Indiana Candidate Traded $1M Lake Home for Garage Apartment

By CASEY SMITH and TOM DAVIES, Related Press/Report for America

UTICA, Ind. (AP) — An Indiana congressional candidate modified his voter registration final yr to an tackle native officers say is not a residence — a big metal-sided storage that he says has a two-bedroom bachelor pad inside.

Republican Mike Sodrel, who was beforehand elected to a single U.S. Home time period in 2004, switched his residency from a lakeside house valued at greater than $1 million positioned simply outdoors southern Indiana’s ninth District as he entered the race for the solidly GOP open seat.

Election consultants say the residence adjustments by Sodrel and one other prime Republican contender for the seat do not seem unlawful. Nevertheless, they arrive at a time many Republicans have made “election integrity” a prime concern amid former President Donald Trump’s continued questioning of U.S. voting methods.

Sodrel, 76, the multimillionaire proprietor of a trucking firm, switched his voter registration on Feb. 15 from the lake house residence in Bartholomew County — the place he had been registered to vote since 2011 — to an tackle 70 miles south in Utica, lower than a mile from the banks of the Ohio River, simply outdoors Jeffersonville.

“As I journey throughout the ninth District, what individuals ask me about is, what can we do about out-of-control inflation? About border management, and management gasoline costs. No one desires to know the place I reside,” Sodrel mentioned.

Residency questions troubled prime Indiana political figures equivalent to Democrat Evan Bayh and Republican Richard Lugar in dropping U.S. Senate races over the previous decade.

However present ninth District Rep. Trey Hollingsworth overcame opponents dubbing him “Tennessee Trey” for transferring to southern Indiana simply earlier than getting into the 2016 race for the open congressional seat and spending hundreds of thousands of his Tennessee household’s wealth to win a crowded Republican main. Hollingsworth unexpectedly introduced in January he wouldn’t search reelection, setting off a scramble for candidates getting into the race.

Sodrel’s $45,000 homestead property tax deduction, indicating the Bartholomew County house as his main residence, was eliminated earlier this yr, county property information present. He nonetheless owns the four-bedroom house with an enclosed pool that has an assessed worth of almost $1.4 million.

Sodrel, a longtime space resident till promoting his close by New Albany house a decade in the past, informed The Related Press he pays $500 a month in hire and that the second-floor condo of what he calls a “storage” is now his main residence.

Sodrel stays the first proprietor of the trucking firm he began, Jeffersonville-based Sodrel Truck Traces, and his candidate monetary disclosure report lists its worth at between $5 million and $25 million, with a 2021 revenue of over $5 million.

Officers on the Clark County Assessor’s workplace, nonetheless, mentioned Sodrel’s new tackle — a property consisting of a pole barn and small cabin — is just not a registered residence. City of Utica officers mentioned they had been unable to find constructing or occupancy permits for the property.

Clark County Sheriff Jamey Noel, who serves on the Indiana Republican state committee because the get together’s ninth District chairman and is the county Republican Social gathering chairman, mentioned he and his spouse have owned the property because the Nineteen Nineties, and that he has paid taxes on it since.

“(Sodrel) got here to me three years in the past and mentioned he was on the lookout for a spot to hire due to this market. And that’s the way it all took place,” Noel mentioned. “There’s ample place for somebody to remain at.”

Noel mentioned he chalks up criticism about Sodrel’s residency to “wild accusations” that include the political season. Sodrel mentioned he is “positive” he’ll go from “renting to purchasing one thing in some unspecified time in the future.”

Clark County Clerk Susan Popp, a Democrat who a county election board member, mentioned no complaints about Sodrel’s residency or voter registration have been filed.

“He could be registered there to vote, however it definitely doesn’t look nicely for somebody who’s working for Congress,” she mentioned.

Stu Barnes-Israel, one other of the 9 GOP candidates working for the ninth District congressional seat, modified his voter registration in latest months from his 4,500-square-foot house in Indianapolis to a 2,300-square-foot house beforehand owned by his grandparents in his rural southeastern Indiana hometown of Greensburg.

Barnes-Israel and his spouse obtained a homestead property tax deduction on their home close to downtown Indianapolis assessed at $664,000 till Jan. 20, in accordance with the Marion County auditor’s workplace, though he had first switched his voter registration in November 2021 to Greensburg, the place he was registered whereas serving within the Military and attending graduate faculty on the College of Pennsylvania.

Barnes-Israel, who has labored for the worldwide consulting agency McKinsey & Firm and Chicago-based funding agency Citadel, mentioned that he, his spouse and their two sons now reside full-time within the “nostalgic” home 50 miles from Indianapolis.

“We spend time in every single place,” Barnes-Israel mentioned. “We spend just a little little bit of time in Indianapolis to be by an airport, to assist me be capable of stability my profession, however Greensburg’s been house my complete life.”

Charles Taylor, director of the Bowen Heart for Public Affairs at Ball State College, mentioned that at a time when many Republicans are questioning election integrity, Sodrel and Barnes-Israel have opened themselves as much as criticism.

“It form of turns into a political challenge, like are you actually from this district?” Taylor mentioned. “Are you actually dwelling there?”

Casey Smith is a corps member for the Related Press/Report for America Statehouse Information Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit nationwide service program that locations journalists in native newsrooms to report on undercovered points. Observe Smith on Twitter.

Copyright 2022 The Related Press. All rights reserved. This materials will not be printed, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.