During a Fox News town hall with presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg on Sunday evening, the South Bend, Indiana mayor called President Trump’s tweets “grotesque.”
The remark drew laughter and applause from the crowd gathered for the Fox News event, a rare, but mild dig against Trump aired on the network with a primarily conservative audience.
“The tweets are — I don’t care,” Buttigieg said Sunday when Fox News’ Chris Wallace asked him how he planned to combat Trump’s insults as a candidate. “Well it’s a very effective way to command the attention of the media and we need to make sure that we’re changing the channel from this show that he’s created. Because what matters, and look I get it, it’s mesmerizing, it is hard for anybody to look away, me too. It is the nature of grotesque things that you can’t look away.”
The remark was met with laughter and then an eruption of applause.
“But every time we’re looking at the show and the latest tweet and the silly insult, what we’re not looking at is the fact that we’re the ones trying to get you a raise and not the ones blocking it, we’re the ones trying to preserve your health care and they’re the ones trying to take it away, we’re the ones who are actually able to deliver on something like paid family leave and they’re against it,” he said. “Their positions as a general rule are unpopular.”
Pete Buttigieg calls Trump tweets "grotesque" pic.twitter.com/60yl8hrrZh
— TPM Livewire (@TPMLiveWire) May 20, 2019
Trump was clearly bothered by Fox News’ decision to host a town hall with the Democratic presidential candidate, tweeting his disdain with Fox for “wasting airtime” on Buttigieg.
