Trump's redistricting revenge tour lands in the Hoosier State
We preview all of Tuesday's top primaries in Indiana and Ohio
After nearly a two-month layoff, the 2026 primary season picks back up Tuesday as voters in Ohio and Indiana cast ballots in races that have been defined by redistricting—or a lack thereof.
The convoluted rules Ohio voters approved in 2018 required the state to redraw its congressional districts for the remainder of the decade ahead of this year’s elections. Faced with even less appealing alternatives, the Democratic minority on the state’s GOP-dominated redistricting commission last fall agreed to a new Republican gerrymander that, while favorable to conservatives, fell short of the GOP’s dream map.
These new boundaries made districts held by Democratic Reps. Greg Landsman and Marcy Kaptur’s tougher for them to defend. Both could still prevail, though, and on Tuesday, they’ll learn who their opponents will be in November.
Democrats, meanwhile, believe that Donald Trump’s weak approval ratings will give them an opening to unseat Republican incumbents in districts that Trump decisively carried under both sets of maps.
The House Majority PAC, the largest pro-Democratic super PAC involved in House races, recently reserved millions in fall ad time that could be used to target three Ohio Republicans: Max Miller, Mike Turner, and Mike Carey. Democrats have contested primaries in all three races that will be resolved on Tuesday.
The situation is quite different in Indiana, where Republicans in the state Senate resisted Trump’s fierce pressure campaign to replace the gerrymandered congressional map they drew in 2021 with a map that would have eliminated the state’s last two Democratic seats. Trump and his allies are now determined to punish seven of the senators who defied him by launching a well-financed campaign to defeat them in Tuesday’s primaries.
Below, you’ll find our guide to the key primaries in these two states. In addition, there’s a pivotal special election for control of the Michigan Senate, which we previewed in the most recent edition of our Morning Digest newsletter.
You can also find interactive maps from Dave’s Redistricting App for congressional districts in Indiana and Ohio, as well as for the Indiana Senate.
Reliable public polling has been extremely scarce for all of these contests. In fact, survey data has surfaced in just one race, the GOP primary for Ohio’s 9th District. In all the rest, none is available.
Polls start to close at 6:00 PM ET in the portion of Indiana located in the Eastern Time Zone, which covers most of the state. Join The Downballot on our private Discord server to discuss the election returns with fellow community members as they come in on Tuesday night!
Indiana
IN State Senate (R)
Trump is backing primary challenges to seven of the eight Republican members of the Indiana Senate seeking reelection this year who opposed him on redistricting, and he’s not limiting his efforts to some mean posts on Truth Social.
Groups tied to Trump, Gov. Mike Braun, U.S. Sen. Jim Banks, the hardline anti-tax Club for Growth, and other entities pledged to spend at least $5 million to defeat the incumbents. In fact, it appears they deployed much more—perhaps even twice as much.
Senate President Pro Tem Rodric Bray, who also opposed the remap but is not up for reelection until 2028, responded by directing millions to defend his caucus, though his side has access to considerably less money.
The challengers, though, have sometimes struggled to explain just why Republican voters should eject their senators.
State Rep. Michelle Davis, for example, responded to Politico’s question about the most important issue in her campaign against state Sen. Greg Walker with a long-winded answer that began, “Good question, um. Gosh, okay, defining issue. What’s it about?”
After a detour about “stuff like making sure that boys aren’t in girls’ locker rooms,” she finally acknowledged, “When I’m knocking on doors, not one person was talking to me about redistricting.”
Davis’ allies have tried to make a more persuasive case that redistricting isn’t the only reason the incumbents need to go. One ad accused Walker of having voted to raise the state gas tax before taking him to task for having “opposed President Trump’s plan to remove liberal Democrats from Congress.”
Walker has defended his conservative credentials and also questioned the effectiveness of the spending directed his way, telling the Indiana Capitol Chronicle that his daughter has seen ads attacking him even though she lives 100 miles away.
IN-04 (R) (64-34 Trump)
The contest between Rep. Jim Baird, 80, and state Rep. Craig Haggard, 57, offers an early test of whether Republican primary voters are as hungry to replace older members of Congress with younger challengers as so many Democrats are.
