Buttigieg: I’m Not Afraid of Trump’s Tweets ‘Full of Typos’

Democratic presidential hopeful Pete Buttigieg said during Sunday’s broadcast of NBC’s “Meet the Press” that he was not afraid of President Donald Trump’s tweets “full of typos.”

Partial transcript as follows:

TODD: A lot of Democrats say, “Jeez.” They think he — it was unfair in ’16 and he won. And they think this process was unfair and he won again. They’re starting to — some of them might lose faith that, you know, if you try to fight this guy fair, you lose.
BUTTIGIEG: Well, I think that we can fight fair, but we’ve got to fight tough. We’ve got to be ready to go up against somebody who’s pulling out all of the stops in order to —

TODD: What makes you tough enough to take on —

BUTTIGIEG: Well, for one thing, I’m not afraid of the kind of nonsense he’s going to throw around. I’ve seen worse forms of incoming than a tweet full of typos.

TODD: But you can’t ignore it the way — you have a way of trying to be above things. And i think — and it’s healthy — there’s nothing wrong with that. It’s what we all want to teach, we all want to teach kids and we want to teach people to do that. But he doesn’t do that. And sometimes you have to be just as pugilistic.

BUTTIGIEG: Yeah. I mean, there are times you’ve got to fight back and hit back. But the thing about Donald Trump, he’s kind of like a Chinese finger trap, where the harder you pull, the more you get stuck. He has this way of changing the subject. And so in dealing with him, it’s very important if he tells a lie, you correct it. If he does something wrong, you confront it. If he attacks you, you push back. But then, you’ve got to very quickly return to what this election and every election is actually about, which is the voter asking the question, “How’s my life going to be different if you’re president instead of you?” And we’ve got the best answers on all of those questions. We’re the ones trying to get everyone a raise. We’re the ones trying to protect folks’ health care. We’re the ones serious about dealing with gun violence, and climate change, and reforming immigration. On issue after issue, a strong American majority, including some independents and Republicans, is with us right now, which is exactly why he needs to change the subject to himself.

Follow Pam Key on Twitter @pamkeyNEN