Who is Pete Buttigieg? Meet one of the six top names on Harris’s VP short list

Pete Buttigieg , secretary of transportation and former mayor of South Bend, Indiana, has returned to the public spotlight as a possible running mate for Vice President Kamala Harris , the presumptive Democratic nominee.

A candidate for president in 2020, Buttigieg is a Rhodes scholar and the first openly gay man in a presidential Cabinet position. Among the swirling rumors about his role in 2024, Buttigieg has revealed he is open to joining Harris on the Democratic ticket but “is not in that mode right now.”

Buttigieg was born on Jan. 19, 1982. He is 42 years old, making him the youngest member of Biden’s Cabinet and the youngest person to ever serve as transportation secretary.

Buttigieg was born in South Bend, Indiana, the fourth largest city in the state. It sits just south of the Michigan border and once boomed in manufacturing and population in the mid-1900s due to the Studebaker automobile plant. Once the plant closed and manufacturing started to wane in the second half of the 20th century, the number of residents dwindled, and so did jobs. When Buttigieg later became mayor, he was praised for his ability to return some of the city's vibrancy: Rebuilding downtown and employment and enticing tech companies to settle in the area.

As valedictorian of his high school class, Buttigieg received a number of accolades, including first prize for a "Profiles in Courage" essay on Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) from the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum. He attended Harvard University and graduated magna cum laude, double majoring in history and literature. Buttigieg then attended the University of Oxford on a Rhodes scholarship, receiving a Bachelor of Arts from Pembroke College, Oxford, and first-class honors.

After college, Buttigieg helped multiple politicians on their roads to public office, including John Kerry during his failed 2004 presidential campaign and John Donnelly during his bid for Congress.

He later became a consultant for McKinsey & Company, balancing high-level clients in the energy and retail sectors. Buttigieg remained with the management group for three years before returning to politics, focusing on a campaign for Indiana state treasurer that was unsuccessful.

In 2009, Buttigieg joined the U.S. Naval Reserves as an ensign in Naval Intelligence. In 2014, he was deployed to Afghanistan for seven months, requiring him to take a leave of absence from his mayoral duties. He was awarded the Joint Service Commendation medal and worked in the Afghan Threat Finance Cell, a counterterrorism unit focused on taking down Taliban financiers.

At 29 years old, Buttigieg became the second youngest mayor of his hometown of South Bend, Indiana. In office during 2015's controversial Senate Bill 101, originally allowing LGBT discrimination on religious grounds, Buttigieg pushed back against the bill and came out as gay, propelling him into a second term as mayor.

As the 2020 election approached, Buttigieg found himself in a more prominent place within the public spotlight, with many Democratic leaders praising him as an up-and-coming face for their party. In 2029, he joined the presidential race with slim chances of winning.

Despite the odds, he won the majority at the 2020 Iowa Caucus with 14 delegates and then went on to finish second in the New Hampshire primary behind Sanders. He even faced off against Vice President Kamala Harris early on, with her eventually dropping out before the primaries. As the race continued, his prospects dwindled, and in March 2020, he dropped out and endorsed President Joe Biden.

When Biden took office, Buttigieg was chosen as transportation secretary. Instituting tough reviews of Trump-era policies, he also became a leader in the Biden Supply Chain Task Force. The coalition attempted to soothe global supply chain disruptions that blocked people in the United States from receiving household goods in 2021.

As transportation secretary, he has prioritized and made major steps in the Gateway Rail Tunnel Project between the stations in Newark, New Jersey, and New York City, an initiative largely neglected by the Trump administration. He promoted two consequential bills, the American Jobs Plan which sought to create millions of new jobs and improve unions, and Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act which gave discretionary grants to the Department of Transportation adding up $210 billion. When the latter was passed, Business Insider remarked on the newborn spending power of the DOT, calling Buttigieg "the most powerful transportation secretary ever."

In 2018, Buttigieg married his husband, Chasten Glezman, in South Bend’s Cathedral of St. James. In 2021, the couple adopted two newborn fraternal twins, leading to Buttigieg taking a parental leave from his duties as transportation secretary.

Buttigieg was baptized in the Catholic Church and attended a Catholic high school. He often speaks about his relationship with Christianity and the deep effects it had on his life. While at Oxford, he started attending Anglican Services and has since become Episcopalian.

Buttigieg is the author of two books, published around the time of his bid for the presidency. Shortest Way Home: One Mayor's Challenge and a Model for America's Future was published in 2019, and Trust: America's Best Chance in 2020.

Buttigieg was chosen as transportation secretary largely because of his commitment to the environment. During his nomination, Biden hoped Buttigieg would “deal with the existential threat of climate change with real jobs" and "build more climate-resistant communities to deal with more extreme floods, droughts, and superstorms.”

As transportation secretary, he has invested heavily in mass transit, especially the prospect of high-speed rails, as well as reinstating former President Barack Obama's automobile fuel-economy standards.

As a presidential candidate, Buttigieg pledged he would recommit to the Paris Climate Agreement if elected. He also supported the Green New Deal, a proposal from House Democrats that mimics the New Deal of former President Franklin D. Roosevelt but with a deeper emphasis on renewable energy.

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An abortion rights and LGBT community advocate, Buttigieg has also taken a firm stance against "systemic racism" with a 2019 proposal that would grant billions to black colleges and entrepreneurs, greatly reducing the federal prison population, legalizing marijuana, and expunging a slew of drug convictions.

He is a supporter of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals Program and has been highly critical of former President Donald Trump's strict immigration policies. Buttigieg has also pledged his support for Medicare For All, pushing against Republican efforts to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act.