2023 election: Mayor James Mueller routs controversial Republican challenger

SOUTH BEND — In an unexpectedly controversial race against Republican challenger Desmont Upchurch, South Bend Mayor James Mueller won reelection handily in Tuesday's general election.

Mueller overwhelmed Upchurch, winning nearly 73% of the vote, according to unofficial election results. The mayor's unofficial vote tally was 7,877 to Upchurch's 2,938.

Mueller did not quite match the gaping 80-20 margin by which his predecessor, Pete Buttigieg, won reelection over a Republican in 2015. But he surpassed the 63-37 split he achieved in 2019, when he won his first term as Buttigieg's hand-picked successor.

Running as the top incumbent in the dominant Democratic Party, Mueller's campaign placed a somewhat unusual amount of attention on his Republican opponent.

The mayor's campaign mailers featured "voter safety alerts" noting that Upchurch confessed to hitting a woman more than 20 years ago, an incident for which he was charged with a misdemeanor. Mueller declined to formally debate Upchurch, something an incumbent hasn't done in at least three decades. The mayor cited scheduling conflicts, but in doing so he mentioned he wasn't keen to share a platform with a past abuser.

"I find it ironic that the same person that said thank you for your service when I was in uniform had the audacity to say I wasn't qualified," said Upchurch, who served in the U.S. Army for two decades. He said he was disheartened by the result but not surprised, considering Mueller's campaign spending vastly exceeded his own.

Democrats swept the municipal races, barely snatching the lone Common Council seat held by Republicans for decades. Sherry Bolden-Simpson, a longtime educator who's a top administrator at Rise Up Academy, ousted Republican Eli Wax by a razor-thin margin of 37 votes.

"We're proud of South Bend Democrats," Mueller said, "but we need a functional Republican Party on the other side. And I hope that they figure this out. This should be a wake-up call to them: No more extremism."

The nine-person council already featured eight Democrats. But it's even more closely aligned with the Mueller administration after two common detractors, Democrats Henry Davis Jr. and Lori Hamann, lost races this May. Davis lost a bid for mayor and Hamann was outvoted by primary challengers.

Mueller actively backed Ophelia Gooden-Rodgers over a younger, more progressive challenger who vied with her to replace Davis in the council's 2nd District. She won in a landslide Tuesday night with more than 83% of the vote against Republican Roosevelt Stewart, whose campaign reeled after he was charged with punching and choking his 15-year-old daughter.

Oliver Davis Jr., who has 12 years of experience on the council, will replace Hamann as an at-large councilor.

A criticism voiced by both Henry Davis Jr. and Hamann is that the council already functions as no more than a rubber stamp for the mayor's ideas. Their dissent and their ideas aren't taken seriously, they say.

Mueller noted that South Bend officeholders are likely as diverse as they've ever been, and he trusts that they bring an array of viewpoints to each issue. Six of the nine Common Council members are women, and seven are people of color.

But he did concede that a full slate of Democrats will need to work harder to incorporate the views of South Bend Republicans. The straight-ticket vote shows that a third of city voters in this election were Republicans.

"When we go into work, we represent every resident of South Bend. We're going to have to be thinking about the Republican point of view and other points of view."

Email South Bend Tribune city reporter Jordan Smith at JTsmith@gannett.com. Follow him on Twitter: @jordantsmith09

This article originally appeared on South Bend Tribune: Election 2023: South Bend Mayor James Mueller wins re-election