What we’re deciding this year

There are 100 House seats and 25 Senate seats up for election this year, with 53 incumbents seeking reelection unchallenged, according to The Indiana Citizen.

Forty-two of the House incumbents aren’t being challenged. In the Senate, 11 candidates have a clear path to victory at this point, although party officials can fill ballot vacancies after the primary, reducing the number of unchallenged candidates.

In the U.S. Senate, Republican Todd Young and the Democratic mayor of Hammond, Thomas McDermott, are unchallenged in the primaries. In the U.S. House, the Ninth District will be highly contested with incumbent Trey Hollingsworth stepping down. The other eight districts have incumbents running for their seats once again.

This will be the first election utilizing 2020 census data and new maps after redistricting. With some incumbents being drawn into the districts of their colleagues, this created some unique circumstances in which incumbents will be running against other incumbents.

Unique competitions

One example of this is District 47, representing areas of southern Indiana, where Sen. Kevin Boehnlein, R-Jeffersonville, will be facing off against Sen. Gary Byrne, R-Salem. Both candidates are technically incumbents but have been in office for a short time. Boehnlein was chosen to replace Sen. Ron Grooms, R-Jeffersonville, upon his retirement in November 2021. Grooms was the only Republican who voted against the new redistricting maps, which shifted his district.

Byrne was chosen to replace Sen. Erin Houchin, R-Salem after she stepped down in January to pursue U.S. Rep. Trey Hollingsworth’s Ninth District congressional seat.

Houchin will be running against Republicans Stu Barnes-Israel; Rep. J. Michael Davisson, R-Salem; Dan Heiwig; D. Eric Schansberg; Mike Sodrel; Bill J. Thomas and Brian Tibbs in the primary. Democrats Matthew Fyfe, D. Liam Dorris and Isak Asare are also vying for the seat.

In the House, Rep. Curt Nisly, R-Milford, will be competing with fellow Republican legislator Rep. Craig Snow, R-Warsaw. Rep. Bruce Borders, R-Jasonville, and Rep. Jeff Ellington, R-Bloomington, will be competing for District 45.

The election commission received a challenge on Ellington’s candidacy since he had not been residing in the district. The commission turned down the challenge, with Ellington saying he had moved to challenge Borders in the primary, according to The Indiana Citizen.

Despite calls for an independent redistricting commission to be used for the new maps, the maps were Republican-drawn. Critics said the maps favored incumbents and minimized competition.

The ballot will also include school board elections and some other local races.