‘Flailing’: Pete Buttigieg rips Trump for rejecting virtual debate

“It’s too bad,” Buttigieg said. “I don’t know why the president’s afraid to participate in the debate. You know, all of us have had to get used to virtual formats.”

Buttigieg, who ran against Joe Biden during the 2020 Democratic presidential primaries, is now a surrogate for the former vice president.

The CPD’s decision follows Trump’s brief hospitalization after testing positive for COVID-19. Since Trump’s diagnosis, 34 “staffers and other contacts” connected to the White House have tested positive for the disease, according to an internal government memo reported by ABC News.

“I think part why the U.S. is falling behind — is badly behind — the rest of the developed world is because every time there’s been a choice between doing something in a way that’s more safe or less safe, the president has pushed for less safe,” Buttigieg said, before pivoting to attack the strength of Trump’s campaign leading up to the election. A recent poll from Rasmussen Reports, one of the president’s preferred pollsters, showed Biden with a 12-point lead less than a month before the election. Rasmussen has boasted about being one of the few polling outlets to predict the 2016 election results accurately.

“I think it’s also probably a reflection of the weakness of his campaign,” Buttigieg said. “You know, when you see campaigns getting the kind of bad news that he’s been getting through this month, you’ll see these kinds of increased arguments over rules, withdrawing from opportunities, a little bit of flailing there.”

“Of course,” the former mayor concluded, “the only reason we’re here in the first place is that the president of the United States is still contagious with a deadly disease. … Maybe the president doesn’t care about other people.”