Pete Buttigieg said Friday that someone made an anonymous false report to Michigan authorities claiming he posed a danger to his 4-year-old twins. Michigan State Police confirmed they received the report and that investigators determined it was baseless.
In a Substack post, the former Transportation Secretary described how state police and Child Protective Services showed up at his home in Michigan a few days prior. His children were temporarily removed while they underwent separate forensic interviews the following morning. Buttigieg himself was then questioned as part of the investigation.
The accusation came from an anonymous caller who claimed to know someone who said she had met Buttigieg at an Alabama conference years ago. According to the caller's story, this woman alleged he had confessed to committing violent crimes. Buttigieg told investigators he had never been to that town in Alabama.
"The officer made clear that he believed this was politically motivated, and said it would not be referred to a prosecutor," Buttigieg wrote. "Nothing in the forensic interview with the children, which was conducted by trained personnel, had led to concerns."
The CPS worker assigned to the case also found no basis for the allegation, though the formal investigation would require additional time to close. Buttigieg spent 24 hours separated from his children before they were reunited.
Michigan State Police released a statement calling false reports "dangerous" and saying they "divert law enforcement officers and Child Protective Services workers from responding to legitimate emergencies and protecting vulnerable children and families." The agency did not identify who filed the report or whether any investigation into the false filing is underway.
Buttigieg praised the officers and CPS workers for their professionalism but characterized the incident as a cruel hoax intended to damage his family. He noted the timing coincided with Pride Month and came shortly after he and his husband Chasten shared family photos on social media for Father's Day.
"For twenty-four deeply distressing hours, we had no idea what I was accused of or what was about to happen," he wrote. "We could not understand someone abusing the system like this in order to hurt me and my family with an absurd and easily refuted allegation of a horrific crime."
A Navy veteran and the first openly gay Cabinet member confirmed by the Senate, Buttigieg has not announced a 2028 presidential campaign, though early polling shows him among the top prospective Democratic candidates.
The incident reflects a broader pattern of what authorities call swatting, in which anonymous callers make false emergency reports designed to dispatch large police responses to someone's home or workplace. The tactic has increasingly targeted government officials and politicians. Last month, Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett's Virginia home was the subject of a swatting call after someone reported hearing gunshots. In November, at least 11 Republican state lawmakers in Indiana reported being targets of similar incidents.
Author Sarah Mitchell: "The fact that this happened during Pride Month and right after he shared Father's Day photos suggests someone was explicitly trying to weaponize his identity against him, and that's the part that sticks."
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