Tangle - An anti-incumbent wave in Indiana.

Starting point is 00:00:00 From executive producer Isaac Saul, this is Tangle. Good morning, good afternoon and good evening, and welcome to the Tangle podcast, a place we get views from across the political spectrum, some independent thinking, and a little bit of my take. I'm your host, Isaac Saul, and on today's episode, we're going to be talking about the Indiana state primaries, President Trump's little revenge tour against some GOP senators, state senators, who refused to gerrymander in Indiana. We're going to talk about exactly what happened, share some views from the left and the right, and then, of course, my take. Before you jump in, I want to give you a quick heads up

Starting point is 00:00:51 that our latest episode of Suspension of the Rules is out. It's up on YouTube. You can find us, Tangle News on YouTube. Also, you can find the episode in this podcast feed. There was some discussion early on about whether Camille can pull off his glasses or not. New pair of glasses, Camille's rocking. So if you want to actually see the glasses,

Starting point is 00:01:08 you're going to have to go to YouTube. And that's my plug for the YouTube channel. All right, with that, I'm going to send it over to John for today's main topic, and I'll be back for my take. Thanks, Isaac, and welcome, everybody. Here are your quick hits for today. First up, the United States and Iran are reportedly nearing an agreement to end the war between the countries and set a framework for future discussions over Iran's nuclear program. The agreement reportedly includes a moratorium on Iran's nuclear enrichment and end to U.S. sanctions and unrestricted transit through the Strait of Hormuz. Number two, Federal Bureau of Investigation agents

Starting point is 00:01:49 searched the Office of Virginia State Senate President pro-temporary L. Louise Lucas, pursuant to a public corruption investigation. Another search warrant was executed at a cannabis store that Lucas co-owns. Lucas, who has not been arrested or charged, said the search was in retaliation for her recent support of a new congressional map in Virginia designed to boost Democratic representation in the U.S. House. Number three, Republican state lawmakers in Tennessee, proposed a new congressional map designed to flip the state's sole Democratic seat in the U.S. House. Number four, a federal judge rejected a request by Fulton County, Georgia to order the Justice Department to return ballots and digital ballot copies related to the 2020 election that were seized

Starting point is 00:02:30 in January. The judge found that the county did not show the federal government lacked probable cause or conducted the search illegally. And number five, a suicide note allegedly written by convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein was released on the order of a judge. The 2026 Indiana primaries making history ousting more state Senate incumbents in one night than in the past quarter century combined. Most of the candidates had challengers endorsed by President Trump. President Trump and Governor Mike Braun threatened to help primary Indiana Republicans who defeated Trump's redistricting plan last year, with Trump's ally spending an unprecedented amount money on these races, their efforts ultimately proved successful.

Starting point is 00:03:23 On Tuesday, Indiana held primary elections for the 26 midterms. The state Senate primaries were closely watched after President Donald Trump supported challenges against incumbent Republican state senators in response to their opposition to a mid-decade redistricting plan last December. Six Trump-backed candidates defeated incumbent lawmakers, while another won an open primary seat. Only one incumbent opposed by the president, Greg Good of Tara Hote, has won their election. For context, in December 2025, following similar efforts in other states, President Trump publicly pushed Indiana Republicans to adopt a new congressional map designed to net the GOP additional

Starting point is 00:04:00 seats in the U.S. House. The state Senate, which has a 40 to 10 Republican majority, rejected the plan. Afterward, President Trump said he would support primary challenges to anti- redistricting state senators, and outside groups such as Club for Growth Action and Turning Point Action, invested significant resources in recruiting and supporting challengers. On Tuesday, President Trump affirmed his support for the primary challengers, writing on truth social, good luck to those great Indiana Senate candidates who are running against people who couldn't care less about our country or about keeping the majority in Congress. There are eight great patriots running against long-seated rhinos.

