Former presidential candidate Mayor Pete Buttigieg has opened up about the support–and pushback–he got from fellow LGBTQ people on the campaign trail.
During a GLAAD Livestream hosted by Billy Eichner, the 38-year-old former mayor of South Bend, Indiana addressed his history-making candidacy as an out, married gay man on the campaign trail. He also talked about the criticism he received from some corners of the queer community.
“I think our LGBT+ community is going through that generational experience,” Buttigieg waxed. “I wonder if for some people it was empowering, in terms of a group that’s so close to the edge in terms of marginalization, to frankly feel empowered to be queer and to not vote for [an out-queer candidate]. One generation’s just astonished that there can even be a candidate who is queer, but I think for some others, it might have felt empowering to be able to be queer and not vote for a candidate who is queer. On some level, I get that. I just hope that people can have whatever their political views are and not be mean.”
Related: Forget the beard, Mayor Pete just shaved his head.
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Buttigieg went on to elaborate on some of the “mean” views he and his husband Chasten endured during his run. While some of the criticism came from political opponents who attacked him for being gay, ironically, Buttigieg also had to suffer attacks from other LGBTQ people who found him too mainstream.
.@PeteButtigieg and @Chasten joined @billyeichner on #TogetherInPride to discuss the importance of voting and being engaged in the political process. pic.twitter.com/sLmVQMNsxM
— GLAAD (@glaad) April 27, 2020
“People could say really, mean, awful, untrue things about you, but they don’t know the first thing about you,” Buttigieg said. “They don’t know what I went through or what my story was. I reminded myself I’m worthy of love and trying to do my best, and if people don’t like something about my husband, then that’s their prerogative, but I will never look down on myself for not meeting the definition of some gatekeeper somewhere, on am I gay enough, am I not gay enough.”
Buttigieg scored a major victory by winning the Iowa Caucus, the first Democratic contest for the 2020 Election cycle. He dropped out of the race and endorsed Vice President Joe Biden March 1.
Kieran
Lucky for Obama not many in the black community felt “empowered” voting against the black candidate.
Hdtex
Get off Obama’s dick already. This is not about Obama.
Kangol2
@Kieran, you support Bleach Bum, who’s appointing anti-gay judges to the federal courts faster than any other president since Stonewall. Bleach Bum Don the Con also refuses to criticize Saudi Arabia, Egypt, or other “allies” who allow brutal oppression against gay people. Are you going to publicly condemn Covfefe in Chief Drumpf for turning a blind eye to Saudi and Egyptian oppression of gay people? Are you asking him to stop appointing and the GOP to confirming anti-gay judges? Are you ever going to speak up, Kieran?
Hdtex
Just never were that into some inexperienced mayor from a fifth-tier town. Your sexuality had nothing to do with it.
Cam
Mayors have executive experience which Senators don’t.
Taiyoken
And senators have experience which mayors don’t. Many senators were mayors at one point. However he wasn’t a very good mayor according to his constituents.
D_Bro
@Taiyoken & yet he was reelected with 80% of the vote. I guess some constituents liked him.
Cam
@Taiyoken
And yet, I could point out the specific experience mayors have that Senators don’t, and you couldn’t detail out anything. Just more of your trolling and supporting anti-LGBT Republicans by attacking any out dem politician who runs.
Sweetie…ya boring.
LumpyPillows
Not impressed? Then you did not listen to him. I find smug people like you to be laughable.
Taiyoken
Why are you such a hateful malevolent scumbag, Cam? the fck did I ever do to you? You are as bad as every pos anti-gay bigot I’ve ever had to deal with. I’m sick of you trolling my every comment to accuse me of being a right wing bot. I don’t like the gay candidate because he stands for the policies that bankrupted my family and cost two members of my family their lives? I guess I’m a brown shirt 1934, huh? I busted my ass fighting for the candidate who stood for healthcare for all Americans, higher education, and a living wage? Well you can just call me Aaron McKinney. I’m such scum. How dare I? someone disagrees with the great and wise Cam? Obviously a paid Russian troll.
What do you want from me?
This: ?
Americans deserve to be poor with substandard healthcare they can’t afford. We deserve to lose our family members who can’t afford healthcare. The rich need my money more than I do, so it’s good that we went bankrupt due to medical bills. Poor people don’t need an education, so it’s good to keep college prohibitively expensive.
It was for the best that the DNC worked its ass off to stop Bernie and prop up the rapist Biden. Because the dementia addled Biden will definitely beat Trump.
You win, Cam, you win. Now leave me alone.
