Large crowd turns out for Buttigieg visit to Charles City

Democratic candidate for president Pete Buttigieg poses for "selfie" photos after a rally Sunday afternoon at the Elks Lodge in Charles City. Press photo by Bob Steenson

Democratic candidate for president Pete Buttigieg answers questions from the crowd during a campaign stop Sunday afternoon at the Elks Lodge in Charles City. Press photo by Bob Steenson

Democratic candidate for president Pete Buttigieg greets a large crowd during a campaign stop Sunday afternoon at the Elks Lodge in Charles City. Press photo by Bob Steenson

By Bob Steenson, bsteenson@charlescitypress.com

Exactly one year from the next presidential election, the first of the Democratic “big four” candidates stopped in Charles City Sunday afternoon for a campaign event that brought out the enthusiastic and the curious.

Former Floyd County Democratic Chairman Jim Davis introduced candidate Pete Buttigieg, saying the 37-year-old South Bend, Indiana, mayor and combat veteran “has steel in his spine.”

Buttigieg took about 45 minutes sharing his vision for America, talking about specific policies and answering questions.

“The stakes could not be higher,” Buttigieg said about the 2020 presidential election.

“Every election, they say it’s the most important election but (shuddering) look where we are right now,” he said.

Buttigeig said he wants to end the “chaos and the meanness,” “the corruption and the tweets” from the White House.

But he also said that even if a Democrat wins next year and President Trump does not get a second term, the same problems will face the country that are facing it now.

“The sun’s gonna be coming up on a country that will be even more divided than we are now,” he said. “And all the big issues that helped us get to this point will still be waiting for the next president,” including economic issues, climate issues, the need for better health care options, and others.

It will take leadership to “boldly answer those issues with something a lot better than the political warfare we’ve gotten used to out of Washington, and unify the American people while we’re doing it,” he said.

“That is a tall order, but I’m running to be the president who can do that, who can pick up the pieces,” he said. “And we can do this resting on the values that unite us as a country, if you have a president who understands that these values are something used to bring us together, not to drive us apart.”

He said while he knows not everyone will agree, there is a “strong majority” of people in the country who are ready to do something about health care, and he talked about his “Medicare for all who want it” plan.

“I’m not going to kick you off your private plan. I’m going to set up one and let you decide for yourself whether it’s better,” he said. “I think the plan we create is going to be better but I’m not going to assume that it’s the right one for you.”

Later, answering an audience question, Buttigieg said his plan to get everyone health care would cost $1.5 trillion, “which by the way is still an awful lot of money, but a fraction of what some of the others do,” in one of the rare references to his competitors for the Democratic nomination.

He said America needs to stop being the only developed country that doesn’t have a paid family leave policy, and he said the majority of Americans back “sensible” gun laws such as mandatory background checks and “red flag” laws.

“And if we really want to protect this country and protect each other, we’ve got to protect our future,” Buttigieg said. “Which is why we’ve got to treat climate change like the security threat of our time, because it is, and in order to tackle it we’re going to have to lead the world into doing something about it.”

Here are some of his comments on some of the other issues:

• FAITH: “Values like faith … should not be used to divide us against one another. The Constitution protects people in this country of every religion and of no religion equally. It’s one of the founding ideas of this nation.

“It’s also the case though, and while honoring that separation of church and state, I want voters of faith to know my commitment to building a White House, a presidency, a federal government where you never have to look at Washington, scratch your head and say, whatever happened to, ‘I was hungry and you fed me. I was a stranger and you welcomed me. Whatever you have done the least of these you have also done to me.’”

• RACISM: “We need to tackle systemic racism with the sense of urgency that lets all of us know, all of us, that we have a stake, in the name of the future of the Republic, of seeing to it that in this country your race has no bearing on your health or your wealth or your life expectancy or your relationship with law enforcement.”

• IMMIGRATION: “We haven’t upgraded immigration in this country since the 1980s, and the consequences are that the levels that we set country by country are out of whack, the process is bureaucratic, the backlogs are enormous, and we’ve got 10 million people living and often working right here in the United States who don’t have documentation.

“This is why we need to create a pathway to citizenship to those who are here. That’s why we need to support and protect Dreamers who are as American as I am but don’t have the paperwork for it,” he said.

Regarding a question from a business owner who said unemployment is so low he had difficulty hiring workers, Buttigieg said he was proposing “community renewal visas,” where a community could apply for a number of visas to be issued to immigrants who commit to bring their skills to live in that area for a fixed amount of time.

“It’s gonna be good for businesses, it’s gonna be good for the community and it’s gonna be good for people who get the visas,” he said

Regarding a question from a young person about separating families at the border, Buttigieg said he would put an end immediately to any chance of that kind of separation happening.

He also said that children who have gone through that are owed something.

“We need to make sure that they have compensation and that we do things to try to make it right and to better take care of them after what we have done to them.”

• PEOPLE WHO MIGHT MAKE AN ISSUE OF HIM BEING GAY: Pointing out that he was re-elected with 80% of the vote to an office in Indiana when current Vice President Mike Pence was governor there, Buttigieg said, “I find that elections are not so much about my life. I’m happy to tell my story and I’m proud of who I am. It’s really about your lives.”

• TAX POLICY: “The better you have done, the better you have benefitted from living in America, from the roads and streets and bridges and even the national security this country provides, and our system of schools and universities — all of those things that we take those tax dollars and use them for.

“To my mind, it’s only fair that those who have benefited the most, contribute the most. … We are going to make sure that income tax rates for the wealthiest are higher. We are going to make sure that investment income is taxed, too. … It’s not just people, it’s companies.”

• NATIONAL DEBT: “It used to be the Republicans talked about it all the time. Then they took over Washington and revealed that they don’t actually care, because they have increased the deficit — just a year’s worth of deficit — to almost a trillion dollars.

“Even as my campaign proposes really serious, significant and sometimes ambitious investments, we’re always going to make sure two things are true. One, we’re only ever going to make a promise that we can keep. … We’re going to be really measured in the promises that we make. But we’re also going to make sure that everything we’ve put forward, we’re willing to pay for it.”

• CAMPAIGN LAW: He said a constitutional amendment would be in order if the Citizens United legal decision could not be overturned by legislation.

Elks Lodge Manager Tina Schmidt said there were 276 people at the event, and there were also about 20 members of the national and regional press who are following Buttigieg’s campaign.

Buttigieg has consistently polled in the No. 4 spot in national political polls, behind former Vice President Joe Biden, Sen. Bernie Sanders and Sen. Elizabeth Warren. Those four are significantly ahead of any of the other Democratic candidates.

The latest New York Times/Sienna College poll of people who say they are likely to attend the Iowa caucuses saw Buttigieg move into third place, with 18%, and Biden dropping to fourth place with 17%. Warren led that poll with 22%, followed by Sanders with 19%. The second-through-fourth positions are all within the poll’s margin of error.