Pete Buttigieg rips Democrats’ ‘Portlandia’ approach to diversity
Former Biden administration official Pete Buttigieg said that the Democratic Party’s approach to promoting diversity was too heavy-handed and led to the election of President Donald Trump.
“What do we mean when we talk about diversity? Is it caring for people’s different experiences and making sure no one is mistreated because of them, which I will always fight for? Or is it making people sit through a training that looks like something out of Portlandia, which I have also experienced,” Buttigieg said.
“And it is how Trump Republicans are made,” Buttigieg added.
Speaking at a forum titled “The Future of the Democratic Party,” Buttigieg responded to moderator David Axelrod’s critique of the “spectacle of the Democratic National Committee chair election” that occurred earlier this month.
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Former Department of Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg on Tuesday attributed the election of President Trump to the Democrats’ approach to promoting diversity. (YouTube screenshot)
The forum was hosted by the University of Chicago Institute of Politics with guest speakers Justin Bibb, the Mayor of Cleveland, and Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez, D-Wa.
Axelrod added that the Democratic National Committee chair election “seemed to devolve into sort of, like, ‘We need a left-handed Mongolian caucus and a right-handed this caucus’ … what we did was fine—we just have to communicate it better.”
Perez responded first saying, “What a load of s–t,” disapproving of the DNC’s insistence on appealing to Americans’ identity.
After the congresswoman’s remarks, Axelrod directed the question to Buttigieg, asking how can the Democratic Party avoid being viewed as a “caricature” that way.
Buttigieg explained that the DNC event “was a caricature of everything” wrong with the Democratic Party’s “ability both to cohere as a party and to reach to those who don’t always agree” with them.
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The forum was hosted by the University of Chicago Institute of Politics, featuring guest speakers Justin Bibb, the Mayor of Cleveland and Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez, D-Wa. (YouTube screenshot)
“If that comes to your workplace with the best of intentions but doesn’t actually get at what we’re doing, what actually matters here, what’s actually at stake,” Buttigieg said.
“I think—and this might sound counterintuitive—if we were more serious about the actual values and not caught up in vocabularies and trying to cater to everybody only in terms of their particular slice of combinations of identities versus the shared project.”
“It’s a problem, especially for men and White men,” Bibb said. “Both educated and non-educated college degree White men,” Bibb added.
Democrats have been reflecting on their election defeat since November. Many have pointed to the party’s inability to reach young men and working class voters. Some Democrats highlighted the over-emphasis of attacking Trump as opposed to developing a viable economic plan.
Democrats have been reflecting on their egregious election defeat since November. (Fox News)
Bibb, the chairman of the Democratic Mayors Association, said that the party has been too “soft.” He explained further that mayors are vital to the reform of the Democratic Party.
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“We, as a party, we have to do a better job at meeting people where they are and embracing the lived experience of people. Unfortunately, I think we’ve gotten too soft as a party. The fact that President Trump was the first president in history to go to the Super Bowl or show up to a UFC fight? I mean, Democrats, it’s okay to be cool and go to cultural events, and you might get booed, but that’s the game—that’s what you sign up for.”
