President Donald Trump and his yapping yes men around the country have been leaning hard on Republican-dominated state legislatures across the country to rig next year’s U.S. House of Representatives election.
The president—perhaps understandably, given that he’s bent almost every law he hasn’t broken—worried that a House in Democratic hands and armed with subpoena power could pose problems for him and his unquestioning subordinates. He also can count well enough to know that his public approval ratings, which are now lodged firmly in the middle 30-percent range, didn’t promise success if next year’s balloting occurred on an even playing field.
Hence, the presidential campaign to change the rules of the game by getting compliant governors and state lawmakers to play Etch A Sketch with their states’ congressional district maps in hopes of pilfering a few more Republican seats.
Here in Indiana, Republican Gov. Mike Braun—one of Trump’s more slavish lackeys—complied almost immediately, acknowledging publicly that he was doing so because he was afraid of the president. Braun said that Trump would punish Hoosiers if they didn’t give the petulant president what he wanted.
Most Hoosiers, though, are made of stronger stuff than their governor.
Poll after poll indicated that the idea of calling a special session not to serve the interests of Hoosiers but to save the pouting president a political headache or two was about as popular in Indiana as a return of the bubonic plague would be.
Democrats and independents overwhelmingly detested the idea and even the numbers of Republicans who opposed it climbed over 50% in some surveys.
Worse, some of the polling data indicated that the opposition to redistricting was spilling over to other areas. Indiana voters were beginning to ask why the governor and some lawmakers were willing to declare an emergency to try to save Donald Trump’s job, but seemed remarkably nonchalant about the ways accelerating inflation and a stagnating job market were wreaking havoc with the lives and budgets of ordinary citizens.
That meant Trump was asking Hoosier Republican lawmakers to risk enraging their own voters—and offering those legislators and Indiana citizens nothing in return.
Indiana Senate President Pro Tempore Rodric Bray, R-Martinsville, had been telling both Trump and Braun for months that there weren’t enough votes in the chamber in pass a redistricting plan.
Braun either didn’t listen or was so scared of the peeved president that he tried to force the issue by unilaterally calling for a special session.
But Braun’s hand isn’t that strong, either.
Some Republicans have told me that the party’s private polling has put Braun’s public approval rating here in the state at just over 25%. That’s not a strong enough number to frighten any but the most skittish lawmakers.
So, Bray decided to put an end to the farce.
“Over the last several months, Senate Republicans have given very serious and thoughtful consideration to the concept of redrawing our state’s congressional maps,” he said in an announcement. “Today, I’m announcing there are not enough votes to move that idea forward, and the Senate will not reconvene in December.”
The governor reacted as petulantly as his master in the Oval Office.
“I called for our legislators to convene to ensure Hoosiers’ voices in Washington, DC are not diluted by the Democrats’ gerrymandering,” Braun pouted in a statement. “Our state senators need to do the right thing and show up to vote for fair maps. Hoosiers deserve to know where their elected officials stand on important issues.”
That statement explained why Trump’s and Braun’s gerrymandering dream for Indiana went nowhere.
There are states in which Democrats have rigged the maps—Maryland being at the top of that list—but at present Republicans are runaway winners in the gerrymandering sweepstakes.
Even the most GOP-friendly studies on the subject show that eight out of the top 10 most gerrymandered states are in Republican hands. And many studies show that nine out of the top 10 are GOP strongholds.
Already, there are voices lauding Bray and other Senate Republicans for demonstrating integrity despite pressure from above.
Perhaps.
More likely, they just demonstrated that they have enough sense not to walk willingly into a buzzsaw.
Maybe that counts for something.