Cam
@Taiyoken
No matter what screename this right wing troll hides under, it always slips up, freaks out, and name calls if it is called out.
Nice to know I live rent free in your head no matter what fake sockpuppet account you use.
That said, once again, I point out that you couldn’t name what relevant experience Senators had over mayors, and because you can’t respond, you flip out, name call and basically wet your pants and throw a tantrum to hide the fact you can’t answer.
As every judge on every talent show on TV would say “At least you stayed true to yourself”.
Taiyoken
@Cam Irony. Once again you ignore the content of my post and call me a troll. while accusing me of ignoring the content of your post. all you said was: “Mayors have executive experience which Senators don’t.” to which I retorted the inverse was also true. you then attacked me, called me hateful names. and accused me of not providing examples, which you also failed to do.
I asked what I did to you to cause you to throw so much hate and malice at me and you responded by tripling down.
You are a bully Cam, a truly awful human being.
You know why you don’t address what I say? Because you can’t. Your every response is hate and attacks. you are a bully. I’ve dealt with bullies my whole life. Dan told me it gets better. If it is to start getting better, we need to ignore hateful jerks like you. Kindly, never @ me again.
Cam
@Taiyoken
Translation: First you tried to tantrum and name call to deflect from the fact that you couldn’t respond to the simple comment.
Now you name call and play victim…..and once again, can’t respond to my point. Could you please tell your manager at the troll farm to put someone smarter on this account? You’re really terrible at this. Then again, with oil down and the Russian economy in a shambles I guess they can’t afford to hire the smart trolls anymore.
jayceecook
@Taiyoken THANK YOU! Finally somebody else calling out that phucking prick for their constant harassment and bullying. Unfortunately bud Cam is going to continue to troll your comments no matter what. I’ve asked him repeatedly to stop @ me and he just phucking keeps doing. I don’t like engaging but you know sometimes… The problem is he feeds off of it. My advice, try to ignore him as best as you can. Because no matter what you say, even when he demands you provide him with specifics (something he can’t do himself) and you do, Cam is going to ignore it, contradict himself, and continue to troll. Because a troll’s gotta troll. And that’s what he is. In every sense of the word.
Cam
@jayceecook
Except, my comment was that I pointed out that Mayors had executive experience which Senators don’t. And he stated that Senators had other experience mayors don’t. I pointed out that he couldn’t’ name what that experience was.
And since that time he has freaked out, called names, and done everything possible to deflect from the fact that he couldn’t back up his comment with any facts.
Just like your comment. But the fact that you are sounding exactly like a known troll account pretty much shows what’s going on with you.
zimmy88
@Taiyoken and Jayceecook I’ve tried to post back and forth with Cam before. It always ends up with him repeatedly using “right wing troll” and some variation on “oh sweetie” or “oh hunny” to try and make it feel like he’s talking down to you. My guess is that his other account is a moderator account because many posts criticizing him (no matter how politely) get taken down while his always stay up.
You both made very good points and I concur. Voting for someone just because they’re gay isn’t enough. Ellen is a lesbian and there’s PLENTY of hate for her going around. Should she ever run for office, does she deserve my vote just because of her sexuality? Nope.
Cam
@zimmy88
Except they didn’t make those points. Tai couldn’t defend his comment so just lashed out and named called. But then again, you already know that because you are a sock puppet account. We have never “Gone back and forth” on a post.
But nice try.
zimmy88
@Cam Oh sweetie puddin’ pie, yes we have. Several times. It was the post about that skank Melanie encouraging people to go outside. You tried to smear me by saying I didn’t really know about the research that was coming out since I said “a midwestern university” instead of (later) actually naming UNMC as the institution. I even posted a blueprint for your typical response:
1) Demeaning sassy name-calling
2) Claims of being a right wing troll account and/or the second/third screen name of some aforementioned right wing troll account
3) Phrases and tone evocative of a retort given while waving a finger snap in your face
4) Mocking encouragement telling whomever you thought you just owned to “try again.”
But that got deleted. Surprise. Because I’m guessing you are actually the one who is a second login for a moderator.
Cam
My fear wasn’t that he was too “Mainstream”, I was worried that he was still in that phase of coming out where he thinks it’s his responsibility to ingratiate himself to bigots, rather than understanding that sometimes you don’t have to.
At the beginning he was too eager to say nice things about Mike Pence, and treating bigotry as if it’s a legitimate opinion is part of what got us into this mess. He corrected later and I was glad to see that. A debate between he and Trump would have been a sh*tshow since Trump can barely remember what he had for breakfast.
