Two Indiana Democrats discuss push to change Statehouse culture on sexual harassment

• By Marilyn Odendahl, The Indiana Citizen December 2, 2024

Looking ahead to the 2025 Indiana General Assembly session, state Rep. Carey Hamilton acknowledged she is not very hopeful.

The Indianapolis Democrat pointed to the “earth-shaking election” that, in Indiana, included the defeat of Democratic gubernatorial candidate Jennifer McCormick, who would have been the first woman elected governor in the state, and the Republicans sustaining their supermajority status in the Statehouse. This was followed by the recent Indianapolis Star investigation into allegations of sexual harassment against the Indiana Senate Minority Leader, Greg Taylor, D-Indianapolis.

“It’s been rough, so hope is in the background,” Hamilton said. “Women’s reproductive health care, things that are important to families and women (such as) child-care access and affordability, and pre-K investments that are just critical for our state, I am pretty certain we’re not going to make progress on and so we’re going to have to fight really hard to maintain” what is already in place.

Hamilton and state Sen. Andrea Hunley, D-Indianapolis, talked about the upcoming legislative session, the Statehouse culture and potential reform during the L. Keith Bulen Symposium on American Politics at Indiana University Indianapolis on Nov. 22. The two legislators participated in the Women in Politics panel discussion which was moderated by Margaret Robertson Ferguson, professor of political science at IU Indianapolis.

Of the 150 lawmakers in the Indiana General Assembly, 40 are women. Also, 10 of the 35 leadership positions in the Republican and Democratic caucuses in the House and Senate are held by women, but none of them hold the top leadership role.

Hunley, first elected to the legislature in 2022, said women can absolutely make a difference in state and national politics. She noted women, especially those who are mothers, bring a different perspective to policy, thinking about how a new initiative or change in the law will impact the coming generations.

“We work well together, we focus on issues, we build consensus, we shake up stagnant systems and we, on the whole, put egos aside to really focus on the task at hand, to get things done,” Hunley said of women legislators in the Statehouse. “I’ve been able to work with my colleagues across the aisle who are women to get things done and that has been a breath of fresh air.”

Hamilton said when she was first elected to the Indiana House in 2016, she was one of just two women in the chamber. She is now one of 30 women in the House and serves in leadership as the House Democratic caucus chair.

Echoing Hunley, Hamilton said having more women in the General Assembly would bring new ideas and different viewpoints to the legislative process. Women are very important and must be involved, she said, in improving the culture of the Statehouse.

Hamilton said she has had several conversations with her male colleagues in the legislature, since the news broke about Taylor. While most men are wonderful and respectful in the way they treat women, she said, they do not fully understand the problem.

Even well-meaning men, Hamilton said, don’t have the perspective or abiliyt to relate to women that have experienced sexual harassment. “They absolutely want to do the right thing, but with our experience as women, we can help steer the best solutions,” she said.

‘Enough is enough’

According to The Star’s reporting, three women have accused Taylor of sexual harassing them between 2009 and 2016. Two former legislative staffers said Taylor initiated unwanted physical contact with them, including pinning one against a door. Another woman said he pursued a romantic relationship with her when she was a legislative intern in 2016.

The Senate Democratic caucus issued a statement in response, apologizing to the women and saying harassment and exploitation by individuals in “positions of public trust” is “especially egregious.” However, the caucus reelected Taylor as its leader, after The Star published the story.

Hunley, assistant minority leader in the Senate, unsuccessfully challenged Taylor for the minority leader position. Democratic Caucus Chair Sen. Rodney Pol Jr., D-Chesterton, had supported Hunley’s bid.

Speaking during the panel discussion, Hunley said coming forward with a sexual harassment complaint continues to be difficult. Even when men are accused of such misconduct, women often remain the focus and face personal attacks, she said.

Moreover, Hunley pointed out the “structural problem” that exists in that complaints about legislators are reported to and handled by other legislators. She talked about women who had told leadership about being harassed only to see nothing happen as a result.

