FROM THE NEST | SPRING 2026 | 3 ON CAMPUS Pete Buttigieg Delivers Kenner Lecture The former U.S. Secretary of Transportation gave an optimistic speech and urged attendees to imagine “what’s next.” Pete Buttigieg spoke about family, the future and finding common ground during Lehigh’s 2026 Kenner Lecture in March. Buttigieg recalled that the last time he was in the Lehigh Valley was when he served as U.S. Secretary of Transportation and delivered transportation funds plus other infrastructure resources. “It doesn’t feel like it’s been that long since I was doing that work, and yet how much has changed for our country,” he said. He noted how much has changed for him personally since leaving the Cabinet. Yet, his role as father, the most important role in his life, didn’t shift. He then drew attention toward current events. Buttigieg painted an unsettling picture of the state of America today, but asked the audience to consider, “Then what?” While acknowledging the difficulty of picturing the future when we are absorbed in the current moment, he urged attendees to imagine what comes next and compelled listeners to consider that action has to begin today. “We need a vision for government and institutions that serves people better; not just better than now, but better than before,” Buttigieg said, listing reforms and policies to tackle. To do so, “we have to be grounded in our highest principles,” he said. “We need to be grounded in the importance of the everyday, which I would argue is what all politics is actually about. And I think we need to be grounded in our regard for one another.” Buttigieg recalled his time deployed to Afghanistan, where the country’s lack of basic infrastructure and necessities are things Americans often take for granted. He said these fundamental things of everyday life are “kitchen table issues.” “I believe things would be healthier if we could build a politics of the everyday, where we all make clear what we are for and what we are against in ways that are clearly accountable to the dynamics of everyday life,” he said. Buttigieg returned to talking about his own family, remarking, “equality is very much a kitchen table issue at our house.” If it wasn’t for the landmark 2015 ruling on the 14th Amendment that granted same-sex couples the right to marry, he wouldn’t be married to his husband, Chasten, today. While it may be easy to be paralyzed by the current state of our country, he said, we should, instead, be propelled to action—conflict fuels revolution. He pointed to major historical American moments defined by revolution—the American Revolution, the Civil War, the Great Depression and the Civil Rights Movement. “When we consider those examples, we realize that our times are more precedented than we think,” he said. It challenges us to face our own times with purpose and hope, he urged, and embrace that our time requires engagement.—Hayley Frerichs CHRISTINE KRESCHOLLEK
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