If Indiana’s Republican senators had any doubts about President Donald Trump’s redistricting proposal, he helped them make up their minds the night before this week’s vote.
In a social media statement, Trump accused the state’s top senator of being “a bad guy or a really bad guy.”
“This kind of language doesn’t help,” said Sen. Travis Holdman, a banker and attorney from nearby Fort Wayne who voted against the plan.
He was among 21 Republican senators who handed Trump one of the most significant political defeats of his second term, voting against redistricting in Indiana. The decision undermined the president’s national campaign to redraw congressional maps to boost his party’s chances in the upcoming midterm elections.
In interviews after Thursday’s vote, several Republican senators said they leaned against the plan from the start because their constituents didn’t like it. But in a nice Midwestern pushback to America’s increasingly crude political discourse, some said they just didn’t like the president’s tone, such as when he called senators “stupid.”
“I mean, it’s pretty ugly,” said Sen. Jean Leising, an Oldenburg rancher who works at her daughter’s travel agency.
Trump didn’t seem to get the message. Asked about Thursday’s vote, the president again took aim at Indiana’s top senator, Rodric Bray.
“He’s probably going to lose the next primary, whenever that is,” Trump said. “I hope he will, because he’s done a tremendous service.”
Sen. Sue Glick, a La Grange attorney who also opposed redistricting, dismissed Trump’s threat to unseat lawmakers who defied him.
“I would think he would have better things to do,” she said. “It would be money better spent electing the people he wants to represent his agenda in Congress.”
Trump has struggled to gain traction in Indiana
The president tried to brush off the defeat, telling reporters that he was “not working very hard on it.”
But the White House spent months embroiled in what Republican Sen. Andy Zay described as “a full court press.”
Vice President JD Vance met with senators twice in Indiana and once in Washington. White House aides frequently checked in on the phone.
Holdman said the behind-the-scenes message was often more reassuring than Trump’s social media attacks.
“We’re getting mixed messages,” he said. “Two days before the vote, they wanted to call a truce for Senator Bray. And the next day, there’s a post on Truth Social that didn’t sound like truce language to me.”
Some of Trump’s other comments also drew backlash. For example, he described Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz as “retarded,” which angered Sen. Mike Bohacek because his daughter has Down syndrome. Bohacek was skeptical of redistricting and decided to vote no in response.
The White House did not respond to questions about the senators’ outreach, but distanced itself from conservative allies who said Trump had threatened to withhold state money.
“President Trump loves the great state of Indiana,” said spokesman Davis Ingle, who insisted that Trump “has never threatened to cut federal funding and it is 100 percent fake news to claim otherwise.”
Regardless, Trump has struggled to gain traction despite months of pressure.
Holdman said he turned down an invitation to the White House last month because he had a scheduling conflict.
“Besides, by then it was a little too late,” he said.
Leising said he missed a call from a White House official the day before the vote while he was in a committee meeting. He didn’t try to call back because he wasn’t going to change his mind.
Mitch Daniels, former governor of Indiana and a Republican, had a simple explanation for what happened.
“People in our state don’t respond well to bullying,” he said.
Senators said their constituents don’t want new districts
Some Republicans criticized the senators for defying Trump.
“His life was threatened — and almost assassinated,” Indiana Lt. Governor Micah Beckwith wrote on social media. “All for what? To make Indiana politicians shy.”
The message to the president, Beckwith said, was “go to hell.”
But senators who opposed redistricting said they were just listening to their constituents. Some believed the unusual push to redraw districts was tantamount to political cheating. Others didn’t like Washington telling Indiana what to do.
The proposed map would have divided Indianapolis into four pieces, grafting chunks of the city into other districts to dilute the influence of Democratic voters. But in small towns near the Kentucky and Ohio borders, residents feared the state’s largest metropolitan area would gain influence at their expense.
“The constituents just didn’t want it,” Holdman said.
During Thursday’s Senate vote, some Republicans seemed torn about their decision.
Sen. Greg Goode, who is from Terre Haute, said he spoke to Trump twice on the phone as he weighed the redistricting plan. He declared his “love” for the president, but denounced “exaggerated pressure.”
Goode said he would not vote for the proposal.
“I am confident that my vote reflects the will of my constituents,” he said.
____ Beamont reported from Des Moines, Iowa. Volmert reported from Lansing, Michigan.