In an interview with WGBH News, South Bend, IN Mayor Pete Buttigieg, a likely 2020 Democratic presidential candidate, said it would be best if President Donald Trump were voted out and not impeached.

He cited the Republican Party being “punished politically” as his reasoning.

Buttigieg said, “This incumbent has a quality of taking any energy that comes his way, even if it’s in the form of criticism and just absorbing it and feeding of it and getting bigger. So the more we are caught up talking about him, the less we are talking about you. And that is a real danger in our media environment.”

He continued, “Grotesque things are hard to look away from, and it’s mesmerizing. It’s like a horror show. No, really it’s mesmerizing. And that is part of his strategy because if by lunchtime he insults another war hero we will be talking about that which means we won’t be talking about how they are trying to take away your health care, and we are trying to get you a raise.”

Even though Buttigieg has said he believed Trump deserves impeachment, the mayor added, “I’m not in Congress so I can say what I think, but I have a very specific role with respect to ending this presidency, and it is to get nominated and defeat him. And another reason I think it will be valuable for this president to be defeated resoundingly at the ballot box is because it is the last hope we have of Republicans coming to their senses. If they are not punished politically for what they have done, which goes against not only our values but their own, if they are not punished politically for that we will never have the Republican Party re-group and become — while I may never agree with them — the more decent and consistent and coherent party that we need the opposition to be.”

Follow Pam Key on Twitter @pamkeyNEN