Former Vice President Kamala Harris wanted to choose former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg as her running mate in the 2024 presidential election, but decided that it was too risky.
The Atlantic published an excerpt from Harris’ book “107 Days,” which is set to be released on September 23.
As Kamala Harris rushed to pick a running mate last year, her “first choice” was her close friend Pete Buttigieg, but she decided that it would be “too big of a risk” for a Black woman to run with a gay man.
Buttigieg “would have been an ideal partner—if I were a straight white man,” Harris writes in a passage of her soon-to-be-released book, 107 Days, that I saw. “But we were already asking a lot of America: to accept a woman, a Black woman, a Black woman married to a Jewish man. Part of me wanted to say, Screw it, let’s just do it. But knowing what was at stake, it was too big of a risk.”
“And I think Pete also knew that—to our mutual sadness.”
Harris explains that Buttigieg was her first choice because “he is a sincere public servant with the rare talent of being able to frame liberal arguments in a way that makes it possible for conservatives to hear them.”
She also wrote, “I love working with Pete. He and his husband, Chasten, are friends.”
Yet, she wound up choosing Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz because he appeared to be the “safe” choice. But, as CNN’s Scott Jennings pointed out, Buttigieg might have been a better running mate despite attitudes about his sexuality.
“So you couldn't pick Pete Buttigieg because he was gay, but you could endorse taxpayer-funded sex changes for minors,” he said during a recent broadcast. “And then you picked Tim Walz. There is not a single political operative alive who believes that Tim Walz was a good choice or helped the ticket.”
Jennings further stated that Buttigieg “would have been a far superior choice” and that “the idea that you’re going to blame it on that now shows just how unfit she was for the presidency in the first place.”
Kamala Harris claims she couldn't pick Pete Buttigieg as her VP because he's gay, so she settled for buffoon Tim Walz.
— Scott Jennings (@ScottJenningsKY) September 18, 2025
So to her, being gay is a bigger liability than endorsing taxpayer-funded sex changes for minors?!
This logic is incoherent. Voters made the right choice. pic.twitter.com/FwsBLUvbK7
To be fair, a platypus would have made a better running mate than Walz. But Jennings might be right — Harris would have done better with someone like Buttigieg, whose cringe factor was a bit lower than Walz’s. But it’s still unlikely she would have beaten President Donald Trump.
After the disaster that was the Biden administration and Democratic control of Congress, America wanted something different. There was no chance that Harris could overcome her former boss’ horrendous performance in the White House.