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Pete Buttigieg Criticizes Pence’s Homophobic Policies on ‘Ellen’

Pete Buttigieg Criticizes Pence’s Homophobic Policies on ‘Ellen’

Pete Buttigieg Criticizes Pence’s Homophobic Policies on ‘Ellen’

The Indiana mayor also spoke about how his own faith guides him politically.

Gay (but not queer, eye roll) presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg is on the publicity warpath, and if you want to be in the gay mafia you have to kiss the ring of its leader: Ellen DeGeneres.

Buttigieg appeared on DeGeneres' talk show Friday, teaching the comedian how to pronounce his name (the emphasis, he explained, is on the "boot") before talking about his public tension with vice president and former Indiana governor Mike Pence.

"I'm not critical of his faith, I'm critical of bad policies," Buttigieg explained. "I don't have a problem with religion. I'm religious, too. I have a problem with religion being used as a justification to harm people and especially in the LGBTQ community," he said, adding that in many parts of the country queer people can still be fired for their identities.

"I'm not interested in feuding with the vice president," said Buttigieg, "but if he wanted to clear this up, he could come out today and say he's changed his mind, that it shouldn't be legal to discriminate against anybody in this country for who they are."

DeGeneres also asked Buttigieg about his faith, which he said he's not interested in imposing on anyone. "But it does guide me, and when I'm in church the scripture that I hear is about taking care about the least among us it's about lifting up those who are most vulnerable...that's what I get when I hear scripture. Its a message that is fundamentally about love.

"That does have implications for how I behave in the political space," he said.

When asked about the election, Buttigieg had advice for voters: "You gotta vote for the person you think best speaks to your values and is best able to lead the country, and you may decide that's me and you may decide that's somebody else."

RELATED | Pete Buttigieg Is Glad He's Gay, but He Didn't Always Feel Like That

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