Pete Buttigieg Makes History, and Makes America Face the Meaning of LGBTQ Equality—and Reality of Prejudice

Pete Buttigieg: navy suit, white shirt, tie. If he’s feeling utterly wild, shirt sleeves, no tie. Dark hair, short back and sides, neat and tidy. That’s the workmanlike, sexy Bible salesman uniform of “Mayor Pete,” candidate for president and (at the time of writing) maybe-perhaps-looking-likely winner of the Iowa caucuses.

Whether or not Pete Buttigieg is finally counted as the winner in Iowa—if so it would make him the first LGBTQ candidate to win a state contest in a presidential primary—and whatever you think of him (and LGBTQ voters are not one uniform bloc of support; many support other candidates), what he is doing as a gay man is of history-making note.