Holcomb Launches Barnstorming Tour for GOP Mayoral Candidates

(LAWRENCE, Ind.) – Governor Holcomb is hitting the road to reelect three Republican mayors and elect seven new ones.

Holcomb rallied about 40 Republican campaign workers in Lawrence to get out the vote for Mayor Steve Collier, in the first stop on a 10-city tour that will close in New Albany on Monday night, 12 hours before the polls open. In between, he’ll make stops on behalf of Mayors Duke Bennett in Terre Haute and Mike Moore in Jeffersonville, and boost Republican nominees in Muncie, Fort Wayne, Kokomo, Washington, Elkhart and Valparaiso.

Holcomb says a strong relationship between state and local government is one of the things new businesses look for as they consider where to locate. He borrowed his own 2016 campaign slogan to praise Collier for “putting people first” in his first term.

In Fort Wayne and New Albany, Holcomb is putting his weight behind challengers to Democratic incumbents Tom Henry and Jeff Gahan. But conspicuously missing from the schedule is the state’s biggest city, where Indianapolis State Senator Jim Merritt is trying to unseat Democrat Joe Hogsett. Holcomb brushes aside the omission, saying there’s only time to get to so many cities — he says he could easily have added 30 more cities if there were time. 

And Holcomb notes Lawrence is a Marion County stop. Marion County’s unique city-county government means Lawrence residents vote in both their own mayor’s race and Indy’s. But Holcomb never mentioned Merritt in either the rally or in a brief meeting with reporters afterward.

Gov. Eric Holcomb (Photo: Eric Berman/WIBC)