The election was won by the incumbent mayor, Pete Buttigieg, who was reelected with more than 80 percent of the votes, defeating Republican Kelly Jones.

Buttigieg handily won the general election, facing only a weak Republican competitor in a heavily Democratic city.

[9][10][11][12][13] He also noted recent economic development announcements by the city that promised to generate $180 million in new investment and up to 1,400 new jobs.

[17] Buttigieg's plans for his second term included creating universal pre-kindergarten and improving public transportation.

"[17] Buttigieg's opponent was outgoing 2nd district South Bend Common Council member Henry Davis Jr.,[9] who filed his candidacy on February 6, 2015.

[18] Davis claimed that he was running for mayor to "restore justice and fairness in the city of South Bend.

[9] He criticized Buttigieg's record on crime, vacant housing, financial management, government transparency, unemployment, and economic development.

[17] Davis also argued that, among other things, Buttigieg had failed to make good on his promise of restoring the city's neighborhoods.

[17] In January, he opposed a $5.6 million parks bond championed by Buttigieg, questioning its size and voicing concern about funds not having been earmarked for specific projects.

[17][23] Davis also had faced controversies from the previous year, including having posted an explicit image to his Facebook page and a city resident filing a complaint against him over a message on his Twitter account about Republicans and abortion.

[29] In the final week of the race, Buttigieg ran advertisements in which he encouraged voters to also vote for Kareemah Fowler in the Democratic primary for South Bend City Clerk.

[13] These districts were geographically contiguous with each other and were located in the heart of South Bend's African American community.

[13] For example, in the city's near northwest side, in precincts 102, 108 and 115, Buttigieg received a 67% of the combined vote from a population that was 49% African American and 39% white.

[23] After losing to Buttigieg, Davis reversed his decision to forgo reelection to the South Bend Common Council, and would unsuccessfully run for reelection to South Bend Common Council as an independent, losing to Democratic nominee Regina Williams-Preston.

[36] Davis would subsequently return to office four years later, when he successfully ran for his former seat as a Democrat after Williams-Preston opted not to seek reelection and instead run in the 2019 mayoral election.

[50][51] The Republican Party had seen little success in South Bend mayoral elections for the previous several decades, not having won since 1967.

[42] In the midst of his reelection effort, Buttigieg came out as gay in a June 2015 op-ed published in the South Bend Tribune.

[12] Remaining consistent with what he had stated during the Democratic primary, Buttigieg's plans for his second term continued to include expanding access to pre-kindergarten and improving public transportation.

[12] While unemployment had been on the decline in South Bend, 28% of the city's populace was still living in beneath the federal poverty line.

[34] Among those contributing to Buttigieg's campaign were South Bend Cubs owner Andrew T. Berlin and Colin Jost (the latter having been a Harvard classmate of Buttieig's).

[34] To some political observers, Buttigieg's large fundraising seemed to indicate that he was possibly anticipating a future run for a higher office.

[34] Viewed as a "rising star" in the Democratic Party, Buttigieg had been regularly speculated as a prospective candidate for higher state or federal offices, both elected and appointed.

[42] She supported his approaches to combatting gang violence and his plans for improving policing through the utilization of technology such as gunfire locators.

[12] Jones planned to encourage more diverse event programming downtown and stated that she would seek to revitalize the "Fat Daddy's" block at the corner of Monroe and St. Joseph streets.

[72] Buttigieg defended his Smart Street initiative and the sale of the former College Football Hall of Fame building from Jones' criticisms, once saying, "Taxpayers will benefit from a deal that brings $10 million in private investment to the empty Hall of Fame, while Smart Streets is already generating economic growth.

[36] However, compared to his previous election, Buttigieg underperformed in some of western South Bend's heavily African American precincts.

[23] Buttigieg's vote share in the city's heavily African American 2nd ward decreased by 5% compared to his 2011 performance.

However, the boundaries of the city's wards (including the 2nd) had also been redrawn since 2011 election, accounting for the results of the 2010 United States Census.

[74] In his victory speech at the West Side Democratic Club, Buttigieg described his margin-of-victory as representing a mandate.

[23] At one point in his presidential campaign, Buttigieg declared that, "the black voters who know me best returned me to office and supported me more the second time around than the first."