SD-03 (Gary, Chicago suburbs)
David Vinzant (i) vs. Mark Spencer
Result: Spencer 65.5%, Vinzant 34.5% | Spencer wins
After Sen. Eddie Melton was elected Mayor of Gary, he probably expected that he’d be allowed to choose his successor in the Senate. However, his choice, Gary Councilmember and director of the West Side Theater Guild Mark Spencer, was narrowly upset at the caucus by software business owner and former Hobart City Council President David Vinzant. The decision was controversial, because it resulted in the only majority-Black senate district in Northwest Indiana, and one of only three in the state, being handed over to a white guy from the whitest city in the district instead of a Black representative from majority-Black Gary, despite the wishes of its Black incumbent.
Vinzant, in his short time in the legislature, has done little surprising or notable at all. He seems ideologically acceptable—in fact, he even endorsed Bernie in 2020—but ideology is not really where this contest is being fought. The battle lines are more geographical, which is also to say racial, with the establishment of Gary, a majority Black city that makes up most of this district, behind Spencer, while the rest of the district’s political class backs Vinzant. Vinzant is also benefiting from the support of organized labor, a key constituency in working-class Northwest Indiana.
SD-10 (South Bend)
David Niezgodski (i) vs. Tim Swager
Result: Niezgodski 62.1%, Swager 37.9% | Niezgodski wins
It’s not like Sen. David Niezgodski was the MVP of the Senate delegation before this April. This is a man who supports teachers having guns in the classroom and was the last reliably anti-choice Democrat in the state legislature until last year, when he voted against a bill banning all abortion in the state with exceptions only for rape, incest, and life of the mother, something he “struggled” to decide whether to support. We’d hope voters would dump him over his views on abortion alone, but they choice is even clearer after allegations surfaced in April of Niezgodski engaging sexual harassment towards a former employee of his plumbing business, which reached a level of severity that led the employee to file a claim with the state, before Niezgodski paid her to drop it. The incident has split South Bend-area Democrats, to the point that the county party couldn’t even put out a statement because they couldn’t agree on what to say.
His challenger is St. Joseph County Treasurer Tim Swager. Swager has been going negative on Niezgodski since the allegations were made public, and is smartly mixing them in in his attack mailers with some of Niezgodski’s worst votes. Niezgodski has responded by running as a pro-women candidate, which would have been laughable even before April, and placing the prominent politicians willing to support him at the forefront of his campaign messaging: South Bend State Rep. Maureen Bauer and South Bend Mayor James Mueller. Progressive group MAD voters dropped their support of Bauer this week over the allegations, but she remains relentless in her support of Niezgodski, and it’s not hard to imagine a scenario where Niezgodski losing today begets more serious consequences for Bauer and Mueller.
HD-03 (Gary and Hobart)
Ragen Hatcher (i) vs. Heather McCarthy
Result: Hatcher 56.1%, McCarthy 43.9% | Hatcher wins
Incumbent State Rep. Ragen Hatcher is a perfectly competent state representative, and lawyer Heather McCarthy has been a perfectly competent City Attorney for both Gary and Hobart. Hatcher is doing a decent job in the legislature, McCarthy would do a decent job in the legislature, and the two don’t seem to disagree on anything, really.
HD-95 (Northeast Indianapolis, Lawrence)
John L. Bartlett (i) vs. Autumn Carter
Result: Bartlett 57.7%, Carter 42.3% | Bartlett wins
State Rep. John Bartlett is a reliably liberal backbencher who serves as the parliamentarian of the Indiana Black Legislative Caucus. He faces a challenge from hospital IT worker Autumn Carter, who has served as the finance director of the Marion County Democratic Party. Backed by Run for Something, Carter brings a compelling life story to the table: she became a single mother at 23 and survived breast cancer at 30, and turned those experiences into a career as a keynote speaker and advocate. Carter and Bartlett don’t have any major policy disagreements; Carter wants to bring a more active and youthful presence to the job (Bartlett is 75, Carter is 34) and wants to move more legislation, though Bartlett correctly points out that being a Democrat in the supermajority GOP legislature makes that goal a difficult one.
HD-97 (Central Indianapolis)
Justin Moed (i) vs. Sarah Shydale
Result: Moed 76.3%, Shydale 23.7% | Moed wins
State Rep. Justin Moed is almost certain to survive his no-budget challenge from 23-year-old accountant Sarah Shydale, but she seems cool. Shydale, who is trans, wants to focus on making Indianapolis a safe haven for LGBTQ+ people and faults the incumbent for not focusing enough on transit and urbanist issues; as she notes, this district includes a slice of downtown Indianapolis.