Pete Buttigieg, 2020 presidential hopeful and mayor of South Bend, Indiana, thinks his fellow Democrats are overlooking the value of Fox News.
During an appearance on “The View” Friday, the candidate said it was time for other challengers in the field to use the network as a platform to reach conservatives.
“An election is supposed to be about our whole country,” Buttigieg said, stressing that “we can’t just concentrate on those areas where people, for the most part, already agree with us.”
Though Buttigieg claimed he was “the only one who’s been on Fox so far,” of his party, Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar, New York Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, California Sen. Kamala Harris, Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper, former Maryland Rep. John Delaney and Andrew Yang have all made appearances this year.
Still, that means a handful of big name Democratic contenders in the race haven’t yet done interviews on the channel to discuss their campaigns.
Buttigieg said it was his Indiana upbringing that showed him how to appeal to those with different opinions “by explaining in good faith why I believe what I believe to people who maybe believe differently.”
When it comes to Fox News, he noted, “there are so many viewers who may never hear what our party has to say at all if we’re never going on those channels and explaining what we believe.”
Meanwhile, the network’s ties to the White House, reported in an exposé earlier this month by The New Yorker’s Jane Mayer, have aroused controversy.
The Democratic National Committee has since announced that it plans to block Fox News from hosting or televising any of the party’s primary debates.
The Islamophobia, racism and misogyny of Fox News hosts Jeanine Pirro and Tucker Carlson have also made it an especially trying month for the network’s image.
Correction: This story initially stated only two Democratic candidates had appeared on Fox News. It has been changed to include several others.