Indiana mayor looks to upend DNC race
The race for Democratic National Committee (DNC) chairman can look like a fight between the party’s Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders wings.
But South Bend, Ind., Mayor Pete Buttigieg believes his candidacy can break that narrative.
“I guess I’m offering a way out of that,” the new DNC chairman candidate, who announced his bid last week, told The Hill.
Buttigieg compares the divide between leading candidates like Minnesota Rep. Keith Ellison and Labor secretary Tom Perez to the field he faced in his first run for mayor.
“I wound up being struck by how similar this was to my first race for mayor when there were a couple of people who were perceived as running on behalf of certain factions in an establishment. And I offered a way to get past all that and just have a fresh start for the community.”
{mosads}The openly gay Buttigieg, 34, is a rising star in the Democratic Party. While he doesn’t have the same notoriety as some of the other candidates, he’s been catching the attention of national publications for several years with headlines like “The most interesting mayor you’ve never heard of” and “The first gay president?”
The charismatic two-term mayor has a resume that makes national party talent-spotters salivate. He was deployed to Afghanistan while serving in the Navy Reserves in 2014. During his reelection race in 2015, he penned an op-ed in a local newspaper announcing that he was gay.
Buttigieg hopes to translate his background to mend a fractured party.
“When you’re a churchgoing … progressive, intellectual, red-state Democrat, millennial, gay, war veteran, you learn pretty quickly to think of yourself outside some of the boxes people want to put you in and find your own way,” he said. “I’m hoping that positions me to be useful to the party.”
Before Buttigieg can do that, his biggest challenge will likely be trying to break into the spotlight and not be overshadowed by the two leading candidates, Ellison and Perez.
Ellison, a loyal supporter of Sanders during the Democratic primary, kicked off his campaign early and racked up high-profile endorsements from the Independent Vermont senator and Democratic Senate leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.).
Perez, a fervent Clinton campaigner, jumped in later but has gained steam and is believed to have the backing from some in the White House.
Buttigieg is hoping the party can reflect on the 2016 election, but avoid rehashing the primary.
He’s branded himself as a fresh face for the Democratic Party, arguing that the restructuring needs to be more than a “one size fits all” approach. In Buttigieg’s telling, Washington, D.C. can’t be the epicenter of the party.
He also hails from a red state in the Midwest, a region that many have argued Democrats neglected during the election and cost them the White House.
“A Washington-centric strategy isn’t going to help us find our way out of the problems we face right now,” Buttigieg said. “We’ve really got to have an authentic partnership between the DNC headquarters and the folks out in the states. I think we’ve lost our way on that.”
Buttigieg also noted a skill that could help him stand out: knowledge about cybersecurity. While he said his expertise is primarily counterterrorism, the mayor said his time in the military taught him about cyber-and information security—useful background for a party that was hampered throughout 2016 by email hacks, purportedly carried out by Russian-tied hackers.
Elizabeth Bennion, a political science professor at Indiana University South Bend, concedes that Buttigieg looks like more of a “dark horse candidate” when compared to Ellison or Perez.
Still, Bennion argues that he could potentially be a compromise candidate for rival party factions.
Bennion describes Buttigieg as a mayor liked by people from both sides of the aisle who’s has been integral in revitalizing the city of South Bend. Bennion believes that the Indiana Democrat’s message will resonate with members of the party looking for a new direction.
“There’s a sense among Democrats I think that Republicans have co-opted that language of values and associated them with their party,” Bennion said. “The mayor is attempting to reclaim that language and suggest that it’s not in fact the language of Republicans only, but Democrats have important values to share.”
So far, the other candidates in the crowded race have had a hard time breaking out from the pack. They include South Carolina Democratic Party chairman Jaime Harrison, New Hampshire Democratic Party chairman Raymond Buckley and Idaho Democratic Party executive director Sally Boynton Brown.
A former DNC official tells The Hill that the field breaks down to two tiers, with Ellison and Perez at the top and the rest of the candidates in the lower tier. He added, however, that there is still “no clear favorite,” giving enough time before the party’s late February vote for another contender to gain traction.
“It could be very close in the end,” the official said. “Right now it’s going to take a real push by the other candidates to kind of break up the dynamic of this race right now.”
“I think the tier two candidates all need to figure out what is their rationale and what’s their message that’s going to captivate DNC members to put their trust in them to run the committee.”
Regardless of the outcome, Buttigieg’s campaign will garner him national attention and could boost his profile if he seeks higher office in the future. Bennion cautions that running for DNC chairman comes with both its advantages and risks, especially in a polarized political environment.
“This position could potentially help his political career and his national reputation, but also as a party chair, there is risk that comes along with this position because by definition it’s highly partisan,” Bennion said.
Buttigieg claims he isn’t just running to raise his profile. The first time someone proposed he run, Buttigieg didn’t consider the idea seriously.
“I feel bad now,” said Buttigieg. “I literally laughed at them.”
Still, the Democratic mayor said he eventually came around to the prospect of running a national party after he got more encouragement and assessed how he could help fix the DNC.
“This race is way too difficult and complex and intense to do for any other reason than to win,” Buttigieg said.
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