“Taking office, the top priority for me is to safeguard Indiana’s record of free, fair and secure elections, ensuring that all Hoosiers know their vote counts,” Sullivan said.

Sullivan has been representing the Evansville in the Indiana House since 2014 and had a background in engineering process management.

In the legislature, Sullivan has served on House committee including rules, roads and transportation and the budget-making ways and means committee.

During Sullivan’s tenure in the Indiana General Assembly, she worked with the Secretary of State’s office to pass legislation funding critical local cybersecurity improvements in time for the 2020 elections. She’s also worked with the office’s auto dealer services division to modernize Indiana Code through legislation.

Sullivan began her career in management at General Motors, where she oversaw more than 100 employees in the auto giant’s paint division. Then holding a similar role for Toyota’s Indiana manufacturing operation, she supervised production quality and staffing across the company’s Hoosier plants. From there, Sullivan launched her own consulting firm, Onward Consulting, and began working with the University of Southern Indiana at the school’s Center for Applied Research.

Sullivan earned an undergraduate degree from the University of Missouri and has continued her education in business management at Lindenwood University.

“Indiana has become a leader in election transparency and election integrity. I’m extremely confident in Indiana’s elections and I hope you are too,” Sullivan said of the state’s current election landscape and called the 2020 election cycle “well-run.”

“I’m thrilled Rep. Holli Sullivan has accepted this new leadership role for I know she will serve Hoosiers with the same intellect, integrity and energy she brought to the General Assembly,” Holcomb said. “Secretary of State Sullivan hits the ground running, building on the remarkable work Hoosiers have come to expect from the office during Connie Lawson’s historic tenure.”

Lawson announced Feb. 15 that she would step down down two years shy of the end of her term. Lawson said the 2020 election term took a toll, leading to an early retirement, but that she would work with her replacement to get them up to speed.

Lawson had been originally appointed to the office in March 2012 following the conviction of Charlie White for perjury, theft and voter fraud. She was re-elected in 2014 and 2018 before stepping down this year.

In her first public appearance at the appointment press conference Tuesday, Sullivan deferred specific questions about any tweaks or changes she would want to see in Indiana election law, although she said she looked forward to continuing working with her now-former colleagues at the Statehouse to “defend” the electoral process.

In response to a question about mail-in voting — Indiana allowed no-reason absentee voting in the delayed June primary but not in the November general election — Sullivan did indicate she’d maintain the current rules.

“There is a strong balance between in-person and mail-in voting and I think that balance needs to be there,” she said.

She declined commentary on a question about whether she perceived any issues with the 2020 election result on a national level, instead stating she would be “hyper-focused on Indiana” and that Hoosiers should trust in this state’s process.

“When I look at Indiana I have the utmost confidence in Indiana’s elections,” she said.