Top 10 Indiana politics stories of 2024
A $40 million primary + a former vice president scorned.
Indiana Republican gubernatorial candidates sunk some $40 million into a primary to replace term-limited Gov. Eric Holcomb. Self-described Christian nationalist an Lt. Gov-elect Micah Beckwith did an end run around Gov.-elect Mike Braun’s chosen running mate—while making national news over some of his controversial statements.
And Sen. Todd Young and Mike Pence both declined to endorse Donald Trump in his successful political comeback—a somewhat surprising turn for his former running mate and a deep-red state senator.
All of this, and more, made for a topsy-turvy year in Indiana politics.
Here, I break down the top 10 stories that moved the needle in 2024.
10. Hoosier Democrats remain in wilderness
Is it harder to help the no-name mayor of Indiana’s fourth-largest city raise $100 million and finish atop the Iowa caucuses or get a Democrat elected statewide here in Indiana? Over the last four years, Mike Schmuhl found out the answer: Turns out, it’s harder to do the latter. The Indiana Democratic Party Chair and former campaign manager to Pete Buttigieg’s 2020 campaign oversaw some municipal electoral gains and played defense in barn-red Indiana, but couldn’t return Democrats to statewide elective office.
Schmuhl restored some competitiveness to statewide elections, winning national investment from the Democratic Governors Association in the gubernatorial race and getting both his candidate for governor, Jennifer McCormick, and attorney general, Destiny Wells, back to the 40 percent floor that 2020’s contest saw all but collapse in the governor’s race.
Now, Schmuhl is mulling what’s next.
9. Indiana GOP sees generational re-shuffling
The Mitch Daniels-Dick Lugar era sunsetted this year, as Hoosiers elected a new governor with few ties to the former two-term governor, and will replace Holcomb, a former Daniels aide. Beyond endorsing in a suburban state senate race, Daniels largely maintained his distance from electoral politics.
“I think we’re in a place where Mitch Daniels couldn’t get elected right now, but Todd Rokita still can,” as Todd Rokita told The Indianapolis Star this year.
On a Saturday in August, though, about 150 alums of Mitch Daniels’ two gubernatorial campaigns and his administration gathered at The Patio at Crooked Stick Golf Course to mark 20 years since the My Man Mitch movement began. (Daniels’ famous RV One was there, too.)
“First, this extraordinary group of people showed Indiana a new and better way to compete for public office,” Daniels said in a condensed version of his remarks to IMPORTANTVILLE. “Then, for eight years they showed that a government can actually do what it says it will do, deliver the big changes it says it will deliver, and conduct the public’s business with competence thriftiness, and integrity. We believe we left behind a less cynical, more hopeful, and more promising state than we found.”
8. Holcomb’s foreign travels
One of the defining stories of the Holcomb era will be his effort to build international ties to the Hoosier state. He took 27 international development trips as governor, the last of which was to Kuwait and Saudi Arabia.
Holcomb’s most notable trip took place in September, where he became the first U.S. governor to visit since Russian invasion of Ukraine, meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. It was a noticeable break from many in his party who have urged international retrenchment. And Braun has signaled he is not likely to follow in Holcomb’s footsteps abroad.
7. Daniels laments one-party rule
It got surprisingly little play at the time, but Daniels also made news this year when he lamented one-party rule in his column for The Washington Post—even after ushering it into Indiana with the supermajority. Surveying the GOP gubernatorial field earlier this year, Daniels wrote:
It became difficult to tell whether these folks were running for secretary of state or secretary of homeland security. If they had any concrete suggestions more relevant to the job they were seeking, it obviously didn’t make sense to share them.
Wise policy and good government can and do emerge in lopsided states. But competition, always and everywhere, fosters innovation. In politics, it also compels a sensitivity and an outreach to the widest possible audiences. The contours of the current system don’t conduce to those outcomes; until that changes, we have to hope for candidates who, elected by 5 percent of the state, somehow come to consider their duty of service to all the rest.
6. Young opposes Trump
Indiana’s senior senator refused to endorse the standard bearer for his own party. “I won’t be voting for Biden,” he told Based in Lafayette. “I also won't be voting for Trump. So, does that mean I leave it blank? Does that mean I identify another conservative who's almost certain not to be the next president of the United States and write them in? I haven't decided that. … at some point, principled conservatives need to incentivize our party, the Republican Party, to nominate somebody that principled conservatives can actually believe in. Stated differently, I'm tired of having my vote taken for granted. And I think a lot of Hoosiers are.”
5. Banks skates: Jim Banks clears primary field
In a state with a GOP bench that has some of the sharpest elbows you’ll find, Sen.-elect Jim Banks avoided a primary challenger after Daniels decided last year to sit out a Senate bid. Still, Banks campaign and his ability to sideline would-be opponents will be studied for years to come.
His primetime RNC address this July in Milwaukee, coupled with his closeness to Vice President-elect JD Vance, makes him a figure to watch in the coming years.
4. Indiana’s $40 million GOP gubernatorial primary
It was the primary about nothing, as I wrote for POLITICO. But the generationally competitive contest left sore feelings all around, with some calling it “toxic.”
In a state under Republican rule at the top of the ticket for nearly two decades — and one known for orderly and genteel succession at the hands of a strong state party — it’s unfamiliar territory following the sunny Republicanism of Daniels and former Gov. Mike Pence, both of whom swore off negative campaigning in Indiana.
3. The rise of Micah Beckwith
Trump’s own endorsement of his handpicked running mate wasn’t enough for Mike Braun to beat back the movement candidate, who shocked the political establishment by winning at convention.
He has said that God told him he sent “those riots to Washington” on Jan. 6 and that it was God’s “hand at work.” And he has suggested Haitian immigrants here legally in Logansport should be immediately deported.
Now, he will likely draw some national coverage and stir controversy throughout his time in office.
“There’s no doubt about this. I’m in charge,” Braun said at the time. “And Micah is going to be someone that works with me. And if he doesn’t … it will probably not be as fruitful in terms of what we can get done.”
“This is what full on transitions look like,” Mike O’Brien, the longtime GOP hand and lobbyist, told me. “We haven’t had one since 2004. Pence was a coronation that we almost screwed up. Holcomb was incredibly unique. The realignment of relationships and power is messy and we’re new to it.”
2. Sexual harrassment allegations among Democrats
Dueling investigations by Mirror Indy and The Indianapolis Star published days apart exposed sexual harrassment at the top ranks of Indianapolis Mayor Joe Hogsett’s administration.
In November, another investigation by The Indianapolis Star revealed that three women are accusing Indiana Senate Minority Leader Greg Taylor of sexual harassment.
The reports led to multiple investigations. The reporting also led the party’s state central committee to adopt a code of conduct and form an ethics committee.
1. Mike Pence becomes the resistance
He served him loyally for years. He helped stock his presidential administration with Hoosiers. Then, he ran against him for the presidency.
But this year, former Vice President Mike Pence didn’t even endorse his own running mate after the Hoosier’s failed 2024 presidential campaign. At any moment in American history, it would be a stunning story. In the Trump era, it quickly faded into the background.
Pence’s opposition to Trump didn’t stop there. He’s also opposing Trump’s pick for Health and Human Services secretary, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., saying his nomination is “deeply concerning.”
Carlin Yoder, the former state senator who is weighing a primary challenge to Young, posted to X last month: “Can we get @Mike_Pence and @SenToddYoung to officially move to Blue Sky? They’ll be loved over there.”
Now, it’s your turn: What stories did I miss? How would you rank these storylines?
