Democratic presidential candidate and Afghanistan War veteran Pete Buttigieg went after President Trump’s avoidance of military service, accusing him of faking a disability to dodge going to Vietnam.
Buttigieg, who also compared Trump to a “crazy uncle,” tiptoed around criticism of primary rival Joe Biden, who also avoided the Vietnam draft.
“I have a pretty dim view of his decision to use his privileged status to fake a disability in order to avoid serving in Vietnam,” the South Bend, Ind. mayor said, in a Washington Post interview Thursday.
In 1968, Trump received a diagnosis of bone spurs in the heels, which prevented him from serving in the military. The daughters of the now-deceased podiatrist who gave that diagnosis said in December that diagnosis was a favor to Trump’s father, Fred Trump.
When pressed on whether he believes that Trump faked a disability, Buttigieg impishly asked the moderator, “Do you believe he has a disability?”
Buttigieg then suggested Trump might have a disability, but referring to the supposed bone spurs, said, “At least not that one,” prompting laughter from the live audience.
“I don’t mean to trivialize disability, but I believe that’s exactly what he did,” said Buttigieg, who served seven months in Afghanistan in 2014 as a lieutenant in the Navy Reserve. “I mean, if he were a conscientious objector, I’d admire that. But this is somebody who, I think it’s very obvious to most of us, took advantage of the fact that he was a child of a multimillionaire in order to pretend to be disabled so that somebody could go to war in his place.”
[Also read: Mike Pompeo blasts Pete Buttigieg for ‘slanderous’ attack on Mike Pence]
Michael Cohen, Trump’s former lawyer, told lawmakers in congressional testimony in February that when he asked Trump for medical records relating to the bone spur, “he gave me none and said there was no surgery.” Cohen said that Trump told him, “You think I’m stupid, I wasn’t going to Vietnam.”
Former Vice President Joe Biden also received deferments from Vietnam duty and was eventually disqualified from service due to having asthma as a teenager.
Buttigieg claimed that while it is necessary to respond to respond to “lies” from and disagreements with Trump, it is important to not make the debate about him.
“Any energy that goes his way, including any energy that goes his way in the form of criticism, turns into a kind of food. He just devours it and gets bigger,” Buttigieg said, adding that dealing with Trump is “sort of like a crazy uncle management.”
“Like, he’s there, you’re not going to disrespect his humanity, but he’s – he thinks what he thinks, there’s not much you can do about it,” Buttigieg said. “I don’t have a problem standing up to somebody who was, you know, working on season seven of ‘Celebrity Apprentice’ while I was packing my bags for Afghanistan. But at the end of the day, it’s not about him.”
While Buttigieg was unafraid to condemn Trump, he was hesitant to directly criticize Biden, focusing on policy disagreements while avoiding mentioning Biden’s name.
When asked if he agrees with presidential candidate and Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s assessment that “Biden was on the side of credit card companies” when Biden pushed a 2005 law that made filing for bankruptcy more difficult, Buttigieg briefly paused in careful consideration before answering.
“I have a difference of opinion with anybody who favors credit card companies over consumers,” Buttigieg said.
Buttigieg also criticized the 1994 crime bill, which Biden helped craft when he was a senator, saying that there is a “broad sense” that the bill contributed to mass incarceration.
“I would think that many of those who were behind the ’94 crime bill, at least many of them, would do it differently if they had a chance to do it again,” Buttigieg said.
At a campaign stop in New Hampshire earlier this month, Biden defended the crime bill and denied that it generated mass incarceration.
