I’m a huge fan of Buttigieg, who is one of the most lucid, unflappable political explainers of our times.
Today he was going against a Fox News host who was trying to corner him on whether Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh should have been protested at Morton’s Steak House:
Buttigieg acknowledged that public officials “should always be free from violence.”
“You’re never going to be free from criticism or peaceful protests, people exercising their First Amendment rights,” the Transporation secretary pointed out.
Buttigieg talked over Emmanuel as he tried to interrupt.
“That’s what happened in this case,” he explained. “Remember, the justice never even came into contact with these protesters, reportedly didn’t see or hear them. And these protesters are upset because a right, an important right that the majority of Americans support was taken away.”
Emmanuel tried to interrupt again but the secretary ignored him.
“Not only the right to choose by the way,” Buttigieg continued, “but this justice was part of the process of stripping away the right to privacy. Since I’ve been alive, settled case law in the United States has been that the Constitution protected the right to privacy and that has now been thrown out the window by justices, including Justice Kavanaugh, who as I recall, swore up and down in front of God and everyone including the United States Congress that they were going to leave settled case law alone. So yes, people are upset. They’re going to exercise their First Amendment rights.”
Buttigieg even managed to get a dig in about Trump trying to overthrow the government, a real no-no on Fox News, as you can tell from the way the show host tried again to cut him off before he could say any more about Trump.
Watch the entire exchange below.