Up and Coming: Pete Buttigieg

The 2020 race for president has been a long and confusing road. The Democratic candidates all agree on two things: President Trump needs to be stopped and we all need to be in this together. In all of this political chaos, there is one underdog candidate who has caught the attention of the press: Pete Buttigieg, Mayor of the small city of South Bend, Indiana.

Buttigieg became the youngest Mayor in the history of South Bend in 2012, when he was elected at the age of twenty-nine. He also became South Bend’s first openly gay mayor when he came out in 2015. Even after coming out, Buttigieg was able to secure 80% of the vote and win reelection. Buttigieg also served in the Navy and was deployed to Afghanistan for 7 months in 2014.

Buttigieg is the only openly gay politician who has run for president. He lives with his husband, Chasten Buttigieg, in his hometown. They are happily married and in love. Both grew up in very conservative communities, and Buttigieg took a while to come out to his parents. In 2015, when he finally told his family he was gay. Soon after that  Vice President Mike Pence “signed the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, which allowed local businesses to discriminate against LGBTQ people.” Despite the arguable regression in policy, Buttigieg still won the re-election as South Bend’s first openly gay mayor. “We’re out to embrace it and not run away from it,” Buttigieg says, more circumspectly, “but also not let it become the main thing.” Buttigieg doesn’t want his being gay to be the only thing people see when they look at him.

Many argue that Buttigieg is too young or doesn’t have enough experience in politics despite the fact that he has more than President Trump himself. He is essentially the polar opposite of Donald Trump. His views are much more liberal and more progressive. On two of the most terrifying topics in politics, guns and gun control, Buttigieg explained that it’s normal to want to have a gun to protect yourself and your family, but there needs to be much stricter rules around them. Another issue that has come up in many debates is healthcare. Buttigieg says “Medicare for all who want it” is the best way to go about handling our healthcare problem. He thinks people should be able to choose what to do with their medicare.

Buttigieg has made impressive strides from being a mayor from a small town to becoming one of the Democratic candidates in this 2020’s race for president. He has big ideas for the country and is determined to fix it for the better. In Mayor Buttigieg’s words, “This is our moment to defeat Donald Trump and do it by such a big margin that we send Trumpism into the dustbin of history.” Buttigieg has proven that it is possible to overcome barriers and fight for what you believe in order to change our country.