Pete Buttigieg joins a rally against redistricting.

Lieutenant Governor Beckwith wants to pause utility taxes, plus state spending, to prep a prison for Ice detainees.

And more from the television studios at WFTYI.

It's Indiana Week in Review for the week ending September 19th, 2025.

Indiana Week in Review is produced by WFTYI in association with Indiana Public Broadcasting Stations.

This week, former U.S.

Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg urged hundreds of Hoosiers at a statehouse rally to hold Republicans accountable if they redraw the state's congressional map.

State Republican lawmakers appear likely to redraw congressional district lines this year to gain more seats for the GOP.

Buttigieg, a former South Bend mayor, came home to Indiana to urge citizens to talk to their neighbors and push state lawmakers not to redistrict.

Buttigieg says rather than change their unpopular policies, national Republicans are trying to change district maps.

They know that on a fair map, if they get caught taking all the money they took out of.

Medicaid and giving it to tax cuts for billionaires, they will lose.

Governor Mike Braun this week said there could be negative consequences from the Trump administration if Indiana doesn't redraw its map.

Democratic Senator Andrea Hundley says that shouldn't matter.

Governor Mike Braun should be less worried about relationships with politicians out in D.C., and should be more concerned with making life better for Hoosiers.

Braun also said a special session for redistricting would probably happen in November.

Will this pressure influence the outcome?

It's the first question for our Indiana Week in Review panel.

Democrat, Ann DeLaney.

Republican, Chris Mitchum.

Jon Schwantes, host of Indiana Lawmakers.

And Leslie Bonilla Muñiz, reporter for the Indiana Capital Chronicle.

I'm Indiana Public Broadcasting Statehouse bureau chief Brandon Smith.

Chris, can this pressure from Democrats primarily affect what Republican lawmakers ultimately decide to do?

well, from the Democrats specifically, no, I don't I don't think so.

I unfortunately for them, but I do think that it's been interesting to see seemingly the pivot from Mike Brown, especially considering his latest comments, seemingly going from going to work with the legislature to see what the decision is to I want this.

Now we're going to have to wait for the legislature to see what they want to do.

And I think he is adding more kind of fuel to the fire, of bringing in those federal consequences, which I do think is shortsighted, just to completely overlook.

You could argue about whether it's the right thing to do or the wrong thing to do, but especially if you get more details on what those federal consequences could look like.

I think that's something that you have to consider, whether you like it or not.

It's the reality of the situation.

So, you know, I do think anything that Braun says, if he does end up starting to add the pressure to the legislative side, we'll have much more of an impact than anything that Democrats would do or any, you know, Democrat, you know, top in person they decide to trot out.

But I will say, as a lobbyist, perhaps one of the most things that keeps me up at night is how Braun said that other topics may be available.

If a special session is called that, that doesn't sit well.

I mean, does that I mean, that idea of, well, it's a special session for redistricting, but I mean, technically anything can be brought up the way Indiana's rules work.

You can't limit a special session to one topic.

though the leadership certainly can shove things in a in a desk drawer, but does that open a can of worms that that's going to make this harder for lawmakers?

It absolutely does.

And I do think the pressure has an impact.

And it's not just from Democrats.

You had prominent Republican after prominent Republican from Mitch Daniels to to Brian Barr.

My other people saying this is the wrong thing to do.

There will be consequences if they do it.

But I think there are some principles, Republicans who are reluctant to do this, and they think it's the wrong thing to do.

It's never been done before.

And on top of that, it could be done.

Every, you know, you're not going to control forever.

And it could be done on a, you know, every other year to give advantages.

The problem they have is that Trump's policies are hurting people.

They're hurting farmers.

They're hurting transportation.

They're hurting.

Inflation is up.

All of these things that he supposedly was going to fix are not being fixed.

And he knows that.

And that's why he's worried he's going to lose.

And he's going to lose big in 26 unless he can cheat and rig the election.

And I don't know that there are there are obviously a lot of trumpets in the Republican caucuses in both houses.

But there are also people who think about the institutions and think about democracy and are reluctant to trample to trample those for Trump.

Too many tears.

In the interview this week on on our radio up in Fort Wayne, which is where all of this stuff from Mike Braun is coming from.

you know, we've heard about the idea of potential consequences from the Trump administration basically this whole time.

But he started to get a little more specific.

He specifically mentioned, the Department of Agriculture, the U.S.

Department of Agriculture, which is looking at, creating these regional headquarters around the country in Indiana was one of the states that so far has been chosen for that as something that potentially could be affected by this.

Are these sort of because those threats are going to go through Mike Braun, not to individual state lawmakers as much will the specificity of some of that change some minds of the state House?

I think it could I mean, I the funny thing is I asked him point blank, last month if we could be penalized for, you know, not complying.

