Buttigieg slams DeSantis over video on Trump’s LGBTQ record: ‘Who are you trying to help?’

Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg (D) on Sunday knocked Gov. Ron DeSantis’s (R-Fla.) campaign after it shared a controversial video that attacked former President Trump, the Florida governor’s fellow 2024 contender, for his previous comments on LGBTQ rights.

“I’m going to choose my words carefully, partly because I’m appearing as secretary, so I can’t talk about campaigns. And I’m going to leave aside the strangeness of trying to prove your manhood by putting up a video that splices images of you in between oiled-up shirtless bodybuilders, and just get to a bigger issue that is on my mind whenever I see this stuff in the policy space, which is, again, who are you trying to help?” Buttigieg said on CNN’s “State of the Union.”

“Who are you trying to make better off? And what public policy problems do you get up in the morning thinking about how to solve?” the transportation secretary asked.

DeSantis’s campaign shared a video highlighting previous comments from Trump in support of the LGBTQ community and touting the Florida governor’s crack down on gender-affirming care and other issues. The video shows screenshots of headlines related to DeSantis’s actions on the issue in his state and photos of the governor, as well as images of shirtless, muscular men.

“To wrap up ‘Pride Month,’ let’s hear from the politician who did more than any other Republican to celebrate it,” the campaign account wrote.

Despite his comments along the 2016 campaign trail, Trump moved to ban transgender people from the military during his term in the White House. As he campaigns for another term in 2024, he’s vowed to “ban men from participating in women’s sports” and to crack down on gender-affirming surgery.

“And I just don’t understand the mentality of somebody who gets up in the morning thinking that he’s going to prove his worth by competing over who can make life hardest for a hard-hit community that is already so vulnerable in America,” Buttigieg said on Sunday.