By Sydney Byerly
The Indiana Citizen
August 19, 2026
Indiana Lt. Gov. Micah Beckwith told attendees of a gathering intended to support President Donald Trump’s mass deportation efforts that immigrants should assimilate into “American culture,” but he did not define the American or Hoosier values he said they should adopt.
Beckwith delivered the remarks in a prerecorded video message for Save Heritage Indiana’s Aug. 1 event the group billed as a “Mass Deportation Rally.” The Indiana Citizen obtained the video through a public access request. Despite his office previously telling Indiana Capital Chronicle a public records request would be needed to obtain the video, Beckwith reposted the video on his official lieutenant governor account on Aug. 13, saying he had approved the message.
The organization promoted the event as a “Mass Deportation Rally,” and its website says its mission is to “save Indiana’s heritage by reversing mass migration.” The organization urges supporters to vote only for leaders who will end mass migration.
Attorney General Todd Rokita was also scheduled to provide prerecorded remarks for the rally. The Indiana Citizen requested both officials’ videos through Indiana’s public access law. Beckwith’s office provided his video this week, but Rokita’s office has not yet provided the GOP attorney general’s video or answered whether he recorded a message for the event.
During Beckwith’s roughly four-minute message, he praised the Trump administration’s efforts to crack down on immigration and end Temporary Protected Status protection against deportation for migrants from countries deemed unsafe including Haiti, Somalia and Ethiopia. Also, Beckwith emphasized what he described as threats to American and Hoosier values.
“Immigration has been used as a catalyst to destroy our values as Americans, and really as Hoosiers,” Beckwith said.
He also said immigrants should assimilate into American culture.
“It really is about assimilation, if you want to be honest,” Beckwith said. “What are American values? What is the culture that we believe? What do we hold dear? And if you want to come here, you become like us, not the other way around.”
Beckwith did not elaborate on what specifically constitutes those American or Hoosier values, in his view. He warned that immigrants could bring “a foreign culture, a foreign political ideology, a foreign hostile faith” into American society.
He also sought to distinguish between ethnicity and culture, saying he believes “multiethnicity can be a good thing as long as you’re under one culture.
“One culture – the American culture,” he said.
That position is somewhat different in emphasis from some of Beckwith’s own recent immigration rhetoric and from Save Heritage Indiana’s broader anti-immigrant message, which includes identifying Americans by their bloodlines.
In a September 2025 conversation with Save Heritage Indiana’s founders, Beckwith said the group was right to focus on immigration and agreed with proposals including ending birthright citizenship, imposing a moratorium on immigration, deporting undocumented immigrants and making English the official language for government agencies. He also said multiculturalism was “a very destructive force.”
In that same conversation, Beckwith said the United States could not “take in the whole world” and could not “open up our doors for taking everyone.” He said he intended to use his platform as lieutenant governor to highlight what he called the immigration problem and encourage the Trump administration’s immigration policies.
His comments about Haitian immigrants have also shifted in tone depending on the context. In October 2024, Beckwith described Haitian resettlement in Logansport as an “invasion” and urged local officials to identify Haitians who he said “should not be in our community.”
In September 2025, after meeting with Haitian pastors, he praised Haitians who were living or seeking asylum in Indiana and said they were “determined to work hard, raise their children, and contribute to the Hoosier state.” Beckwith defended the apparent contrast by saying those immigrants had come through legal channels under Temporary Protected Status and that he had not “flip-flopped.”
At a Merrillville town hall in August 2025, Beckwith similarly argued that the United States should offer asylum to people seeking refuge through legal channels. “I’m saying we can be compassionate without being lawless,” he said. He also said the country had been “invaded” during former President Joe Biden’s administration.
The latter portion of the video focused heavily on Islam, echoing some of Beckwith’s recent rhetoric while using less inflammatory language.
Beckwith described “radical Islam” and what he called the “radical Islamification of Indiana and America” as another threat. He claimed that the purpose of “radical Islam” is to “immigrate, populate, and dominate,” and pointed to countries including the United Kingdom and France as examples of what he described as attempts to “overthrow Western civilizations.”
The language was less severe than some of Beckwith’s more recent public comments about Islam. In June, he called the religion “actually worse” than Nazism and said it represented a “clear and present threat” to Indiana and the nation. In May, he said Americans needed “permission to hate again” and called Islam a “demonic death cult.”
Beckwith urged those watching the video to “speak the hard truths” about American and Hoosier values.
“If we don’t know what values we believe, we won’t know what to protect,” he said.
He encouraged viewers to study and teach those values to the next generation.
“Teach it, speak it out, lay the groundwork in the hearts and minds of the next generation, and that’s how we save the heritage of this great Hoosier State,” Beckwith said.
Beckwith was among other political figures connected to the Save Heritage Indiana event, which was held under a tent in Clinton County because organizers reportedly could not find a venue owner in Fishers willing to rent space to them.
State Rep. Jim Lucas, R-Seymour, spoke at the rally. Prerecorded messages were provided by British politician Rupert Lowe, founder of Restore Britain, a far-right political party that advocates for reverse mass immigration, and Austrian activist Martin Sellner, who has been described as the poster boy for the European Identitarian movement.
The landing page for Save Heritage’s website includes a portrait of Beckwith smiling in front of the American and Indiana state flags along with his statement supporting the organization.
“Save Heritage Indiana is doing exactly what our state needs,” Beckwith is quoted as saying.
The landing page also features pictures and quotes from Republican state Reps. Zach Payne of Charlestown and Chris Jeter of Fishers.
Rather than attending in person, Beckwith recorded a message for the rally. The Indiana Citizen previously reported that Beckwith and U.S. Border Patrol Commander-at-Large Greg Bovino were scheduled to give remarks during the event. Bovino last year became the face of Trump’s mass deportation efforts as he led immigration sweeps in several Democratic-led cities, before retiring this spring in the wake of backlash over the shooting deaths of two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis by federal agents.
Beckwith thanked Save Heritage Indiana and Bovino for their work.
“Save Heritage Indiana is doing a great work in helping Hoosiers remember who we are,” Beckwith said. “I want to say a big thank you to former Commander Greg Bovino for what he’s done for our nation and how he’s inspiring all of us to remember what the values we stand on in America are.”
He concluded by telling organizers that he was “honored to partner” with them and would be “there every step of the way.”
Sydney Byerly is a political reporter who grew up in New Albany, Indiana. Before joining The Citizen, Sydney reported news for TheStatehouseFile.com and most recently managed and edited The Corydon Democrat & Clarion News in southern Indiana. She earned her bachelor’s in journalism at Franklin College’s Pulliam School of Journalism (‘Sco Griz!).
The Indiana Citizen is a nonpartisan, nonprofit platform dedicated to increasing the number of informed and engaged Hoosier citizens. We are operated by the Indiana Citizen Education Foundation, Inc., a 501(c)(3) public charity. For questions about the story, contact Marilyn Odendahl at marilyn.odendahl@indianacitizen.org.
