Inside Pete Buttigieg's all-in-bus tour

WATERLOO, Iowa – Pete Buttigieg told a group of journalists that jerky was his favorite snack on the road. His two dogs, Buddy and Truman, were missing. down shirts – that he's ironed – and a pair of jeans for this four day swing across eastern Iowa.

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The bus tour of the mayor of South Bend – enrolling in the ultimate access to the press that fueled its rapid rise last spring and propelled it into the middle of the Democratic presidential primary of 2020 – is more of a Live Tweet Express than its original inspiration, John McCain's 2000 Straight Talk Express. The Buttigieg campaign, which enters the fall months outside of the top three polls, is betting again on this transparency, and on a flood of headlines and social media posts written by reporters transcribing all reflections on the bus, to boost it in Iowa strong contrast with other candidates less inclined to appeal to the media.

But more than the media landscape has changed in the two decades since McCain's campaign. The cautious and professional way of talking about Buttigieg is very different from the Arizona senator's, which was provoked by a disproportionate and salty speech that caused a sensation. Buttigieg is not a "let down" candidate and kind of vampire, said Mike Murphy, a Republican strategist who was sitting in a rifle position during McCain's 2000 election campaign tour.

However, Buttigieg rejected the idea that he was not as relaxed as McCain. "Maybe one of you just needs to please me," he said Monday during a drive from Waterloo to Elkader, Iowa. (Nobody did.) He added that McCain, then a former senator, had "regaled" the press "with stories from other senators," but said, "I'm not here to inform you about the Washington practices. "

"You can press my buttons," he added. Lis Smith, Buttigieg's Senior Communications Advisor, laughed: "You can try."

When asked, Buttigieg said the last thing that made her scream was a football game.

"McCain was ruthlessly honest and that's why it worked. He was not one to mince words or choose them carefully. So for Straight Talk Express to work, you have to be honest, "said David Axelrod, chief strategist for the campaigns of former President Barack Obama. "It's not that Pete is not straightforward, but he chooses his words carefully."

"It might not have the same galvanic effect," Axelrod said.

On the bus, a dozen traveling journalists, crushed together on leather seats, pecked at their laptops and phones as they sowed questions about Buttigieg over the past three days. By the time he answered a question – including what it would be like he was not an elected ("literary critic at a university"), the nickname he's found in Afghanistan when buddies discovered that he was mayor ("honorable lieutenant") and sport most comparable to politics ("football provides the most analogies") – these responses appeared on Twitter.

The prolonged exposure gave rise to a series of recorded conversations that stemmed from his critique of the clarity of the Medicare for All advocates on how they would pay the program for the views of philosopher John Rawls, and then the nagging question of "Electability" in the 2020 primary.

"I remember so many conversations in Indiana, when Obama emerged, it was always the same thing:" I think it's great, but I'm not sure if the world is ready for that or if my neighbor is ready for that, "says Buttigieg." I know people have the same conversations about me and I think we have a very good answer to that. "

Buttigieg is competing with a media cycle run by President Donald Trump, whose action in order to put pressure on Ukraine so that it investigates Joe Biden dominated the news talk these last days. All of the 2020 contestants are looking for ways to break new ground, thousands of selfies according to Elizabeth Warren at Beto O'Rourke's live broadcast. Even Cory Booker transparently exposed his fundraising problems, asking for $ 1.7 million to continue his campaign.

"We try to reduce the noise," said Buttigieg. "One way to do this is to make sure we have a direct conversation different from the one others can do."

Buttigieg hopes to be able to dissociate supporters of former Vice President Joe Biden in the same way that McCain sought to be "the classic GOP alternative" to Texas Governor George W. Bush in the New Hampshire, opening a line of press access to compete with Bush 's financial advance. He is positioning himself as "Biden's double," said Murphy, adding that "like McCain, [Buttigieg] choose his shots. "

"There is a contrast between a candidate who is ready to surround journalists 24 hours a day, 7 days a week and a candidate whose media interactions are carefully managed," said Axelrod. "It's hard to avoid contrast, and I guess it's intentional."

Buttigieg acknowledged that he and Biden were "competing for many of the same people" in the primary. He added, "What will change in my mind is in part when people will start thinking about the ability to elect consistently with history, because right now I think it remains still the feeling that the most familiar face is the most eligible face. "

Buttigieg has frequently used the "familiar face" line when filming in Iowa this week. And this begins to appear in the polls. An investigation by the Des Moines Register / CNN revealed that Warren became a small advantage in the first caucus, while Biden was in second place. Buttigieg got 9% support in the survey but has touted some of the best favorability figures. On the bus, Buttigieg said the survey "shows we're on the hunt".

Buttigieg also devotes seven figures to a television and digital blitz, presenting itself in a series of biographical ads.

"When people see Pete for the first time, all of a sudden, they raise their heads and listen and everything changes," said Mayor Ryan Arndorfer of Britt, Iowa, who had approved Buttigieg last week and had come to see him at Iowa Falls.

The conversation on the bus sometimes became personal. Buttigieg said her husband, Chasten, was "ready to be a dad" and that the couple would have children while he was at the White House, if things went that far. And on Jacob Wohl, the Republican provocateur who tried to defile Buttigieg with a false allegation of sexual assault, Buttigieg said, "The biggest thing that was running through my head was to feel relieved that it was so obviously a simulacrum. "

To deal with it, however, Buttigieg said that he had to "do a lot of compartmentalization".

But the dialogue was deeper during the shooting at South Bend, when a white policeman fired at a black man and killed him in June. Buttigieg acknowledged that he was "so determined to make sure that I just do my duty not to take sides and to let it be known that I missed an opportunity to show how much I'm at it." Comfortable with the reason why people were unhappy. "

While the police union was pressuring Buttigieg to defend him and activists were warning him to fire him, "it is inevitable that you have the impression that you are not recording the moral and emotional power of what is going on. Said Buttigieg. . "What's really happening is that you're recording all that, and it's tearing you apart."

Buttigieg acknowledged that his campaign had little appeal to minority voters, but that he was "the white candidate most likely to be asked about race", there is "an opportunity, especially if I can use it as a way of talking to whites to have a conversation about the breed that many whites are not ready to have. "

Buttigieg took a break from the press as he wandered on Twitter Monday afternoon. What was planned in the form of a 15-minute question-and-answer on Twitter is turned into a 45-minute conversation between Buttigieg and his supporters, organized via the hashtag #ButtigiegBusTour.

"We tend," said Buttigieg casually, a few questions.

"Good job," Smith said, looking over Buttigieg's shoulder as he scanned his mentions. Subsequently, Smith advised Buttigieg to add the hashtag to "break" his chances of appearing higher in the list of trends, while Buttigieg watched a journalist's musical tastes by tweet because they were at less than a meter away in the bus.

"If anyone wanted to know how this bus tour would be different from 1999," Buttigieg said.

The journalists on the bus sat in silence, looking at their phones.