As the Democratic Party primaries begin, and the race to find a candidate to defeat Trump starts in earnest, can a 38-year-old gay ‘wild card’ who appeals to both sides of the political divide emerge as a serious contender?

Pete Buttigieg bounces on to the stage just before noon, suit jacket off and sleeves rolled up. It is a Sunday a few weeks before Christmas and some 300 people have turned out in the small city of Washington, Iowa, to hear his pitch for the presidency.

The venue is Washington Middle School’s sports hall. A dozen rows of seats are positioned on the polished wood, all facing a small black stage set up between two basketball hoops. The scoreboard reads ‘20:20’ – election year.

An hour earlier the queue had begun to form outside. Friends and families in winter coats and bobble hats, some with children in tow, had stood waiting for the doors to open. Now inside, those who cannot sit hover at the back, near the TV cameras.

Buttigieg’s stump speech (the standard speech given by politicians on the campaign trail), 15 minutes long and delivered without notes, centres on the American values under threat from Donald Trump – patriotism, faith, democracy, freedom. It has all the hallmarks of a traditional bid for the White House. There is folksiness – a thank you to the crowd for giving up a ‘perfectly good Sunday in hunting season’ – talk of God, references to Buttigieg’s military service and a call for national unity.