Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg was heckled off the stage as climate protesters chanted “Stop Petro Pete” and “End Fossil Fuels Pete” during an event on Wednesday.
Buttigieg was speaking at iMPACT MARYLAND at the Joseph Meyerhoff Symphony Hall in Baltimore, Maryland, when he was interrupted by the protesters from the liberal group.
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Breaking: we just chased Secretary Pete Buttigieg off the stage at the Meyerhoff Symphony.
Petro Pete is a coward. As we write he is ramming down our throats the Sea Port and GulfLink oil terminals – each worse than Keystone.
We must resist him with all we’ve got. And we will. pic.twitter.com/aVKeCre5eH
— Climate Defiance (@ClimateDefiance) October 10, 2023
“Your [Department of Transportation] just approved the Seaport Oil Terminal, a project that will have 80 coal plants’ worth of greenhouse gas emissions and will worsen air quality in areas that already live in cancer clusters. This is about environmental racism, and it’s about the climate impacts this project will have,” a protester told Buttigieg.
In footage released by the group behind the protest, Climate Defiance, Buttigieg can be seen trying to speak with the protesters before eventually leaving the stage, with them continuing to heckle the transportation secretary as he was escorted away by security.
The protesters tried to follow him offstage, chanting, “Stop S.P.O.T. and GulfLink, stop Petro Pete,” but they were prevented from going backstage.
“Think about why he said he can’t ‘speak off the cuff’ on climate. Please! We’re ready to! We’re happy to have a conversation with Secretary Pete,” one protester said.
Climate Defiance, in a post on X, formerly known as Twitter, called Buttigieg “craven and corrupted” and accused him of “destroying entire communities to enrich his fossil fuel cronies.” The group also claimed one of the protesters present was a volunteer for Buttigieg’s 2020 presidential campaign.
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“One of the people in today’s action was a volunteer on the Buttigieg presidential campaign. She is now repulsed by her former role model. People across the county are waking up, realizing that Petro Pete is as slick & slimy as the fossil fuel projects he rubber-stamps,” the post said.
The group was demanding that the Department of Transportation, under Buttigieg’s authority, reject permits for the Sea Port crude oil export terminal and the GulfLink oil export terminal, both located off the coast of Texas.