Starting point is 00:04:37 State Senator Travis Holdman, the highest-ranking Republican that opposed the redistricting effort, was among the incumbents defeated by a Trump-backed challenger. Furthermore, the results could imperil state Senate president. pro-temporary Roderick Bray's leadership position, as the challengers are expected to vote to oust him if they win their general election races. Indiana has a large Republican voting majority, and most, if not all of the Republican candidates, are expected to win in November. President Trump's allies in Indiana touted the outcome as a signal to the party about the president's enduring popularity. Everyone in Indiana politics should have learned an important

Starting point is 00:05:12 lesson today. President Trump is the single most popular Republican among Hoosier voters, Senator Jim Banks, the Republican from Indiana said. Indiana is a conservative state, and we deserve conservatives in our state Senate who have a pulse on Republican voters. State Senator Bray, an opponent of redistricting, noted the significant outside spending on the primaries saying, the amount of money that was spent in Indiana is material, it matters, and that was very, very difficult to overcome. We worked really hard. Our candidates worked really hard to get their message out, but the voters spoke. State Senator Holdman told the Indianapolis star, revenge and retribution is not a Christian value. And that's what this was all about.

Starting point is 00:05:53 Today, we'll share commentary on the results from the right, left, and Indiana writers. And then Isaac's tape. We'll be right back after this quick break. All right. First of, let's start with what the right is saying. Some on the right say the result hammers home what GOP voters really want from their representatives. Others suggest it could be a short-lived victory for Trump and the party. In the daily caller, Mary Rook said voters taught GOP leadership a valuable lesson. Indiana has nine House districts as a deep red state, allowing two Democratic Party-controlled districts didn't align with the state's actual voters. Voters wanted the Indiana state legislature to redistrict the state from a 7-2 Republican advantage to a 90-GOP sweep, Rook wrote.

Starting point is 00:06:51 There were eight state senators, part of a larger group of 21 Republicans who voted against the redistricting bill and were up for re-election on Tuesday. Millions were reportedly spent on these races to unseat the defectors. Ultimately, six of the eight lost their races. Defeated incumbents are not wrong to claim that his and the other's losses were about revenge and retribution. That's exactly what happened here, and the broader GOP should take heed. Either use the power the voters gave you to enact their will and mandate, or sit back and watch the voters take you out one election at a time, Rook said. The era for so-called principal conservatism is over. Voters want elected officials to be fighting tooth and nail to

Starting point is 00:07:31 their wishes across the line. The Wall Street Journal editorial board wrote about Trump's hollow Indiana victory. The media scorekeepers have declared that President Trump remains the king of the Republican Party. The more important question is whether his kingdom will shrink after November, the board said. The Maga Machine went all in, and for what?

Starting point is 00:07:50 Indiana's current U.S. House districts are split 7 to 2, giving them 78% of the GOP. Mr. Trump carried only 59% of the state's vote in 2024. The map proposed last year aimed to turn Indiana into a 9-0 state, but that wouldn't reflect Indiana, and a gain of two seats might get swamped by a blue wave. When the state Senate rejected redistricting 19 to 31, more Republicans voted against than in favor.

Starting point is 00:08:15 I was contacted by many, many, many constituents, Senate President Pro Tem Roger Gray later said, I would say that 10 were against it to every one that was for it. He also raised doubts about trying to stretch the GOP's finite voters to win all nine seats. the board wrote. We're after you, Mr. Bray, Trump wrote online in January, like no one has ever come after you before. Mr. Bray isn't up for re-election until 2028, but why is this GOP infighting a useful focus six months before November? All right, that is it for what the right is saying, which brings

Starting point is 00:08:56 us to what the left is saying. The left frames the results as evidence of the GOP's subservience to Trump. Others say Trump, reasserting his power could hurt the GOP in the midterms. In MS now, Paul Waldman said the primary highlighted the rot within the GOP. While Trump largely won these contests, did replacing conservative Republicans with other conservative Republicans really help him or the GOP? How these elections played out was evidence of the rot within the party, and the links it will go to in satisfying every one of Trump's whims, no matter how self-destructive, Waldman wrote.

