At Texas rally, Donald Trump Jr. says 'male kindergarten teachers' can take paternity leave but slams Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg for doing the same

• Donald Trump Jr. was a warmup act at former President Donald Trump's rally in Texas on Saturday.
• Don Jr. criticized Pete Buttigieg for taking paternity leave.

Donald Trump Jr. slammed Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg for taking paternity leave during a speech at former President Donald Trump's rally in Conroe, Texas, on Saturday.

"If you're a male kindergarten teacher and you take paternity leave, I think that's wonderful I couldn't care less," he said. "If you're the secretary of transportation, you get your ass to work. It's not that hard of a concept. When millions, tens of millions, hundreds of millions of people depend on you, you show up."

Insider's Nicole Gaudiano and Adam Wren previously reported that Buttigieg, the first openly gay transportation secretary, took leave in mid-August after his newborn twins, Penelope Rose and Joseph August Buttigieg. were adopted.

Buttigieg was mostly "offline" for the first four weeks, with the exception of major decisions that couldn't be delegated to another person in the agency.

Dawn Huckelbridge, director of Paid Leave for All told Gaudiano and Wren that the move was "modeling at the highest levels."

Buttigieg's office did not respond to Insider's request for comment at the time of publication, but the transportation secretary has previously pushed back on criticism of his decision.

In October, Tucker Carlson criticized the decision during his primetime show. "Pete Buttigieg has been on leave from his job since August after adopting a child. Paternity leave, they call it, trying to figure out how to breastfeed. No word on how that went," Carlson said.

He defended his choice during an appearance on MSNBC's Deadline White House. "I guess he just doesn't understand the concept of bottle feeding, let alone the concept of paternity leave," Buttigieg said.