Pete Buttigieg and his kids subject to CPS, police investigation after false report; NPR, June 26, 2026

Elena Moore, NPR; Pete Buttigieg and his kids subject to CPS, police investigation after false report

"Former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg says he and his children were the subject of an investigation by Child Protective Services following an anonymous report that was later determined to be false.

Buttigieg, who lives with his husband and their twin four-year-old children in Traverse City, Michigan detailed the experience in a Substack post on Friday, saying that a police officer and CPS worker had come to his home and notified him of an anonymous report that alleged his children were at risk...

When asked for comment, the Michigan State Police told NPR they had received an anonymous report this week that state police and CPS responded to and "determined the report was false."...

The Michigan State Police have not shared any additional information on a potential motive for the false report against Buttigieg and his family. But in his statement Friday, Buttigieg noted the incident had taken place during Pride Month, meant to celebrate LGBTQ+ people.

"It's not lost on me that this happened soon after we shared photos of our family on social media for Father's Day," Buttigieg said in his statement. "Or that this occurred during a month meant to make families like ours feel welcome and safe."

News of the incident prompted bipartisan support for Buttigieg, including from Rep. Derrick Van Orden, R-Wisc., who replied to the Michigan Democrat's post on X saying, "this has happened to our family and I agree, this is horrible."

What happened to mercy?; The Washington Post, November 13, 2025

Thomas Banchoff , The Washington Post; What happened to mercy?

"Decades ago, Pope John Paul II made a plea for mercy. His 1980 encyclical “Dives in Misericordia” (“Rich in Mercy”) emphasized God’s forgiving love toward humanity and decried a widespread tendency to “remove from the human heart the very idea of mercy.” Instead of mercy, John Paul saw a rise in “spite, hatred and even cruelty.”

Mercy is painfully scarce in our politics today. When the Right Rev. Mariann Budde, the Episcopal bishop of Washington, appealed to President Donald Trump from the pulpit in January to show mercy toward the vulnerable, the president bristled and demanded an apology. In the months since, his administration’s policies have been rife with cruelty, from eliminating life-giving aid programs abroad to threatening to withhold food assistance for more than 40 million Americans."

This Is Trump’s Message: At his Madison Square Garden rally, Trump’s argument was hate and fear.; The Atlantic, October 28, 2024

David A. Graham, The Atlantic; This Is Trump’s Message

At his Madison Square Garden rally, Trump’s argument was hate and fear.

"We might as well start with the lowlight of last night’s Trump campaign rally at Madison Square Garden. That would be Tony Hinchcliffe, a podcaster who’s part of Joe Rogan’s circle, and who was the evening’s first speaker.

“These Latinos, they love making babies too. Just know that. They do. They do. There’s no pulling out. They don’t do that. They come inside,” he joked. “Just like they did to our country.” A minute later: “I don’t know if you guys know this, but there’s literally a floating island of garbage in the middle of the ocean right now. Yeah, I think it’s called Puerto Rico.” It took a few more minutes before he got to the joke about Black people loving watermelons. Novel, edgy stuff—for a minstrel show in 1874.

Other speakers were only somewhat better. A childhood pal of Donald Trump’s called Vice President Kamala Harris “the anti-Christ” and “the devil.” The radio host Sid Rosenberg called her husband, Doug Emhoff, “a crappy Jew.” Tucker Carlson had a riff about Harris vying to be “the first Samoan-Malaysian, low-IQ former California prosecutor ever to be elected president.”"

Think Outside the Box, Jack; The New York Times, May 30, 2020

Maureen Dowd, The New York Times; Think Outside the Box, Jack: Trump, Twitter and the society-crushing pursuit of monetized rage.

"The Wall Street Journal had a chilling report a few days ago that Facebook’s own research in 2018 revealed that “our algorithms exploit the human brain’s attraction to divisiveness. If left unchecked,” Facebook would feed users “more and more divisive content in an effort to gain user attention & increase time on the platform.”

Mark Zuckerberg shelved the research...

“The shareholders of Facebook decided, ‘If you can increase my stock tenfold, we can put up with a lot of rage and hate,’” says Scott Galloway, professor of marketing at New York University’s Stern School of Business.

“These platforms have very dangerous profit motives. When you monetize rage at such an exponential rate, it’s bad for the world. These guys don’t look left or right; they just look down. They’re willing to promote white nationalism if there’s money in it. The rise of social media will be seen as directly correlating to the decline of Western civilization.”"

Obama Responds To Charlottesville Violence With A Quote From Nelson Mandela; Huff Post, August 12, 2017

Paige Lavender, Huff Post; Obama Responds To Charlottesville Violence With A Quote From Nelson Mandela

"Former President Barack Obama tweeted a quote from former South African President Nelson Mandela Saturday in an apparent response to the violence in Charlottesville, Virginia...

“No one is born hating another person because of the color of his skin or his background or his religion. People must learn to hate, and if they can learn to hate, they can be taught to love. For love comes more naturally to the human heart than its opposite,” Obama tweeted.

The quote is from Mandela’s autobiography, Long Walk to Freedom. Obama’s series of tweets also featured a photo of him greeting children at a day care facility in Bethesda, Maryland, in 2011."

Prince William Appears on the Cover of Attitude, a Gay Magazine; New York Times, 6/15/16

Katie Williams, New York Times; Prince William Appears on the Cover of Attitude, a Gay Magazine:

"After meeting with a group of gay people who said they had been bullied, Prince William, the Duke of Cambridge, appeared on the cover of Attitude, a gay magazine, and urged young people to report instances of abuse to an adult.

“No one should be bullied for their sexuality or any other reason, and no one should have to put up with the kind of hate that these young people have endured in their lives,” Prince William said in an accompanying statement. “You should be proud of the person you are, and you have nothing to be ashamed of.”

The cover was planned weeks before a shooting at a gay nightclub in Orlando, Fla., killed 49 people, but the magazine said in a statement that the type of hatred exhibited by the gunman, Omar Mateen, begins at an early age.

“Such violence does not exist in a vacuum but snowballs from intolerance and bullying that begins in classrooms, too often comes from politicians, religious leaders and is often not treated with respect by the media,” the statement read.

For Prince William, the decision to meet with members of the lesbian, bisexual, gay and transgender community appears to be a further venture into gay rights issues and an extension of a broader effort to combat bullying."

[Podcast] Looking Back At The 'Tremendous Hate' Of Bullies; NPR's StoryCorps, 1/7/11

[Podcast] NPR's StoryCorps; Looking Back At The 'Tremendous Hate' Of Bullies:

"Recent stories about bullying — and the people who have spoken out publicly against it — inspired Rob Littlefield to tell his own story of abuse, and how it affected his family."