Pete Buttigieg is many things.
At just 37 years venerable, he is the mayor of South Bend, Indiana. He is a military veteran and a deeply religious gay man who is married, but also likes sandwiches from Chick-fil-A (which opposes same-sex marriage). He is a Harvard graduate and a Rhodes Scholar who speaks eight languages. She is the first-ever millennial presidential candidate and so far the only Democratic candidate eligible to appear on “Fox News Sunday.”
“I am all of these things,” Buttigieg — pronounced “boot-edge-edge” — said in an interview with the New York Post. “I try not to have any characteristics… completely defining,” he added.
Critics say these qualities are the main reasons he can’t beat Donald Trump. His supporters say that’s why he can do it.
Mayor Pete, as he likes to call him, uses a tone that is kinder and less combative than the insult-based policies of Trump and far-left members of the Democratic Party. His boyish good looks, intelligence and military background are undoubtedly attractive, as is his faith.
“Scripture tells us to care for the least among us, that it also commands humility and teaches us about what is greater than ourselves,” said Buttigieg, a devout Episcopalian. “It points the way to the inclusive and selfless politics that I strive to practice, whether I talk about my faith on the stump or not.”
Mayor Pete’s policies are already gaining traction. Since forming an exploratory committee to run for president on Jan. 23, he has already raised $7 million for his campaign. A recent Quinnipiac poll found that 4 percent of Democrats would vote for him – the same number backing Elizabeth Warren, who has been a U.S. senator for six years.
The fact that he was born and raised in America’s Rust Belt is probably his greatest advantage.
“Our party can and should do better in the industrial Midwest,” Buttigieg said. “I am convinced that so many people in this part of the country are already with us, much more than with the other side on substantive and political issues.”
He said his experiences in his hometown of South Bend prove there are solutions that work beyond the “promise of turning back the clock.”
When Buttigieg was first elected to office in South Bend in 2011, the city was on its knees. There was no job growth, and like many Rust Belt cities where industry was sinking, jobs had been limited since the 1970s.
First, he improved the city’s appearance by demolishing over 1,000 abandoned houses, and then he focused on its revitalization, attracting hundreds of millions of private investments for commercial development.
You won’t see Buttigieg mocking other Midwestern voters or taking them for granted the way Hillary Clinton’s campaign did in 2015 after South Bend-based University of Notre Dame invited her to attend a high-profile event celebrating Patrick’s Day, her campaign dropped, telling organizers that “white Catholics are not the audience she should be spending time reaching out to,” as The New York Times wrote.
Trump was projected to win the vote of white Catholics in 2016, at 52 percent according to Pew exit polls, reversing the gains Democrats made when Barack Obama won their votes in 2008 and 2012.
Still, Buttigieg’s religious beliefs have not prevented him from taking progressive positions on key issues.
He supports third-trimester abortion out of his belief in “freedom from government,” he said. And he will not rule out tax increases. “If the only way I can provide all of us with paid parental leave, universal health care, dramatically improved child care, better education, good infrastructure, and therefore a longer life expectancy and a healthier economy is by increasing incomes, then we should be straightforward about it,” he said.
And while natural gas provides good, solid jobs in the Rust Belt, it is a gigantic source of wind and solar energy. “I think the target still needs to be focused on renewables,” he said.
But just because Buttigieg has a progressive platform doesn’t mean he’ll easily break through far-left Democrats. Last month, a roused crowd at Slate questioned the adolescent mayor’s credentials with a since-changed headline that read: “Is Pete Buttigieg Just Another White Candidate, or Does His Homosexuality Count as Diversity?”
And just because Buttigieg is from the Rust Belt doesn’t mean he can win the general election in places like Ohio, Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, especially if you compare his agenda to Trump’s.
“He must share their values on such fundamental issues as lower taxes, regulation and religious freedom,” warned Dr. G. Terry Madonna, director of the Center for Policy and Public Affairs at Franklin & Marshall College. If he doesn’t do that, “it will be very difficult for him to win.”
But Jeff Rea, former mayor of another Indiana city and current president of the South Bend Chamber of Commerce, said no one should count on Mayor Pete. He and Buttigieg have been on opposite sides on many projects but “always found a way to find a solution together.”
Buttigieg “is a guy who cares about data, and he’s also a very good person,” Rea added. “That helped him win over voters who might not like progressive policies.”
No mayor in history has ever run for and won his party’s nomination for president, nor has anyone under 43 years of age. On the other hand, no businessman did this until Trump came along.
Michael Wear, Obama’s faith adviser, told me he thinks Mayor Pete has a chance.
“Everything is changing,” Wear said. “And in America anything can happen.”
Salena Zito is a CNN political analyst and a reporter and columnist for the Washington Examiner. Reaches Everyman and Everywoman through leather journalism, traveling from Main Street to the Beltway and all places in between. To learn more about Salena and read her previous articles, visit the Creators Syndicate website at www.creators.com.
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