Pete Buttigieg and husband Chasten become parents to baby boy and girl

Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg and his husband Chasten revealed Saturday they are the parents of a baby girl and boy, Penelope Rose and Joseph August, and shared a photo showing them altogether.

“Chasten and I are beyond thankful for all the kind wishes since first sharing the news that we’re becoming parents,” the head of the Department of Transportation said on the social media service Twitter.

“We are delighted to welcome Penelope Rose and Joseph August Buttigieg to our family,” the former Democratic presidential hopeful said in the Twitter post announcing the news.

The tweet included a black-and-white photo showing the Buttigiegs sitting side-by-side in a hospital bed, each cradling a newborn child and smiling proudly.

The post had been shared, or retweeted, approximately 19,000 times and counting as of late Saturday afternoon, garnering scores of congratulatory responses from prominent well-wishers.

“You’re both going to make wonderful parents,” reacted Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, who also unsuccessfully competed alongside Mr. Buttigieg for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2020.

Mr. Buttigieg, the former mayor of South Bend, Indiana, announced last month that he and his husband were becoming parents. The Washington Post previously reported they had been trying to adopt for a year.

“The process isn’t done yet and we’re thankful for the love, support and respect for our privacy that has been offered to us,” he said last month when he announced the couple were becoming parents.

Mr. Buttigieg, 39, is the first openly gay person to head up a Cabinet-level agency. Married since 2018, NPR reported the Buttigiegs are “arguably the highest-profile same-sex couple in U.S. politics.”