Interview: Gov. Eric Holcomb on 'Trump Fever,' why Pence faltered and what's next
Plus: The eyebrow-raising text Republican delegates received this morning.
Republican delegates to the 2020 convention received an eyebrow-raising text this morning at 10:01 a.m., according to screenshots shared with IMPORTANTVILLE, asking them to take a SurveyMonkey survey on the “Indiana Attorney General’s race in 2024.”
Its two questions, paraphrased by a former delegate, raise the prospect that Attorney General Todd Rokita, who is dealing with a Supreme Court reprimand that threatens his law license, may not be the GOP nominee: If Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita’s law license is suspended for any length of time, do you believe that disqualifies him from running for Attorney General? And the final question: If Todd Rokita is unable to be o the ballot who would you support for attorney general? [Former Attorney General] Curtis Hill; [Decatur County Prosecutor] Nate Harter; [Hamilton County GOP Chair] Mario Massillamy; [Attorney] John Westercamp; someone else.
Eric Holcomb is in the middle of a long goodbye. The term-limited governor, who is entering his last year on the job and his final legislative session, is already getting asked about his legacy, whom he might endorse in the GOP gubernatorial primary, and what he’ll do next.
The late Indianapolis Star columnist Matthew Tully asked whether Holcomb would be “more like Mitch or Mike?” referring to Holcomb’s predecessors Mitch Daniels and Mike Pence. Nearly eight years later, the answer, it turned out, is that Holcomb has been his own man, though he ended up favoring Daniels’ example slightly more than than Pence’s. (Despite one prominent Republican operative recently referring to Holcomb and his perceived liberalism as the “governor of the CCP,” he did sign into law one of the nation’s most restrictive abortion laws).
In an interview with IMPORTANTVILLE conducted just hours after the death of Henry Holcomb, the governor’s beloved miniature schnauzer, the governor spoke about why he hasn’t endorsed his sitting lieutenant governor Suzanne Crouch, whether he regrets his role and ushering in the GOP supermajority, and why Mike Pence’s candidacy failed to take flight. Read all the way to the cliff-hanger of a final line.
Questions and answers have been lightly edited for length and clarity.
“I think that Trump fever has not broken and there’s a certain inevitability about the Republican primary, knowing that there are such quality alternatives.”
—Gov. Eric Holcomb
What’s one political lesson Henry taught you?
That everyone has a common denominator. And it could be a dog or a cat or a child. And he was someone who had interrupted meetings. He would, in some of them at the residence especially, he'd sit on my lap and people would think, how's this going to go? I would say if walls could talk, but if Henry could talk to things that he has heard….To see grown men and women just break down and become loving with this dog that they just met, whether they’re an ambassador, or a CEO, or some community leader, or a student….that something so simple as a dog that just gave unconditional love to everybody he ever met was pretty powerful.
He brought people together, and if you can figure out what it is to bring people together? That turns out that works in politics.
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