Starting point is 00:09:30 All of those targeted were, to be clear, Republicans who support a conservative agenda, but Trump wanted their heads, so his will had to be done whatever the cost. One might argue that investing millions of dollars in taking vengeance on the Indiana Republicans will have a deterrent effect. Like a mob boss, perhaps Trump wanted to punish those who stepped out of line so no one in his party would get any ideas about showing independence, Waldman said. The problem, though, is that Trump will only be president for two and a half more years. He is almost certain to lose the House this November and perhaps the Senate as well for the remainder of his presidency. Furthermore, the redistricting wars

Starting point is 00:10:05 may be petering out. There are only so many seats even the most nakedly partisan state legislature can squeeze out of their maps. In the new republic, Perry Bacon explored the silver lining in the results. The good news is that the results of Indiana showed that the Republican Party is really a cult of Trump, so Republican candidates will be reluctant to distance themselves from an increasingly unpopular president and therefore might lose winnable races this November and in two years, Bacon wrote. The bad news, though, is that the results in Indiana showed that the Republican Party is a cult of Trump, so Supreme Court justices, governors, state legislatures,

Starting point is 00:10:40 Congresspeople, and even rank-and-file GOP voters will keep falling in line with the whims of our wannabe dictator. Trump just ended the careers of five politicians he probably hadn't heard of a year ago. I don't like the idea of party bosses, but what really discouraged me is being on the side of a party that doesn't have effective bosses against one that does, Bacon said. There is a silver lining, though.

Starting point is 00:11:02 Trump will be emboldened by the results in Indiana. He will keep making Republicans defend whatever he does, such as stuffing funding for the White House ballroom into a budget bill moving through Congress this week. And Trump's approval rating continues to sink, potentially plunging to post-Katrina lows of George W. Bush at the end of his second term. All right, that is it for what writers from the right and the left are saying, which brings us to what Indiana writers are saying. Some Indiana writers expect both new state Senate leadership and a new congressional map.

Starting point is 00:11:32 Others bemoan the outcome but acknowledge Trump's electoral sway. In the Indianapolis star, Jacob Stewart said Trump's Senate win means redistricting is back in. Bray is out. While it's difficult to guess which senators would support Bray in a caucus, the 19 votes in favor of redistricting in December can serve as a decent proxy, Stewart wrote. If senators vote to oust Bray from his leadership position, they will likely replace him with Senator Chris Garten. Garten, unlike his colleague Senator Liz Brown, did not publicly criticize his colleagues for their votes against redistricting and has remained most of the closely behind the scenes during the primary campaign season. As a result, he maintained his leadership

Starting point is 00:12:09 position and stands to gain support from both pro-redistricting and anti-redistricting senators. U.S. Representative Marlon Stutzman suggested the General Assembly would likely revisit the issue of redistricting at some point after the primaries were over. This would likely have to come after Bray is ousted, as Bray has significant control over what bills are even getting a hearing, Stewart said. If senators vote the same way as they did in December, with the extra votes in favor, redistricting would just barely pass. If the vote is tied, Lieutenant Governor Micah Bekwith

Starting point is 00:12:39 could still cast a tie-breaking vote in favor of redistricting. Also in the Indianapolis star, James Briggs wrote, Sometimes you gotta hand it to Trump. Donald Trump is the most corrupt president in history. Every gas station sign you pass attests to the wreckage of his second term.

Starting point is 00:12:57 But sometimes, you gotta hand it to him. Trump is very, very good at politics, Briggs said. Indiana's primaries were a referendum on Trumpism. Trumpism prevailed. Simple as that. Even if you want to discount the results by attributing them to the unfathomable $13.5 million ad blitz that hit state Senate primaries, you have to acknowledge Trump is a singular figure who can make it rain on obscure state legislative elections because they happen to be important to him personally. Trump's endorsement in Indiana GOP primaries once again carried tremendous weight, backed by millions in outside spending from

Starting point is 00:13:30 political action committees tied to allies, including banks. Springs wrote. On top of that, Indiana, Republicans might wind up redistricting Democrats into oblivion sooner or later. The U.S. Supreme Court's weakening of the Voting Rights Act is sparking another round of race to the bottom gerrymandering that will compel red and blue states to extend their partisan advantages further than ever. All right, let's head over to Isaac for his take. All right, that is it for the left and the writer saying, which brings us to my take. The lesson the right seems to have learned this week is that Trump understands what voters want, The Indiana GOP didn't, and so they paid the price.

