‘Blackmail’: Indiana Senate Republicans say no to redistricting despite Trump’s primary threats
By Eric Bradner, CNN
(CNN) — The Indiana Senate voted Tuesday to adjourn until January as its Republican supermajority continues to resist pressure from President Donald Trump to redraw the state’s congressional lines.
Gov. Mike Braun responded by threatening to “compel” the Senate into a special session to vote on redistricting at Trump’s behest.
It was the latest chapter in an escalating intraparty battle in Indiana over the White House’s monthslong effort to bolster the party’s US House majority in time for next year’s midterm elections. Republicans now hold seven of Indiana’s nine US House seats, and Trump is seeking new maps that would give the GOP a shot at a 9-0 sweep.
Indiana takes on more urgency for national Republicans after a federal court invalidated Texas Republicans’ new map that would have given them a better shot at gaining five new seats. While Texas officials immediately moved to appeal the ruling, losing that prospective five-seat gain could put the GOP multiple seats behind Democrats in the redistricting battle Trump triggered.
However, despite Trump taking to social media this week to threaten to back primary challenges to senators who oppose redistricting, there were no signs at the statehouse on Tuesday that the opposition would yield.
“I’ve been a legislator 42 years. I’m not going to change my vote,” said Sen. Vaneta Becker, an Evansville Republican who told CNN her office has received more than 750 calls opposing redistricting and 37 in favor.
“Hoosiers are not used to being sort of in blackmail position. It does not bode well,” Becker said.
Lawmakers gathered in Indianapolis for “organization day” — the long-planned ceremonial start to the 2026 legislative session. The Senate voted 29-19 to meet again on January 5, a vote that implicitly rejected Braun’s call for a redistricting-focused special session.
Senate President Pro Tem Rodric Bray, a Martinsville Republican who infuriated Trump when he issued a statement saying the Senate does not have enough votes to pass new maps, told reporters Tuesday that the adjournment vote was “fairly indicative of the vote that you might have seen” if the Senate had voted on new congressional maps.
Trump this week has threatened to back primary opponents to take on Bray, who isn’t up for reelection until 2028, and other Republicans who opposed redistricting, arguing that they are standing in the way of the GOP retaining its majority on Capitol Hill for the last two years of Trump’s presidency. Braun responded later Tuesday afternoon with a statement backing Trump’s primary threats and suggesting he will seek to force the Senate into session to vote on redistricting.
“Unfortunately, Sen. Rod Bray was forced to partner with DEMOCRATS to block an effort by the growing number of America First Senators who wanted to have a vote on passing fair maps. Now I am left with no choice other than to explore all options at my disposal to compel the State Senate to show up and vote,” Braun said in a statement. “I will support President Trump’s efforts to recruit, endorse, and finance primary challengers for Indiana’s senators who refuse to support fair maps.”
Trump on Monday posted on Truth Social: “A RINO State Senator, Rodric Bray, who doesn’t care about keeping the Majority in the House in D.C., is the primary problem. Soon, he will have a Primary Problem, as will any other politician who supports him in this stupidity.”
Bray on Tuesday said he has had “a couple conversations” with Trump about redistricting and said he is “honored to talk to the president.”
“Frankly, I know that he’s passionate about this issue. I’ve explained to him, as I tried to explain to you guys today, that we want to be helpful. We want to see a Republican majority in the House of Representatives. And this is the best way forward, as we see it,” he said.
Bray argued that even without new maps, Republicans have a chance to win the 1st District, a traditionally blue seat in northwestern Indiana, and hold eight of Indiana’s nine House seats.
“A number of our caucus members, myself included, don’t see this as a binary choice between the 7-2 ratio that you have right now and redistricting into an automatic 9-0,” Bray said.
Trump and his political allies had launched an advertising pressure campaign aimed at forcing the state Senate’s hand.
Some veteran Republican legislators said the primary threats rang hollow because of their constituents’ near-unanimous opposition to redistricting.
“Hoosiers are very thoughtful, and I know for myself, I represent my constituents,” Becker said.
She added that “it’s not a good look for legislators, in my opinion, to kowtow to that.”
But state Sen. Mike Young, a veteran Indianapolis Republican, took to the floor Tuesday to lambast Bray for refusing Braun’s call for a special session. Young said it was “a slap in the face of the governor of the state of Indiana to do something like this.”
“Imagine waking up on Wednesday, the day after elections next November, and we find ourselves in the minority by one or two votes … knowing that we have the opportunity to make sure that doesn’t happen,” Young said. “Elections have consequences, and we won.”
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