Is U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg angling to replace Gov. Gretchen Whitmer?

It’s a question the former mayor of South Bend, Ind., has repeatedly faced since moving to Michigan with his husband in 2020, two years before Democrats secured a government trifecta for the first time in 40 years.

So far, his silence is speaking louder than his words.

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“Pete Buttigieg refuses to rule out running for Michigan governor in 2026 – AP,” NewsWire recently posted to X.

The move to Michigan transpired a year after Buttigieg and his husband Chasten adopted newborn twins, with a Buttigieg spokesperson telling the Detroit Free Press “moving to Chasten’s hometown of Traverse City allowed them to be closer to his parents, which became especially important to them after they adopted their twins, often relying on Chasten’s parents for help with child care.”

But there’s other political benefits in the battleground state of Michigan that simply aren’t available to a liberal Democrat in Indiana. After a failed presidential run in 2020, the Intelligencer noted Buttigieg had few options in The Hoosier State.

“Whatever the personal benefits and the spousal connection, moving to Michigan also happens to place Buttigieg in a red-hot battleground state whose current Democratic governor and two U.S. senators may not stay in their current jobs forever,” the Intelligencer’s Ed Kilgore opined in 2022. “In deep-red Indiana, there was no obvious avenue for higher office for a guy like Buttigieg, which is probably a major reason he ran for president in 2020 instead of climbing a ladder that really wasn’t there.”

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Since the move, there’s been constant speculation about Buttigieg’s intent in the Great Lakes State, where veteran political observer Tim Skubick posed the question directly last November: “So how does ‘Governor Pete’ strike you?”

Buttigieg, then and now, has played coy.

“You know I’ve got one job, I’ve got two titles that really matter to me,” he told Skuick in an interview on WJBK. “One is father and the other is secretary and those are keeping me busy.”

Skubick didn’t relent.

“Say for me ‘I don’t want to be governor of Michigan,’” he said.

“I don’t think about how much I want to, or don’t want to have jobs besides what I’ve got,” Buttigieg replied.

It was the same deal when Axios’ Mike Allen posed the question at a summit in Washington, D.C. in March, and when Buttigieg was confronted by Politico in August.

“I don’t mean to dodge, it’s just that this job takes about 110% of my intellect and attention and I don’t know if I’ll run for office again or not,” Buttigieg told Allen. “But I do really care about the future of the state that I’ve married into, and adopted, and I think Gov. Whitmer is doing a fantastic job.”

A Mitchell Research & Communications poll released in October shows Buttigieg leading Democrats as the potential replacement for Whitmer in 2026 with 38% support among 709 likely voters.

Other potential Democratic contenders included Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson with 18% support, Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan at 3%, Genesee County Sheriff Chris Swanson at 2%, Lt. Gov. Garlin Gilchrist II with 2%, and Royal Oak state Sen. Mallory McMorrow at 1%.

U.S. Rep. John James and 2022 Republican gubernatorial candidate Tudor Dixon virtually tied as frontrunners on the Republican side at 28% and 27%, respectively.

Former car dealer Kevin Rinke, who lost to Dixon in the 2022 Republican primary, received 3% support, while former Michigan House Speaker Tom Leonard and state Republican Senate Leader Aric Nesbitt received 0% support, according to the Michigan Information & Research Service that sponsored the poll.