Starting point is 00:14:18 In hot air, Ed Morrissey said the incumbents lost because they didn't bother to ask voters what they want. In PJ Media, Matt Margolis said there was nothing subtle about the message from MAGA voters. They want strong Republicans who will fight the Democrats not be weak, useful idiots for the left. Mary Rook in the Daily Caller, under what the right is saying, threaten the GOP. Either use the power the voters gave you to enact their will and mandate, or sit back, and watch the voters take you out one election at a time. There is plenty more where that came from, and each writer seemed to be insisting that Indiana's GOP leaders were ousted

Starting point is 00:14:53 because they wouldn't be team players and redraw the state's map to help Trump win the national gerrymandering war he started in Texas. This theory has one problem, though. That isn't what the Trump-backed candidates actually ran on. The MAGA-aligned state legislators who won their elections weren't running ads about how voters should elect them so they can redraw districts to maximize as many Republican seats as possible. Shocking, I know.

Starting point is 00:15:19 Instead, the campaign focused more on a broader set of conservative principles, like opposing gas taxes and transgender participation in sports, things the incumbents were not necessarily supporting. Let me put it in plain terms. Trump wanted Indiana Republicans to further gerrymander the state. State Senate President pro-tempoor Roderick Bray understood this was bad, and early on in these gerrymander wars, he refused, hoping some other states would follow him. Unfortunately, few did.

Starting point is 00:15:49 Trump and his allies were infuriated by the perceived portrayal, so they dumped millions into otherwise small races to crush Bray's allies and oust him from his leadership role. $13.5 million was spent on state Senate primaries overall, a roughly 5,000 percent increase in spending from 2024 when a total of $250,000 were spent. In state Senator Jim Buck's race alone, $1.3 million was spent on ads opposing him while his own campaign spent just $150,000. How did they attack Buck? Did they go after him for not gerrymandering? Not quite.

Starting point is 00:16:26 In just one example, the ads frame Buck is old, pathetic, and liberal. Across the board, Trump's allies use the money to boost candidates' opposition to trans participation in sports or taxes on gases. They won. And now Trump's supporters are celebrating. as if this is proof voters wanted more ferocious partisan loyalty, even more gerrymandering. Sorry, but I'm not buying it. Does this show Trump still has influence in the Republican GOP?

Starting point is 00:16:53 Of course. I never really doubted he did. Does it mean the national GOP could increase spending in tiny state races by 5,000% and get the results at once by attacking its own party members? Yes, it probably does. But did Indiana voters have some organic desire

Starting point is 00:17:10 to oust their representative? for not backing Trump on his gerrymandering push? No. The worst effect of this outcome goes well beyond Indiana. Several states, including Alabama, Louisiana and South Carolina have upcoming primaries and are still considering gerrymanders. The message was sent to those state-level legislators, do as we say or face the consequences.

Starting point is 00:17:33 And down the road, what's to stop Democratic leadership from trying this model out themselves? Infighting in the party is already common, and I wouldn't be surprised if a future, Democratic president or House leader adopts this strategy to keep state-level representatives in line or force more gerrymandering. So what do we get for the millions of dollars spent and the attention on this race? According to political analyst Ryan Gurdowski, as few as 22 House seats in the entire country could be competitive when this wave of redistricting is over.

