Pete Buttigieg wants to be America's millennial savior. Too bad he can't talk about race without sounding like a Disney character

I appreciated what Pete Buttigieg said about his time in the military at the third Democratic presidential primary debate in Houston, Texas. The significance of a candidate who identifies as queer describing his experience as a Navy reserve officer during the military’s “don’t ask, don’t tell policy” can’t be understated. For some watching at home, it may have very well meant the world to hear another gay man with Mayor Pete’s profile confess that when it came to his choice of coming out, “I had to wonder if just acknowledging who I was, was going to be the ultimate career-ending professional setback.“

But, for a man now trying to bill himself as both a generational alternative to Joe Biden and a more moderate and purportedly more “unifying” figure than progressive candidates like Elizabeth Warren and Joe Biden, when it came to the issue of race, Buttigieg sounded just about as antiquated as some of the older white moderates he shared the stage with.

I suppose some would say that Buttigieg deserves credit for saying that anyone who supports President Donald Trump’s immigration policies and rhetoric is supporting racism, but I wouldn’t, because to me it’s obvious. And no, Buttigieg doesn’t get bonus points either for communicating his message in Spanish (“Es racismo y es sencillo“). Certainly not when he follows with the rather banal observation that ”the only people who actually buy into this hateful rhetoric against immigrants are people who don't know any.“

Donald Trump is from Queens.

Queens, the most ethnically diverse county in America, that exists within New York City, which has long enjoyed bragging rights as the most inclusive city on the planet. Donald Trump has seen all types of people all his life, and he still says racist things.

Buttigieg’s line derives from the school of thought that proximity to diverse groups begets less racist attitudes from white people. If only we were all a little closer, things would be easier! Unfortunately, that wonderful-sounding theory really doesn’t check out. New York didn’t just give us Donald Trump; it also gave us Rudy Guiliani. Buttigieg is a millennial, so at this point, he ought to know better by now.

Buttigieg wasn’t the worst on race, though.

Such honors go to Joe Biden, who, when asked about his own record on racial issues and opposing desegregation by busing, offered some rambling, paternalistic message about poor black people that included a reference to a record player.

The runner-up is Amy Klobuchar, who responded to a question about why she failed to prosecute any police officers for the 25 people officers shot and the four others who died in custody when she was the lead prosecutor in Hennepin County from 1999 to 2007 by not really responding at all. Worse, Klobuchar continues to tout her white moderate Midwestern appeal while continuously overlooking the reality that the Midwest includes cities like Detroit, Flint, Cleveland, Milwaukee, St Louis, Chicago — places which are not white and moderate, but are very much needed to win a presidential election.

Still, not being the worst offender doesn’t make Buttigieg’s remarks any less, uh, goofy.

In fact, his comments about Trump supporters supporting racism last night are a deviation from more favorable comments made about them earlier in the year.

In an interview with USA Today published in April, Buttigieg said of Trump voters: “Well, I think it starts with a certain amount of humility and recognizing that how you voted doesn’t make you a good person or a bad person, and we shouldn’t think of ourselves as better human beings because of how we voted.”

Buttigieg did acknowledge his Douglass Plan, which he has previously said would help dismantle racist systems and structures. Yet, the plan comes in the wake of criticism of his handling of the South Bend Police Department. Buttigieg needs the support of black voters to have an actual chance of winning the nomination, so strategically, he has to appeal to us. So here’s a tip: sound less like a Disney character when addressing American bigotry.

Beto O’Rourke may be nearly a decade older than Pete Buttigieg, but when it comes to how to talk about racism in this country and how to handle it, he sounded miles more progressive than his millennial counterpart. The former Texas congressman called Trump a white supremacist, noted racism is “endemic to our country,” and promised to sign Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee’s reparations bill into law.

Funny enough, at one point, Buttigieg told another candidate who answers questions about racism better than he does, Julián Castro, “This is why Presidential debates are becoming unwatchable. It reminds everybody of what they cannot stand about Washington. Scoring points against each other, poking at each other, and telling each that ‘my plan, your plan.’”

Castro interrupted him by saying, “Yeah, that’s called a Democratic primary election. That’s an election.”

Buttigieg may not have liked Castro’s tone all night, but when it comes to reasons why presidential debates can be unwatchable, he might want to consider his own banal and detached musings about racism in this country first before casting judgment on the competition.