Chasten Buttigieg goes after Pence over ‘maternity leave’ joke

Chasten Buttigieg went after former Vice President Mike Pence on Thursday, telling a ‘maternity leave’ joke he made about the Sec. of Transportation. Pete Buttigieg ‘flies in the face’ of the ‘family values’ that Pence preaches.

The Transportation secretary’s husband told The View that the couple has not received an apology from Pence.

Pence was the Republican speaker at the Gridiron Club dinner Saturday night in Washington and mocked the transportation secretary for taking time off after the birth of his adoptive twins.

“When Pete’s two children were born, he took two months of maternity leave, where thousands of travelers were stranded at airports, the air traffic system shut down, planes nearly collided in midair,” Pence said. I mean, Pete Buttigieg is the only person in human history to have had a child and all the rest of us suffer from postpartum depression.

During his appearance on The View – as well as in an Instagram post – Buttigieg chided Pence saying ‘when your son is on a ventilator, you don’t want to be anywhere but his bed.’

Vice President Mike Pence was the Republican speaker at the Gridiron Club dinner on Saturday night in Washington. Pence joked that the country suffered from “postpartum blues” due to travel problems created while Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg was on “maternity leave.”

He argued that Pence’s dig “goes against what he says it is.” “He says he’s a ‘family values’ Republican,” Buttigieg said. I don’t think he is practicing what he preaches here.

The Buttigiegs’ son, Gus, spent two months in the NICU as a newborn.

“I just don’t take that when it’s directed at my family,” Buttigieg said, explaining why he decided to speak out.

“And I don’t think anyone else would, especially when you’re bringing a very young and medically fragile child,” Buttigieg argued.

The White House called the joke “homophobic” and said it was “offensive and inappropriate.”

But Buttigieg told co-hosts of The View that Pence deliberately used “maternity” leave, as a way to feminize her husband, also calling the move “misogynistic.”

He argued that the first few weeks he spent with the twins, when both he and Pete were on paternity leave, were not “holidays” but an incredibly difficult time, as his daughter Penelope also needed 24-hour care.

“And there’s nothing weak about that job,” Buttigieg said on The View.

The Gridiron Club is made up of journalists who perform skits and songs mocking political parties and themselves. Each year there is also a Democrat, a Republican, and a speaker representing the White House.

Humor at dinner is supposed to ‘sear, not burn’.

On Saturday night, Pence’s comments about Pete Buttigieg were overshadowed by novel comments he made about former President Donald Trump, as he recounted his feelings on Jan. 6 when the Capitol was under attack by a pro-Trump mob.

‘I wasn’t afraid, I was angry. President Trump was wrong,” Pence said. “He had no right to overturn the election and his reckless words endangered my family and everyone on Capitol Hill that day.”

“And I know that history will hold Donald Trump to account,” Pence said.