ATLANTA (CNN) — ATLANTA — Democrats selected former Labor Secretary Tom Perez over Minnesota Rep. Keith Ellison as their new chairman on Saturday, concluding a hotly contested race to lead a battered party as it tries to channel the anti-Donald Trump energy of its base into an electoral rebound. Perez defeated Ellison in a 235-200 vote among the Democratic National Committee’s 435 members who cast ballots Saturday. It took two rounds of voting to select a winner after Perez found himself just one vote shy in the first ballot. The five other candidates, who had amassed 13.5 total votes, all exited the race before the second round began. In a victory speech, Perez vowed that Democrats would wage an all-out battle to deny Trump a second term. “We are at a ‘where were you?’ moment in American history: Where were you in 2017 when we had the worst President in US history?” he said. Immediately after winning, Perez made a quick move to bring Ellison’s supporters into the fold — appointing Ellison as the deputy chair of the DNC, to cheers and unanimous approval from the crowd. Ellison called on Democrats to support Perez. “It’s my honor to serve this party under the chairmanship of Tom Perez,” he said. The results brought a chaotic close to a race that stretched on for three months. In the waning days, former Vice President Joe Biden and several aides to former President Barack Obama — including Valerie Jarrett and David Simas — made cal
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