In Indiana’s sprawling state Senate District 23, which stretches from West Lafayette to the Illinois border well to its south and west, there is a race that gives perhaps the clearest window into a divided party, and the figures who lead it.
It comes after several candidates endorsed by President Donald Trump are challenging GOP state senators who voted against redrawing the congressional map.
First-term state Sen. Spencer Deery worked for the state’s most influential political figure of a generation, former Gov. Mitch Daniels, at Purdue University.
His challenger, the Trump-endorsed Paula Copenhaver, chairs the Fountain County GOP and is a staffer for another Indiana political figure: Lt. Gov. Micah Beckwith. Copenhaver declined two in-person requests for an interview.
Beckwith, who presides over the Senate in a largely ceremonial role but often clashes with its GOP leadership, was the first statewide elected official to endorse Trump’s call for redistricting, and has campaigned with the Republicans challenging Senate incumbents.
“I do think the Republican Party is having sort of an identity moment, right — who are we, what do we believe, and also, what will we fight for?” Beckwith said. “And I think that’s what President Trump has done so well, in my opinion, is he’s taught us how to fight.”
Deery, meanwhile, made the case that what’s at stake is a much different issue: “It’s about our federal system and … how much control is Washington going to have over the states.”
