"You're saying, 'We can't talk about you. "In Florida, what kind of state are you building, where you're essentially pushing kids back into the closet?" he said.
In an interview with CNN on Tuesday, Buttigieg said lawmakers and educators should be approaching that statistic from the Trevor Project "with urgency and with compassion and care." "Now they can’t talk to their teachers?" Buttigieg added. "You are purposefully making your state a harder place for LGBTQ kids to survive in," he wrote, citing a national survey from The Trevor Project, an LGBTQ youth suicide prevention and intervention group, which found that 42 percent of LGBTQ youth seriously considered attempting suicide last year. In a tweet last week, Buttigieg said the bill "will kill kids." Supporters of the Parental Rights in Education bill - which was sent to the Florida House's Judiciary Committee on Tuesday - say it's about protecting parents' ability to be in charge of their children's upbringing, while critics have dubbed it the "Don't Say Gay" bill, arguing that it would prevent teachers from talking about LGBTQ issues.
Chasten Buttigieg, a former teacher who is the husband of Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, slammed a Florida bill that would prohibit discussion of sexual orientation or gender identity in "primary grade levels."