Mayor Pete Buttigieg has delivered a provocative response in recent days to those who challenge his empathy with black Americans: His experience as a gay man helps him relate to the struggles of African Americans.
That has angered some African Americans, who view it as an attempt by a privileged white man to claim a type of victimhood that is distinct from the black experience in America, even while others take the comments more favorably.
Oliver Davis, a black council member in South Bend, Ind., where Buttigieg is mayor, said that African Americans, unlike gay people, don't have the option of "coming out" at their chosen moment — as did Buttigieg, who disclosed his sexual orientation after he had been elected mayor.
"When you see me, you would know that I'm African American from day one," said Davis, who has endorsed former vice president Joe Biden. "When someone is gay or a lesbian, unless they tell or they are seen in certain situations, then no one is going to know that. They are able to build their résumés and build their career."
LGBT activists see something different in Buttigieg — a barrier-breaker from a group that has long faced bigotry and violence, a face of the latest struggle for inclusion. And while some successfully conceal their difference, say leaders of the movement for gay equality, that decision can come with its own steep costs.
Evan Wolfson, founder of Freedom to Marry, which helped lead the fight for same-sex marriage, said Buttigieg's message is not "an attempt to appropriate someone else's experience." Rather, he said, the mayor is saying that "because he, too, has had to deal with his own struggles, that has made him more aware of the need to connect with the struggles of others."
"I think Kamala had a point, and I understood what she was saying," the Rev. Al Sharpton, the civil rights activist, said in an interview, though he added that Buttigieg had been misunderstood.
He said Buttigieg is doing his best to reach out. "He's evolving," Sharpton said. "Do I think he's where he needs to be? No."
