Buttigieg defends experience: ‘Anybody of any age can do a good job’

Pete Buttigieg on Friday defended his experience against other Democratic presidential rivals as the South Bend, Ind., mayor seeks to garner more support in the primary race.

“I think anybody of any age can do a good job. Obviously I’m enthusiastic about the generational energy that’s out there, but it only makes sense if it’s connected to a vision,” Buttigieg said on ABC’s “The View.” 

“The case I’ve been laying out is that there’s a vision of what our country might look like by the time I get to the current president’s age, and that vision has to be rooted in the decisions we make right now,” he added.{mosads}

Buttigieg, 37, is one of the youngest candidates vying for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination but has seen his stock rise in polls as he crisscrosses the country campaigning in the early months of the primary race.

The Midwest mayor appeared alongside former Vice President Joe Biden, 76, and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), 77, in Thursday night’s Democratic presidential primary debate. During one exchange, Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.), 38, urged Biden to “pass the torch” to the younger generation.

“I thought Pete Buttigieg looked real young last night, and real green,” Meghan McCain, a co-host on “The View,” remarked on Friday’s episode. 

Was Rep. Eric Swallwell’s comment to former vice president Joe Biden in last night’s #DemDebate ageist? The co-hosts weigh in. https://t.co/1091s9Fn2d pic.twitter.com/QfVTePkz3K

— The View (@TheView) June 28, 2019

Buttigieg maintained that he would combine his youthful perspective with the expertise of older politicians should he be elected president. 

“It’s not that I don’t understand the way things work and the way things have worked for years, it’s that I don’t accept it, and I think sometimes coming in with more of an outside perspective is a real asset, especially when the system itself is so broken and in need of being deeply, deeply reformed and redesigned,” Buttigieg said Friday on ABC.

Mayor @PeteButtigieg: “I learned right away as a very young mayor … sometimes you need to lean on the expertise of people who have been doing work for longer than you have been alive, but you also can’t be afraid to bring a totally new perspective.” https://t.co/ggTzZ6aWge pic.twitter.com/rr7oNnpF63

— The View (@TheView) June 28, 2019

“One of the things I learned right away as a very young mayor is that sometimes you need to lean on the expertise of people who have been doing work for longer than you’ve been alive, but you also can’t be afraid to bring a totally new perspective, which is what I think leaders from a new generation can do uniquely,” he said.