Vice President JD Vance is expected to visit Indiana on Friday to meet with state leaders amid a push by the White House for Indiana and other Republican-led states to redraw their congressional maps before the 2026 midterm elections.
Multiple sources, including two Republican state senators, told the Indiana Capital Chronicle that Vance will meet with lawmakers in Indianapolis. The visit comes as state GOP lawmakers weigh a special session for midcycle redistricting, which has divided some members of the party.
President Donald Trump has been pressing GOP-led states to redraw maps ahead of the 2026 elections to ensure Republicans maintain their House majority for the rest of his second term. Redistricting is typically conducted after the decennial census.
Republicans hold seven of Indiana’s nine congressional districts, with Democrats controlling seats in the northwest and central regions of the state.
Republican Gov. Mike Braun expressed concerns about the redistricting effort’s chances in the state Senate to the White House last week, Politico reported Wednesday, citing two people familiar with those discussions.
One person said Rodric Bray, R-Martinsville, Senate president pro tempore, “has been doing nothing to help the effort along or encourage his members, but has been really sort of hiding behind them, and maybe even subtly or not so subtly pouring cold water on the idea so that he can say he doesn’t have the votes.”
State Sen. Sue Glick, R-LaGrange, told the Capital Chronicle most lawmakers she has spoken with aren’t eager to redraw the maps.
“I think everybody wants to keep an open mind,” she said, “but, you know, the general attitude all along has been that nobody has much of an appetite for redistricting.
“I mean, we thought the maps we did before were fair.”
The state Senate Republican caucus has been largely silent about redistricting. House and Senate Republicans have held closed-door meetings on the topic, according to the Chronicle.
The visit will mark Vance’s second trip to the state in about two months. In August, he met with Braun, Bray, and House Speaker Todd Huston to rally support for redistricting. Braun described the meeting as “pretty good,” but neither he nor legislative leadership signaled any firm commitment to the proposal.
Later that month, dozens of GOP lawmakers from the state House and Senate traveled to Washington, D.C., to meet with Vance and other federal officials on various topics, including redistricting.
Bray and Huston met in person with Trump during that visit, the Chronicle reported. Braun has said repeatedly that he wants legislative leaders to reach a consensus before he would consider calling lawmakers back to the Statehouse.
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