WATCH: Reporter Asks Pete Buttigieg Point-Blank If Pence Should Apologize For Joke WH Calls Homophobic
ABC News Transportation Correspondent Gio Benitez asked Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg if former Vice President Mike Pence should apologize for remarks at the Gridiron Club Dinner that the White House and others have called “homophobic” and “offensive.”
Mediaite sources and other media outlets have reported that Pence made the following remarks at the Gridiron Club Dinner, an annual white-tie political dinner that’s never televised but is attended by hundreds of political and media figures and journalists:
“When Pete’s two children were born, he took two months’ maternity leave whereupon thousands of travelers were stranded in airports, the air traffic system shut down, and airplanes nearly collided on our runways.”
“Pete is the only person in human history to have a child and everyone else gets postpartum depression.”
The remarks drew a sharp reaction from the White House in the form of a statement condemning the remarks from Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre:
The former vice president’s homophobic joke about Secretary Buttigieg was offensive and inappropriate, all the more so because he treated women suffering from postpartum depression as a punchline. He should apologize to women and LGBTQ people, who are entitled to be treated with dignity and respect.
On Monday, Benitez asked Buttigieg about the remarks and whether Secretary Pete feels he’s owed an apology in a clip that was played on Tuesday’s edition of ABC’s The View:
GIO BENITEZ: But people are taking issue with parents using the term maternity leave and making light of postpartum depression. And here’s what Secretary Pete told ABC’s Gio Benitez. Take a look. Does Mike Pence owe you an apology?
SEC. PETE BUTTIGIEG: You know, I’ll let others speak to that. You know, it’s a strange thing to me, because last time I saw him, he asked me about my kids like a normal person would. And I guess, you know, at a political event in white tie, it’s a little different. But again, there’s not a lot of time for me to focus on the Washington game because we have real work to do here.
Secretary Pete’s husband Chasten Buttigieg was considerably sharper in his criticism of Pence, posting a picture of Pete in the hospital and writing on Twitter “An honest question for you, @Mike_Pence, after your attempted joke this weekend. If your grandchild was born prematurely and placed on a ventilator at two months old – their tiny fingers wrapped around yours as the monitors beep in the background – where would you be?”
He followed that up by accusing Pence of using the infants “as a punchline.”
Watch above via ABC News.