Starting point is 00:18:02 According to Gurdowski, if we take the numbers from 2024 as a starting point, that would mean about 7.6 million voters out of 149.5 million ballots cast are going to decide the composition of Congress, just 5% of all-American voters. This is the world decades of bipartisan gerrymandering have wrought, and it's the one President Trump is making worse right now. Voters are no longer choosing their politicians. Politicians are choosing their voters. I only maintain a few hopes for how we get out of this mess. One is that some charismatic, honorable, politically savvy leaders from both parties come together and mount a national campaign to treat the nationwide fever of gerrymandering. That seems sadly unlikely.

Starting point is 00:18:46 Another is that a wave of grassroots bipartisan organizations start campaigning heavily against gerrymandering, standing up voter referendums for independent commissions, and T us up for a sea change in 2030. This is possible, but it would require putting partisan point scoring aside. The third and perhaps most likely hope is that enough members of Congress watch as their seats get dissolved into these nationwide battles, then everyone realizes this is a horrible way to run a country and a piss-poor example of a functioning democracy. Basically, the self-interested and self-preserving opinion

Starting point is 00:19:19 among politicians becomes not to gerrymander, and we go back to a world where reasonable natural districts encompass a diverse set of voters whom Republicans and Democrats have to actually campaign to win over. I am obviously dispirited by all these developments, but I'm not hopeless either. Our country has gone through all manner of political movements, and the future is often less predictable than we think. Just because we're headed this way now doesn't mean it's the only path forward, and the lesson from Indiana isn't that gerrymandering is inevitable.

Starting point is 00:19:50 What it does mean is that we are reaching an inflection point, and what we can learn from the Indiana primaries is that enough people need to keep repeating the same points until it gets through to the population at large. And here is the point. We are no longer choosing our politicians. They are choosing. us. Until we make that an unacceptable arrangement, we'll be stuck in the spot for the future. We'll be right back after this quick break. All right, that is it for my take. Senior Editor Will Kback has a staff concurrence. He wants to expand on some points that he agrees with me on. So I'm going to pass it to Will really quick. Thanks, Isaac. I had a short concurrence to add to Isaac's take today. And here it is. On the point of lessons learned from these primary results, I would highlight another potential lesson for the November midterms. As GOP strategist Carl Rove and others have noted,

Starting point is 00:20:57 the money spent on these races is money that Republicans won't have to help vulnerable Republicans in difficult house races this year. $13.5 million is a minor sum compared to the total funds that will undoubtedly flow into national races this year. But it's representative of a president who often struggles to keep his eye on the ball, and by proxy, a disorganized party. Trump absolutely achieved his goals in Indiana, but I suspect that Democrats have no problem with Republicans spending their time and money on state-level intra-party disputes. All right, that's it for my concurrence. I'm going to hand it back over to Isaac for today's reader question. All right, that is it for my take and our staff concurrence, which brings us to

Starting point is 00:21:47 your questions answered. This one is from Kelly and Park, Raziel, Illinois. Kelly said with the news that the United States is withdrawing 5,000 troops from Germany. I'm curious. Why do we have 5,000 troops in Germany to begin with? How many troops are in allied countries and why, and how much does this contribute to our military budget? Okay, great questions. So in total, roughly 170,000 active duty United States military personnel are stationed on military bases in allied countries all across the world, from Germany to South Korea to Australia to Peru.

Starting point is 00:22:18 These bases serve an array of functions through their distance from the United States mainland. For instance, the U.S. Space Force says the Boutique Space Force Base in Greenland supports missile warning, missile defense, and space surveillance missions from the solid state-phased array radar. In Germany, U.S. bases provide operational support for the Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marines. Somewhat ironically, considering the history, Germany is second only to Japan in hosting United States troops and military bases. Germany is a NATO ally located in the middle of Europe with accessibility to much of the continent, as well as an aerial reach to northern Africa and eastern Asia and waterways that can reach the

Starting point is 00:22:57 North Baltic and Black seas. Originally, the United States set up bases in West Germany after World War II to help with post-war reconstruction and observe the check on the Soviet Union's operations. Today, the United States maintains 47 bases across the now unified country. All told, these bases host approximately. approximately 36,000 troops, not including their families and civilian support, and include some of the largest and most important foreign bases the military operates. Stuttgart holds 20,000 Americans in total, troops, family, and support, and has been the home to the United States U.S. European

