Emails Show Buttigieg Declined Meeting With Senator While on Paterity Leave
- January 13, 2023
WASHINGTON (TND) — U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg declined a meeting with Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley while on paternity leave, despite saying multiple times that, in his position as secretary, he remains available “24/7.”
Buttigieg has been criticized for taking paternity leave amid the 2021 supply chain crisis and for being absent from several other major transportation crises, including the Southwest Airlines 2022 holiday travel debacle.
But the Transportation Secretary has balked at these criticisms, going so far as calling them “nonsense” in an interview with Fox News’s Brett Baier.
But according to emails obtained by watchdog group Protect the Public’s Trust, via a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit, the Transportation Secretary’s availability may not be what he claims it should be.