Chasten Buttigieg slams Mike Pence for making a homophobic joke about his kids getting sick

Over the weekend, former Vice President Mike Pence joked at the Gridiron Club dinner that out Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg went on “maternity leave” in 2021 when his kids were born.

“Pete is the only person in human history to have a child and everyone else gets postpartum depression,” Pence quipped.

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Pete Buttigieg slams Mike Pence: He’ll defend Trump for sending “hush money to a porn star”

Mayor Pete said that he doesn’t envy Mike Pence, a “professed Christian” who he once called the “cheerleader of the porn star presidency.”

Pete Buttigieg’s husband Chasten Buttigieg was not impressed by Pence’s anti-gay humor and brought up what the new dads were doing just after their twins were born two years ago.

“An honest question for you, Mike Pence, after your attempted joke this weekend,” Chasten Buttigieg wrote. “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?”

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Chasten Buttigieg opened up about the health problems their children faced when they were born premature and were hospitalized for two weeks. One of the children had a problem that would make her stop breathing and turn purple. The kids later contracted respiratory syncytial virus, a potentially fatal disease for infants, and were hospitalized again.

The White House also condemned Pence’s statements. Out White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said that Pence “should apologize to women and LGBTQ+ people, who are entitled to be treated with dignity and respect.”

“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,” Jean-Pierre said at yesterday’s White House Press Briefing.

Pete Buttigieg was the mayor of South Bend, Indiana during Pence’s tenure as governor of the state. During the Democratic presidential primaries in 2019, Buttigieg said that Pence’s Christianity isn’t about “protecting the stranger and the prisoner and the poor person” but “sexuality and a certain view of rectitude.”

“But even if you buy into that, how could he allow himself to become the cheerleader of the porn star presidency?” Buttigieg said at the time. “Is it that he stopped believing in Scripture when he started believing in Donald Trump?”

Buttigieg attacked Pence’s long history of opposition to LGBTQ+ equality during the campaign as well, saying that his
“marriage to Chasten has made me a better man.

“And yes, Mr. Vice President, it has moved me closer to God.”

“That’s the thing I wish the Mike Pences of the world would understand, that if you have a problem with who I am, your quarrel is not with me. Your quarrel, sir, is with my creator,” he continued. “Speaking only for myself, I can tell you that if me being gay was a choice, it was a choice that was made far, far above my pay grade.”

Pence responded by accusing Buttigieg – who is Christian – of attacking his Christian faith.

“He’s said some things that are critical of my Christian faith and about me personally. And he knows better,” Pence told CNBC at the time. “He knows me.”

Pence’s homophobic jokes weren’t exactly original. Saying that Buttigieg took maternity leave instead of “paternity leave,” “parental leave,” or “family leave” – to imply that gay men are actually women – is the same joke that has already been told by Fox News host Tucker Carlson, Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-CO), and even The National Review.