‘Mayor Pete’ Documentary Slammed by Reviewers as Supply Chain Crisis Worsens

EV Buttigieg
AP Photo/Seth Wenig
Alana Mastrangelo

Mayor Pete — Amazon Studios’ documentary about U.S. Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg and his failed Democrat primary presidential campaign — is being slammed by reviewers while the supply chain crisis in the United States worsens. Buttigieg has been on paid paternity leave since mid-August, “to spend time with his husband” and their two newborn babies.

“A Pete Buttigieg documentary is, on some level, a step backwards for director Jesse Moss,” reads the film industry and review website Indie Wire, which adds “if the stakes are exponentially higher in ‘Mayor Pete’ — you’d never know it from watching the movie’s unflappable namesake as he explodes onto the national scene and challenges heavyweights like Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren.”

“From the moment that ‘Mayor Pete’ begins, it’s hard to tell if it’s a surface-level documentary — or if Buttigieg simply refuses to let the world have a deeper glimpse at what makes him tick,” Indie Wire affirms.

A review by The Wrap said that it was “frustrating” to watch the documentary and learn “surprisingly little about Buttigieg himself.”

“His history, his policy work, his family outside of husband Chasten? Like the man himself, the nuanced details of his biography often remain just out of reach,” the reviewer said. “A documentary shouldn’t require a supplementary visit to a subject’s Wikipedia page to fill in copious gaps.”

But Buttigieg’s apparent substandard documentary is not the only thing about the former mayor that’s currently getting negative reviews.

“Amateur hour: Pete Buttigieg’s inexperience exposed as supply chain breaks down,” reads a Wednesday morning headline by The Hill.

Under the Biden administration, the former mayor of South Bend, Indiana, is now head of the Department of Transportation, which employs more than 58,000 people and has a budget of $87 billion.

These responsibilities are a far cry from those involving Buttigieg’s previous position as mayor of South Bend, which has a population of just 103,453, and harbors a small train station, a small bus station, and a small regional airport.

Now, with Black Friday and Christmas just around the corner, the U.S. is facing a massive supply-chain crisis that is expected to impact every American — specifically the lower and middle classes — as well as negatively affect restaurants, stores, and small businesses while consumer costs rise.

“A growing number of shipments are stuck at sea because of supply chain issues, leading to growing concern that holiday shipments may not arrive in time,” reads a recent report by CBS News. “Container ships are crowding ports from New York to Los Angeles, where 250,000 containers are floating off the coast waiting to be unloaded.”

The Washington Post perilously describes the situation as well:

But Buttigieg doesn’t appear to be burdening himself with the enormous supply chain crisis, as the U.S. Secretary of Transportation has been on paid paternity leave since mid-August, according to a report by Politico.

“They didn’t previously announce it, but Buttigieg’s office told West Wing Playbook that the secretary has actually been on paid leave since mid-August to spend time with his husband, Chasten, and their two newborn babies,” the report reads.

And Buttigieg doesn’t appear to be the only one taking some time off while Americans suffer.

One of Buttigieg’s fellow Biden appointees, U.S. Secretary of Labor Marty Walsh, tried to explain the worker shortage, telling Axios on HBO that the pursuit of “work-life balance” could be why people are refusing to join the workforce.

“There’s no question that we have work to do,” Walsh said, adding that the worker shortage might also be explained by people’s fears of the coronavirus, the delta variant, and concern for their “personal health.”

You can follow Alana Mastrangelo on Facebook and Twitter at @ARmastrangelo, and on Instagram.

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