The exchange began with a simple enough question: “How does Gov. Pete sound to you?”

But, for the next couple of minutes, the answer to that question and some pointed follow-ups were anything but simple.

Here for the first time, you’ll read what appears to be the first comments by new Traverse City resident Pete Buttigieg on his thoughts — or lack of same — on running for Michigan governor.

The “Off the Record” Public TV interview was conducted in the basement of Kellogg Center almost a year ago, on Dec. 21, 2023. It was arranged by former Michigan Gov. Jim Blanchard, who had booked Buttigieg, the U.S. transportation secretary, to be part of the former governor’s $1 million endowment for the Jim Blanchard Public Service Forum.

As you might expect, Buttigieg’s first response to the opening inquiry avoided a direct answer to the thrust of the question.

“I’ve got one job, and the other is father, and they keep me busy,” he began the dance around the issue.

Earlier in the same chat, he had confirmed he had thought about the vacancy left by the impending departure of Michigan’s senior U.S. senator, Debbie Stabenow, but those thoughts did not go much beyond that.

But note he did confirm he thought about it.

The governor question was a whole other thing.

“Have you thought about governor?” Buttigieg was asked.

“I have so much to keep me busy with my job to sit around thinking,” he wiggled again.

“Have you ever thought about Michigan governor?”

Now he gives some ground (if you can call it that).

“Not in a serious way.”

“‘Not in a serious way’! How did you un-seriously think about it?”

Now he laughs, then proceeds: “I gotta tell you, I am dead focused on my job.”

The interviewer noted that no one had ever used that phrasing, which, of course, warranted another follow-up.

“In your unserious moments, what did you think about?”

“It’s not a serious answer because it’s not a serious question.”

The cat-and-mouse game went into overdrive as he added: “I’ve got a serious job and serious commitments to it.”

But wait.

There’s more.

Previous Michigan governors have often commented that, if you really want to get stuff done for residents, being governor is the job to have. So it was noted that the secretary was that kind of guy, so why not governor?

He conceded that that was actually how he felt when he was mayor of South Bend, Indiana, and how he feels today with his current post, but he reflected: “I don’t know if this is going to be the last elective or appointed job I ever have, but I know my future depends on how I do this job.”

In an attempt to put a conclusive period on the back-and-forth over what he might or might not do, there was this: “So say, ‘I don’t want to be governor of Michigan.'”

“I don’t think about how much I want to or don’t want to besides the job I have,” he asserted as the dry hole remained just that.

Since then, his name has certainly come into play in this town as the list of potential replacements for the current governor seems to be growing by the day.

And, to update Buttigieg’s thinking on all that, on Nov. 3, he told the Associated Press that, after the election, he would decide on “how to make myself useful.”

An answer in keeping with his cagey way of addressing his future, but you must note that that comment is not a yes but not a no either.

Interestingly, the issue did come up while Buttigieg was in Studio C, home to “Off the Record,” weeks ago during the presidential campaign. One of the crew members helping to record his exchange with a national media outlet reminded him that he had been on “Off the Record.”

“Yeah,” he recalled. “That’s the one where I was asked about being governor.”

Yep.

But not in a serious way.