“This issue is not new,” Hunley said of sexual harassment. “I think that what we’re making new, right now, is the fact that we are done. Enough is enough. We are going to speak up, no matter the cost, and we’re going to make sure that the system changes, no matter the cost.”

Hamilton has also indicated a need for reviewing the policies and procedures regarding problematic behavior by lawmakers. In a statement released after the Star story, she emphasized legislators have a responsibility to create a workplace of “respect and accountability” in the Statehouse.

“In 2019, we made significant improvements to our harassment training and reporting policies,” Hamilton said in her statement. “Now, five years later, it is time to ask ourselves: Are there ways to improve the House’s harassment reporting system? How can we best support staff to come forward when they have experienced or witnessed inappropriate behavior?

“In light of Monday’s news about a Senate colleague, it is critical that we revisit these questions,” Hamilton added.

Bringing more balance to the Statehouse

Indiana Democrats’ effort to pick up four seats in the House was derailed by the Republican wave that swept across the country in the 2024 general election. GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump was always expected to win the Hoosier state, but the 58.8% of the vote he captured this year topped the 57% he won in 2020. Also, Republican gubernatorial candidate Mike Braun defeated a surprisingly strong Democratic opponent, Jennifer McCormick, with 54.4% of the vote to 41.1%.

Fueling the red wave, Hunley said, was Indiana’s “very low voter turnout.” She noted that despite 2024 being “a critical election,” voters in Marion County, which reliably votes Democratic, stayed home.

“I see it as folks are disengaged,” Hunley said. “I also have empathy for people, because if you are working three jobs, as my sister is, if you are just trying to keep your lights on, if you are going day to day to day, it is hard to stay informed on all of the things that are happening. I think that those of us who are involved in party politics need to do a better job of engaging the community.”’

However, Hamilton pointed out, Democrats are winning on policy, even as they are losing at the ballot box. The policies of the Democratic Party, such as higher minimum wage, reproductive freedom and support for public schools, are favored by a majority of voters, she said, so the Democrats have to regroup and “figure our how to better share out policies.”

Flipping four seats in the House and breaking the Republican supermajority would have given Democrats a chance to implement some of their popular policies, Hamilton said. Currently, the GOP has enough votes that it can act without any input or compromise with the Democrats, but, she said, eliminating the supermajority would enable Democrats to stop the debate on any bill just by walking out of the room and it would force Republicans to work across the aisle to pass legislation.

“That is my goal: bringing more balance back to the Statehouse and getting to … that closer balance and shared power will help us have more public debate and dialogue and discussion of the issues that are critical to Hoosiers, because that’s not happening right now,” Hamilton said.

In addition to having a bigger role in policymaking, flipping four seats would also ensure Democrats have a stronger influence in redrawing the legislative and congressional districts after the U.S. Census in 2030. Gerrymandering creates safe districts for either Republican or Democratic parties and can disenfranchise voters by diluting the power of their vote and leaving them less choice in the general election. Also, gerrymandering can shift the contested election to the primary, encouraging the candidates of the same party to embrace more extreme positions in order to win.

Even after the election, voters are still left out of the process, Hamilton said. She pointed out that the gerrymandering leads to a lot of the debate in the Statehouse happening behind closed doors within the party caucuses. As a consequence, the ideas and proposals that do not win in the caucus are silenced and not heard in public on the floor of the House or Senate.

“I had several conversations in the last few days with Republicans about policy issues,” Hamilton said, “and a few times I was scolded, or advised to not be public about my positions because that would hurt my ability to have the conversation behind closed doors to maybe make a tiny bit of progress.”

The problem with that approach, she said, is that voters are uninformed about what their legislators are doing.

“How is that good I cannot share with my constituents what I’m working on on their behalf, which they’ve asked me to work on?” Hamilton asked.

This article was published by TheStatehouseFile.com through a partnership with The Indiana Citizen, a nonpartisan, nonprofit platform dedicated to increasing the number of informed, engaged Hoosier citizens.

Indiana Citizen Editor Marilyn Odendahl has spent her journalism career writing for newspapers and magazines in Indiana and Kentucky. She has focused her reporting on business, the law and poverty issues.