LGBT outlets trashed Tucker Carlson as homophobic last week after the Fox News host questioned the rationale behind the gay secretary of transportation taking two months of paternity leave amid a supply chain crisis.
“Pete Buttigieg has been on leave from his job since August after adopting a child,” Carlson told viewers Thursday night after Politico revealed Buttigieg’s absence in the magazine’s “West Wing Playbook.” “Paternity leave is what they are calling it. Try to figure out how to breastfeed — no word on how that went.”
Gay media were quick to condemn Carlson as “homophobic” for raising concerns about the transportation secretary taking advantage of a policy intended to allow mothers adequate recovery from childbirth and breastfeeding. Pete and his husband, Chasten, announced their adoption of a pair of newborn twins the first week of September.
While it’s not uncommon for same-sex couples to take time off after adoption to cultivate a growing family, fathers often take less time to help the mother and newborn in heterosexual relationships before returning to work. According to the U.S. Department of Labor, 90 percent of new fathers take time off, but a vast majority, 70 percent, take 10 days or less. Politico reported Buttigieg had been on paid paternity leave since mid-August, an eight-week stretch which spanned the critical infrastructure debate on Capitol Hill and a supply chain crisis leading to empty shelves.
“Fox News bigot Tucker Carlson goes on ‘homophobic’ rant about Pete Buttigieg ‘trying to breastfeed,'” headlined PinkNews, a U.K.-based outlet where parental leave is a government entitlement. Parents, however, are limited to four weeks a year per child, “unless the employer agrees otherwise.”
In a statement to The Federalist, PinkNews said the online paper offered paid parental leave, but declined to elaborate on how much.
“Fox host Tucker Carlson regularly spews blatantly homophobic and racist drivel during his time on air,” read the lede in LGBTQ Nation. “But he may have hit a new low.”
The Human Rights Campaign (HRC), a nonprofit group dedicated to promoting left-wing causes cloaked in the moral righteousness of gay rights, called Carlson’s remarks “sexist, homophobic, ignorant and just plain rude.”
Boiling it down to taking time “figure out how to breastfeed” is sexist, homophobic, ignorant and just plain rude.
CC: Tucker Carlson 👀 https://t.co/ggpGaQdQI0
— Human Rights Campaign (@HRC) October 15, 2021
Neither the HRC or LGBTQ Nation responded to The Federalist’s inquiries regarding their own programs for parental leave.
A recent Washington Post profile of Buttigieg’s husband, Chasten, has raised more questions surrounding Pete’s need for eight weeks off at a rare critical moment for the Transportation secretary.
Headlined “In Official Washington, Chasten Buttigieg is a stranger in a (very) strange land,” the article highlighted how much excess free time Chasten found himself saddled with, unemployed in the nation’s capital. Since the piece was published in July, it’s unclear whether Chasten has rejoined the workforce.
On Tuesday, Fox Business reported that a “record backlog” of 157 ships sit waiting at California ports in a major bottleneck threatening the holiday shopping season. The backup caused by the coronavirus pandemic and the ensuing labor shortage has begun to wreak havoc on ports in the Atlantic, with the Port of Savannah beginning to see similar congestion.
