With help from Allie Bice
Welcome to POLITICO’s 2021 Transition Playbook, your guide to the first 100 days of the Biden administration
JOE BIDEN’s Cabinet secretaries are lying low.
They haven’t been doing a lot of national media interviews outside of outlets like NPR and MSNBC. Despite invites, none of them have appeared on Fox News. The late night shows are basically Cabinet-free.
Except for Pete, that is.
The Transportation secretary is not usually the most-public facing member of the Cabinet but PETE BUTTIGIEG has been just that for the Biden administration. He has done more high- and low-profile televised and video interviews than any other Cabinet secretary.
Near the start of the transition, Buttigieg had the blessing of the Biden team to continue his “go everywhere” strategy that was a hallmark of his campaign, according to a former transition official. “There was a lot of upside to leveraging his enormous skill and media presence,” the official said.
While some nominees did an interview here and there, Buttigieg essentially obliterated the unwritten rule that nominees don’t talk to reporters ahead of confirmation hearings. And after initially making a play to be U.N. ambassador, he is making the Transportation Department into an unlikely bully pulpit.
“It’s not the most glamorous Cabinet position,” JON STEWART said when Transportation Secretary RAY LaHOOD went on “The Daily Show” in 2009. “It’s the least glamorous Cabinet position.”
Buttigieg has made the job, if not glamorous, then at least more visible than it ever has been. And his profile is only likely to rise if Biden turns his focus, as anticipated, to passing an infrastructure package next.
A Fox News spokesperson confirmed that the channel had invited several Cabinet officials, including Klain, onto their shows, but so far only Buttigieg has accepted (or been allowed on).
Buttigieg has made the usual rounds on CNN and MSNBC — he’s appeared on at least five different MSNBC programs since Biden’s inauguration — but has added sit-downs with “The Points Guy” and Captain America actor CHRIS EVANS.
There’s been a blitz of local media, too — chatting about whether to install a toll on I-80 on CBS Pittsburgh and the Covid relief bill on Las Vegas’ NBC affiliate. (The Las Vegas station noted that Buttigieg had been “offered to us by the White House.”)
Since March 2, he has appeared on local TV in Indianapolis; Charlotte, N.C.; Las Vegas; Raleigh, N.C.; Colorado Springs, Colo.; Columbus, Ohio; and Greenville, N.C.
He has also appeared on three late night shows: “The Tonight Show starring JIMMY FALLON,” “Late Night with SETH MEYERS” and “JIMMY KIMMEL Live!” Buttigieg is the first Cabinet secretary ever to appear live on “Late Night” since Meyers took over in 2014, according to NBC. (Defense Secretary ASH CARTER made a taped…
Read More: Secretary Pete declined this media request