Creamsicle
He’s a Golden Boy. Just look at his career. It’s why people find him so appealing, but it’s also why some people will find him very alienating. He can bandy about some buzzwords about marginalized communities, but his success in South Bend has been described as gentrification, which mostly just displaces marginalized people, rather than lifting them up.
Personally, I didn’t vote for Buttigieg because I wanted a more progressive candidate when it comes to policy, not identity.
Kieran
@ creamsicle So now instead of a smart, attractive, well spoken gay man, you’ve got befuddled Joe Biden as your candidate. Good job.
Cam
@Kieran
Except you happily attacked Buttigieg when he was running and won in Iowa, but now that he is out, you’re pretending you supported him so you can turn around and attack the Democrat who won.
Hdtex
@Kieran the only one befuddled is you.
DarkZephyr
@Kieran
This is one of those times that I actually agree with you. I don’t know if you actually did like Pete, but I think his experience level was just fine. I also think his attempts at bridge building were just fine too. Its one thing to be loyal to your political party and remain true to its ideals, its another to feel that the default setting is that you *always must* be nasty to and refuse to work with members of the opposite party.
Some things do require bi-partisan cooperation (such as pandemics) and we so very rarely ever have that these days, which is at least partially why things never get freaking done. I believe Pete was trying to fix that.
What’s more, I believe that the Trump campaign legitimately saw Mayor Pete as a threat. The shameful way in which he was treated by members of his own party actually greatly amused many people on the Right. I saw them tweeting their glee at such “cannibalism” from the Left.
And now instead we have Joe Biden who gets ridiculed and made fun of routinely for things that he really does have issues with. I will vote for him but we really $#@&ing could have and should have done much better. Among Pete’s big controversies with many progressives was that he was “moderate”, which actually garnered him the devotion and votes from MANY conservatives that were fed up with Trump, he COULD have actually won thanks to that, I mean the Democrats STILL won’t be getting any support from the Cult of Bernie, they never really were going to anyway.
He was also criticized for being white and having a d**k. Well, Joe Biden has those same traits AND he’s got an accusation of sexual misconduct against him. The one time someone attempted to do that to Pete, it was immediately shot down and made fun of as the pathetic lying plot that it was, complete with testimonial proof of that from the would-be accusers that turned out to be hired by Jacob Wohl. We can’t say the same for Biden yet, even if it IS a false accusation.
Goddamned it, so much for our “resistance” talk for the last four $#@&ing years. I am definitely remaining politically independent after this.
Taiyoken
Sure, it would neat to have a gay president. But then what? what would he DO as president? there’s a huge problem in this country where people don’t pay attention to policies, just identities and name recognition.
Cam
The right wing troll trying to claim that one of the candidates with the most policy details in his platform wouldn’t have policy details.
No precious, that’s Trump you’re thinking about. But nice try.
dhmonarch89
I didn’t vote for him in the primary simply because I didn’t feel he was experienced enough or qualified yet to be President. Had the Mayor of South Bend, Indiana (with no other political experience) been a straight white male or female, a straight black male or female, a straight Latin or Asian male or female, or ANY other type of person, I wouldn’t have voted for them either.
jar
Exactly. To our benefit, the gay community has never voted solely on identity, but policies. Sure, when one of our own runs and holds positions we agree with, they get significant support. That’s as it should be. Pete is just another neoliberal in rainbow packaging. He was an empty suit. When Chris Quinn ran for mayor in NYC, she lost the gay and lesbian vote- because she was a corrupt and entitled candidate.
Andrew
Even though most of the time Pete came off as the only one sane in the debates, I too felt like he is not quite ready. I donated twice to the campaign and wanted him to go as far as possible this round so as to be poised to take leadership in the near future. I hope he gets a great appointment from Biden and sticks with it so I can eventually vote for him for president. I think he has done spectacular so far.
jayceecook
I didn’t get a chance to not vote for him because he dropped out before my state could vote then Miss Rona happened and our primary didn’t. It wouldn’t have been because I wanted to feel “empowered”. I’m not even sure I get what he means with that whole theory. I just didn’t like a lot of his policies. Blue Dog Dems don’t do it for me. Queer people shouldn’t be expected to vote for a gay candidate just because he’s family. Same with women and female candidates. Or POC. Or every other identity under the sun.
People really don’t vote for the candidates that best fall in line with their personal politics anymore. Mostly it’s all about voting for somebody because they don’t want this party in control or that party in control. Or they get bamboozled into believing that a candidate will do this if elected or take that away from you if they get elected. That this abstract thing over here will be ruined if this candidate gets elected. It’s so ridiculous. And exhausting.
