville). Thus the beginning of modern day ‘community’, not to mention the wide-spread installation of telephones which didn’t exist so much prior to WWII. Ad to that the upsurge in the publication of magazines after the war, such as Athletic Model Guild, et. al. Artists such as Tom of Finland, George Quaintance finally began having a venue to get their works to whom they were designed for.
frenchjr25
President Buchanan didn’t have an “affair” with William Rufus King. They were partners and lived together for 20+ years.
Cam
LOL!
Along the lines of “He can’t be gay! He was in a fraternity!”.
GayEGO
It would not surprise me, I called my husband my roommate for years. No one here knows what these presidents in the past did in private and frankly, I care about our president being intelligent, respectable, loving, and inclusive for all Americans.
Cam
And look, if media today is still shielding people in the closet, of course they were going to cover for people back then.
Yes, I”m talking about people like Jeremy Renner who has had a “Roomate” for ever a decade, and media said they live together because they “Flip Houses”. Hmmmm, that house flip has taken about 10 years on the last one. (Eye Roll).
IanHunter
I know that Abe L. is gay. For I am the ghost of Joshua Fry Speed. We still kick it from time to time. Boo!
AxelDC
James Buchanan was a “confirmed bachelor”.
Aires the Ram
My Grandmother, who was born in 1898, and lived in the same house from 1920 to 1985, used to talk about {her words} the “old batches” who lived down the street for years. They were accepted as part of the fabric of the neighborhood just like everyone else. When I was in my mid-20’s, it was brought up at a family dinner that I’d better hurry up and find a girl and get married, so that I didn’t have my kids too late. My Grandma piped up and said, “he’s gonna be just like the ‘old batches’ who lived down the street”. ‘Batches’ was her short for ‘bachelors’. Nobody back then thought of them as “other” in any way, and they didn’t talk about, or even care what went on in the bedroom or what the sleeping arrangements might have been.
Chipper
Whoever has been or not been, its speculation. I do not see it a problem having an out president Anything would beat the thing that is there now.
jrdubz
James Buchanan has gay face.
nitejonboy
You got that right!!! Bet he was a power bottom in his day! lol
montegutdude
Without any doubt at least one ex-President touched a penis in college. The Republic will endure.
graphicjack
In Canada we had William Lyon Mackenzie King who was a secret queen. I bet if you go back you’ll find a mo’ somewhere in power in pretty much every country at one point in their history.
OzJosh
In Australia we had three Prime Ministers in quick succession (Holt, McMahon, Whitlam) who were all rumoured to have been either homosexual/bisexual or had homosexual liaisons. Each case was very different. Two were known to have discretely frequented gay beats. One was a sexual lothario who was seemingly up for anything. One was a deeply closeted guy who repressed his sexuality and married the most glamorous woman he could find to serve as a smokescreen. The third had discrete sexual liaisons with men that were kept almost entirely under the radar. All of this is in living memory, yet it’s amazing how political biographies and histories have almost exclusively drawn a discrete veil over their unofficial sex lives. And whenever anyone raises questions over their sexuality they are invariably howled down by family members and party faithful who are invested in preserving the official record. It gives you some idea of just how easily politicians lives can be shrouded in myth and misinformation, and how easily inconvenient truths can be suppressed.
Aires the Ram
Not a president, but you don’t have to dig very far to find homosexual scandal surrounding J. Edgar Hoover.
Ronbo
It was also a “shocking” rumor that Liberace was gay. Times change.
nitejonboy
Wonder if Lincoln was a top or a bottom….I’m pretty sure Madison was a power bottom.