Who should lead the Democrats after their calamitous defeat?

“IN TERMS of the next chair of the DNC, however, the question is simple,” according to Bernie Sanders. “Do we stay with a failed status-quo approach or do we go forward with a fundamental restructuring of the Democratic Party?” For Senator Sanders the way forward is Keith Ellison, a congressman from Minnesota, whom he is backing as next boss of the Democratic National Committee (DNC). The endorsement came shortly after Joe Biden, the former vice-president, announced his support for Tom Perez, a veteran of the Obama administration.

The contest for the DNC chair, which will be decided on February 25th in Atlanta, has become a proxy fight between those who believe that the party must move left to prosper and those who think this would be suicide. Mr Ellison is backed by Elizabeth Warren, the populist senator from Massachusetts, as well as the AFL-CIO, a federation of unions with 12m members, but also by pragmatic establishment types such as Chuck Schumer, the Senate’s minority leader, and his predecessor, Harry Reid, who are intent on making use of the Sanders supporters’ momentum. Neither Barack Obama nor Hillary Clinton explicitly backed Mr Perez, but an endorsement by the loyal Mr Biden is almost as good as a nod from the former president and the Democratic presidential nominee.

The tussle between Mr Perez and Mr Ellison, the front-runners among the nine contenders for the job, could be a boon for Pete Buttigieg (pronounced boot-edge-edge), the 35-year-old mayor of South Bend, Indiana. “We don’t want to relive 2016,” says Mr Buttigieg, alluding to the fierce battles between Mr Sanders and Mrs Clinton in the Democratic primaries. Mr Buttigieg presents himself as the compromise candidate who can bridge the divide between the Sanders and Clinton camps, build alliances with progressive organisations such as the American Civil Liberties Union and connect with the white working class as well as minorities.

Mr Buttigieg joined the race late, but picked up momentum quickly. He bagged the endorsement of five former DNC chairs as well as nine mayors of cities such as New Orleans and Austin, Texas. Howard Dean, another former DNC chair and former presidential candidate, thinks Mr Buttigieg has a shot at winning. If he were elected, the former Rhodes scholar and Harvard graduate would be the youngest, and first openly gay, chairman of the DNC. He would bring to the job his experiences as mayor, navy officer and nerd at McKinsey, a management consultancy (a CV remarkably like that of Tom Cotton, a Republican senator with big ambitions).

How do South Benders see their mayor? Though he was not the favourite to win, Mr Buttigieg was elected with 74% of the vote in 2011 and with over 80% of the vote in 2015. Most of the struggling rustbelt city’s citizens don’t begrudge him using South Bend as a springboard for his political ambition, says Elizabeth Bennion of Indiana University, South Bend. They see the progress he has made with the demolition of 1,000 derelict houses in 1,000 days, the partnership he has fostered with Notre Dame, a rich Catholic university outside the city, and the technology and data companies he is trying to bring in. “There was always a sense that he is destined for bigger things,” says Ms Bennion.

Indiana’s Republicans pay Mr Buttigieg compliments in the form of withering remarks. He doesn’t see any political future for himself in Indiana, which is why he needs an exit, says Pete Seat, a spokesman for Indiana’s Republicans. Mr Buttigieg pitches himself as someone who can win even in a staunchly Republican state that is the home of Mike Pence, the vice-president, says Mr Seat, but South Bend has traditionally been a Democratic fief. The city last had a Republican mayor in 1972.

The victor will replace Donna Brazile, who took over as interim DNC chairman after Debbie Wasserman Schultz resigned. Her departure followed leaked e-mails from DNC staff about how to obstruct Mr Sanders when he seemed to threaten Mrs Clinton’s smooth ride to the party’s nomination. To be on the ballot, a candidate needs 20 signatures from among the 447 voting DNC members. The ballots were sent out on February 22nd, the day of a televised debate on CNN with eight contenders for the DNC’s top job. Members will vote in as many rounds as are necessary for one candidate to receive 224 votes.

Mr Sanders is right: electing Mr Ellison would mark a new chapter for a party that is trying to recover from one of the lowest points in its history. Mr Ellison is the first-ever Muslim congressman and co-chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus. He has flirted with black nationalism and marched with the Nation of Islam, a political-religious movement founded in Detroit, his home town. An early and fervent supporter of Mr Sanders, he too favours a mix of sensible progressive proposals and Utopian schemes. He may not be best-placed to work out how to win back the statehouses and governors’ mansions Democrats have lost in recent years. The Midwestern mayor seems a better bet.