Kangol2
I haven’t had an opportunity to vote in the primaries yet (calendar + Trumpvirus Covid-19 crisis) but while I have sent Mayor Pete funding, I would probably vote for Bernie or Elizabeth Warrren, mainly on political and ideological grounds. Of course it’s all a null issue now that Joe Biden is the nominee, but I do praise Pete Buttigieg for his campaign, and am interested to see what he does next. He’s super-smart, thoughtful, and capable of impressive future service to the country. I think it would be fantastic if he ran for a Congressional seat in Indiana. I could see his district electing him; would the mostly conservative White voters across Indiana vote for him, though? I hope so.
Black Pegasus
He was one of the better candidates but the establishment media already had their minds made up. They wanted an old rich white man whose been in politics for decades. This is the same party who likes to screech from rooftops when it comes to “wokeness “ and diversity yet their primary voters settled on an old man with dementia. Pete Buttigieg was too good for them and quite frankly they never truly deserved him.
Cam
Actually he got a huge amount of play, I was shocked. Remember, after Iowa and NH everybody was talking about Buttigieg and Sanders. It was the voters of South Carolina and Super Tuesday that changed that narrative.
dhmonarch89
when Biden slid in polls- November 19- January 20, they really weren’t covering him much- Pete and Warren got A LOT of coverage here, but Bernie got most.
LumpyPillows
The media did not launch Biden, the voters did. Were you paying attention? The media and the money ignored Biden until SC. Clueless point of view.
Kangol2
Well, the GOP has a demented and deranged old White incompetent racist treasonous accused-rapist pathologically lying and whining sociopath running as its standard bearer, and he also now has over 56,000 American deaths, most preventable, as well as a a completely shattered US economy on his record, so I guess it’s six in one hand and a less than a dozen in the other!
Black Pegasus
@Cam
LOL shsssh! We’re not to suppose to talk about South Carolina when it comes to Buttigieg because it would mean a certain demographic is “homophobic”.. but yeah, I almost forgot about that primary. On paper, Mayor Pete was the guy we needed. He was measured, mature, former military, Harvard grad, and seemingly humbled. Too soon I guess.
kevininbuffalo
I would have voted for Bernie if NY didn’t hold their primary so late that it’s irrelevant and now cancelled. If a gay candidate wants my vote he has to earn it like anyone else. As far as I was concerned the mayor of the fourth largest city in Indiana was just a warmed over Third Way Democrat at a time when we need real change.
Kangol2
Andrew Cuomo needs to reverse his stupid, unethical decision to deny New York voters the right to vote in a Democratic primary and to vote for Bernie Sanders. New York could push the vote till the last possible day before the Democratic convention; even if the candidate is going to be Biden, at least voters have their say. He also has 2-3 months to prepare for a revised mostly voting primary, so go that route, but shutting down the New York primary altogether rather than postponing it is a terrible move.
LumpyPillows
Reading these comments leads me to the conclusion that I do not like most of you. For good reason.
Wolfie
“Queers” are ruining the LGBT community.
metta
I did not support Pete because he is a centrist. I’m not going to vote for centrists any more. Done with that. Not only that he made fun of progressive values.
John
Just curious, Biden is a centrist so do we now just go third party candidate to prove we are just tired of both main stream parties? I am not impressed with Biden or Trump and dislike the fact of being yelled at and ridiculed with the line “it’s your fault HE won” yet, so many others just voted for xyz not policy wise but because it’s not the other.
Tombear
There are many, many great minds in the male gay community. We were the ones who received good grades and were bullied because of it. I finally realized now is not the time for a man who happens to be gay, in itself a gift from God. Someday we will have a gay President!
dustychiffon
Some of the comments on here really interesting.
djmcgamester
I didn’t think he was ready. He did well but I think 2024 was when he would have the best shot. I thought that pretty much from the start. The good thing is that his name is out there.
winemaker
A candidate should be elected on what they propose to do rather than who they sleep with.! So Pete’s gay, big deal, a lot of us are gay. Isn’t it time to make sexual orientation not the deciding factor in important decisions? That being said. many gay people I know are conservative and didn’t vote for any liberal or democrat or progressive or whatever the current name for these people are. Which makes sense when you see what the liberals, democrats or progressives or whatever’s the name for them have done to the one rime jewel of California that’s now the new ‘doo doo’ capital of America. This pretty much describes the whole state as well., sad to have to say.