Starting point is 00:23:33 Command since 1967. Ramstein Air Base, which is home to 54,000 Americans, is the Air Force's base of operations for all of Europe and Africa. Estimates for the operation of foreign bases vary. According to Cato, a single United States military base costs $50 to $200 million a year to operate, or around $60 to $120 billion in total as a conservative estimate. David Vine, a professor at American University, and one of the most vocal critics of these bases, estimates they cost more than $150 billion to operate annually. All right, that is it for your questions answered.

Starting point is 00:24:10 I'm going to send it back to John for the rest of the podcast, and I will see you guys tomorrow. Have a good one. Peace. Thanks, Isaac. Next up is our section, The Road Not Taken. The option that continued to fall off the board for us this week was the war in Iran. Over the weekend, we strongly considered running an addition focused on the U.S. policy of assuring passage for ships transiting the Strait of Hermuz, but opted for the Spirit Airlines closure because we believed it had interesting nuances to unpack. On Tuesday, the status of the war was in flux amid reports of renewed peace talks, so we chose to cover the end of the Department of Homeland Security shutdown. The lack of developments and negotiations by Wednesday left the mail-order Mitha-Pristone pause as our next option. For today, we were between peace talks in Iran and a larger update on the war and the Indiana state Senate primaries. We went with the latter for the electoral impact. We can sometimes be slow to

Starting point is 00:25:05 larger important stories as we give them time to develop. For the Iran war, we also wanted to make sure we did not overly focus on one narrative, as we covered the story four separate times in April. Now that plenty of threads have developed in the war, we are expecting that it will receive a full newsletter edition early next week. And last but not least, our Have a Nice Day story. Amid growing concerns over water insecurity in the American West, a productive development from the San Diego County Water Authority could be providing a roadmap for the future.

Starting point is 00:25:36 The Carlsbad desalination plant. The plant is North America's largest desalination facility, and its output has been so successful that San Diego County dropped its reliance on outside water imports from 95% to just 10% percent. That drop in demand allowed Arizona and Nevada to meet their own needs, purchasing the county's Colorado River allocation in exchange for funds to help maintain the facility. This agreement could be a game changer for San Diego County and the entire Southwest because it creates the possibility of a new collaborative path for moving water where it's needed

Starting point is 00:26:07 most, Water Authority Board Chair Nick Serrano said. Good News Network has this story and there's a link in today's episode description. All right, everybody, that is it for today's episode. As always, if you'd like to support our work, please go to reetangle.com, where you can send up for a newsletter membership, podcast membership, or a bundled membership that gets you a discount on both. In this week's episode of Suspension of the Rules, Isaac Ari and Camille discussed today's newsletter topic, party primaries, Indiana, and Jerry Maynor. Things also get heady as they discuss whether billionaire should exist and unpack a chat GPT criticism of last Friday's edition on corruption in the Trump administration, which you'll read more about tomorrow. You can

Starting point is 00:26:46 check out our latest episode on Apple Music, Spotify, and many other podcast platforms. And if you want to feel like you're in the studio with the guys and see Camille's new glasses, you can head over to our YouTube channel to check out the full episode. I'll be back in your ears again on Monday. For Isaac and the rest of the crew, this is John Law signing off. Have an absolutely terrific weekend, y'all. Peace. Our executive editor and founder is me.

Starting point is 00:27:09 Isaac Saul and our executive producer is John Wall. Today's episode was edited and engineered by Dutie Thomas. Our editorial staff is led by managing editor Ari Weitzman with senior editor Will Kayback and associate editors Audrey Moorhead, Lindsay Canuth, and Bailey Saul. Music for the podcast was produced by Diet 75. To learn more about Tangle and to sign up for a membership, please visit our website at reTangle.com.

Tangle - An anti-incumbent wave in Indiana.

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