Indiana
Trump post signals Indiana redistricting vote too close for comfort
Indiana redistricting doomed by lobbyists who misread Senate | Opinion
Deputy Opinion Editor Jacob Stewart: The out-of-state donors funding redistricting lobbyists need to ask for their money back.
President Donald Trump issued a lengthy late-night plea to Indiana lawmakers on the eve of their critical Dec. 11 redistricting vote, seemingly betraying a lack of confidence in a favorable outcome.
“Rod Bray and his friends won’t be in Politics for long, and I will do everything within my power to make sure that they will not hurt the Republican Party, and our Country, again,” Trump concluded the Truth Social post. “One of my favorite States, Indiana, will be the only State in the Union to turn the Republican Party down!”
This afternoon, the Indiana Senate will decide the fate of Trump’s desire to redraw the state’s congressional map to give Republicans two more favorable districts. But this fate has been very uncertain: Republican senators are split on the issue, with a number of them having remained silent. The vote count is expected to be tight.
Trump’s post last night is leaving many with the impression that it’s too close for comfort.
He repeated some familiar refrains noted in other posts over the last few weeks: lambasting the leadership of Senate President Pro Tempore Rodric Bray, promising to support primary challengers against those who vote down mid-decade redistricting, emphasizing the importance of holding the Republican majority in Congress to beat back the “Radical Left Democrats.”
But in length and in detail, this post delved deeper. He lumped Bray in with the likes of former Gov. Mitch Daniels, who Trump called a “failed Senate candidate,” though Daniels never formally entered the race against U.S. Sen. Jim Banks in 2024. Trump made statements about the Republican “suckers” Bray found to vote against redistricting with him, as though the vote had already occurred.
Those conclusion sentences alone ― promising that Bray and others will not hurt the country “again” ― seems to foretell an outcome.
That outcome will ultimately come to light in the mid to late afternoon when senators take a final vote on House Bill 1032, the redistricting bill.
It had passed the Indiana House by a 57-41 vote last week.
The proposed map gives Republicans the advantage in all nine of Indiana’s congressional districts, chiefly by carving up Indianapolis voters into four new districts. The current congressional map has seven seats held by Republicans and two by Democrats.
Contact IndyStar Statehouse reporter Kayla Dwyer at kdwyer@indystar.com or follow her on X @kayla_dwyer17.