INDIANAPOLIS (AP) — Indiana Republican delegates will meet Saturday for the party’s convention to nominate a candidate for lieutenant governor. In a decidedly unconventional situation, they will have several options this time.
Traditionally, the delegates support the election of the gubernatorial candidate. Senator Mike Braun has endorsed Representative Julie McGuire as his running mate. But she is being challenged by ultra-conservative Christian pastor Micah Beckwith.
Braun, who is leaving the U.S. Senate, announced his election in May, a day after winning the primary with about 40 percent of the vote. Braun was endorsed by former President Donald Trump and campaigned primarily on national issues such as immigration.
Trump issued a surprise endorsement of McGuire on Thursday night ahead of the convention, suggesting Beckwith’s campaign has teeth. The endorsement is a major victory for McGuire in a state where Trump won the 2020 election by 16 points.
McGuire, of Indianapolis, served as a policy analyst for Senate Republicans until 2022, when she ousted a lawmaker who had angered other Republicans by repeatedly calling for a complete ban on abortion. Indiana’s current law allows exceptions in sporadic and circumscribed cases.
Braun said he chose McGuire because of her very conservative legislative and policy record, despite her brief tenure. If elected by voters in November, she would be the latest in a line of women to hold the second-highest office in a state that has never had a female governor.
The lieutenant governor heads four state agencies, serves as ceremonial presidency in the Senate, and would have the deciding vote in the event of a tie should that ever happen in a chamber where Republicans hold a two-thirds majority.
Beckwith, who ran unsuccessfully for Congress in central Indiana in 2020, spent a year actively campaigning for lieutenant governor, canvassing for delegates months before the convention. He co-hosts a podcast called “Jesus, Sex and Politics” and is known for his far-right views on gender, sexuality and abortion. He presented himself as a political outsider who would keep the governorship in check, limit property taxes and oppose schools’ efforts to support the LGBTQ+ community.
Sometimes delegates defy the decision of their party leaders: In 2022, they opposed supporting Republican Governor Eric Holcomb for a second term as the incumbent Secretary of State, choosing instead Diego Morales, who won the general election.
Whoever wins that nomination will pit Braun against Democratic gubernatorial candidate Jennifer McCormick, a former state education secretary, and Libertarian candidate Donald Rainwater. Democrats have not won statewide office in Indiana since 2012.