And he said no, at the time, he was just like, you know, our relationship might not be as close as it is, but I think, you know, kind of he has at least acknowledged that where there is discretion, there lies some uncertainty for Indiana, as you mentioned, the USDA hub, they've also use us as a, platform for some major national announcements, like the EPA announcement, that kind of honoring of us and the giving of those opportunities.

I mean, what they give us, they can easily take if or not, you know, I mean.

The state is also in the middle of of trying to negotiate some changes to, to Medicaid and managed care, reimbursements and things like that.

there's the likelihood or at least the possibility that they're going to go and ask the feds to do some more tolling on Indiana, interstate highways.

And that could be affected because, again, these are things that are.

Leading to doing something that's wrong.

I don't know if they should be, but it seems like that's what's happening.

Well, Harvard stood up to him and Harvard won.

Maybe we should do the same thing.

Harvard has a much bigger endowment than the state of Indiana.

Well, I don't.

You're right.

It's pretty.

The fact that they haven't, announced the special session yet.

Does it lead to any other conclusion at this point?

Then, at least in one of the chambers, they don't have the votes.

I think that's the conclusion I would draw, because I think members of the General Assembly realize this is not broadly popular.

within the chambers and certainly among probably a good portion of their constituents.

I think Hoosiers, common sense people who say, you know, we like the rules.

You know, we'll play any game.

We'll go up against any competitor.

But let's not cheat or change the rules.

So I think there's a sense that there's not an appetite for this.

So what you want to do if there isn't an appetite for something is do it fast, get it out of the way so people forget about it before the next session, or the next round of elections, etc., etc.. and that also if you're sole goal, which I guess now it is, is to appease one person or a collection of people in Washington, D.C.

the faster you do it, the more you know jewels you get in your crown, as these negotiations go forward.

So why would you not?

Yeah.

but to me, it does sound more or less like politics and more of a hostage negotiation.

I'm waiting for the notes to come with letters cut out from magazines.

Almost.

This is what we want.

The bag should be dropped.

You know, at this location or something bad happens to your state.

I mean, it's it's it's a departure from anything I'm used to.

Yeah.

All right.

Lieutenant Governor Micah Beckwith says Indiana should put a moratorium on the state sales tax on utilities.

As Hoosiers face sharply rising utility bills.

An annual survey showed that the typical residential consumer, using 1000 kilowatt hours of energy, paid an average of nearly $30 more a month this year, compared to last year.

Across the state's five investor owned utility companies, that's an average increase of about 18%.

Beckwith told the Indiana Capital Chronicle this week that he's building a coalition of lawmakers to push a pause on the sales tax on utilities.

But key committee leaders, including House Ways and Means Chair Jeff Thompson and Senate tax and Fiscal Policy Chair Travis Holdman are reportedly skeptical or, in Holdman's case, outrightly dismissive of the idea.

Exempting utilities from sales tax could cost the state more than $600 million a year.

Ann DeLaney, does Micah Beckwith have the right idea?

Micah Beckwith is trying, obviously, to divert attention from his office and the fact that that this Christian nationalist minister who said he knew nothing about the pornographic film that was being displayed there, apparently at least, is being accused of watching it.

So, you know, obviously he wants to talk about anything else.

The problem with this is they have been in charge for 21 years.

They have let these rates rise and rise and rise.

They've cut back on the ability to develop solar or wind.

They've interfered with our ability to get electricity from Kansas.

They want these data centers, which are just huge sponges of electrical need.

And now, after 21 years of facilitating this, we already had before this 18% increase, we already had the highest average monthly residential rate in the Midwest.

Where have they been for an entire generation?

Now he's going to talk about, what is it, 4%, 5%, whatever the sales tax on it, 7%.

Okay.

That doesn't even cut in to the 18% increase.

And it does penalize the state coffers.

They've let this run amok.

They have given utilities whatever they want.

And now all of a sudden, when people realize that their rates are through the roof, now they're going to do something.

Micah Beckwith was out there pretty publicly on what he thought the state should do in terms of its property tax debate earlier this year.

I don't think he was totally satisfied with the outcome when he told Mike Braun to veto it, which Mike Braun did not do.

he could, but on this issue and this is something a lot of he's right about this.

A lot of people are very as they should be very upset about how high, how high their utility bills are.

Can he have some success here?

I think he's a smart enough politician to know that his specific proposal of trying to suspend sales tax on utility bills probably won't happen.

And I think you heard that, you know, from some significant leaders in the legislature.

But I do think politically, it's interesting that he does represent a vocal and influential part of the party that typically tends to shy away from executive power that they don't like.

Right.

So I think with him also joining the chorus along, as you've seen with Mike Braun and all the changes you've made to the IAC and the Office of Utility counselor, now you have seemingly the other side of the party that's also saying we want to see proposals, we want to see solutions.

And this is our idea, and I've said it on the show before, but I think, you know, utilities are kind of starting to go a little bit of the way at the hospital where for years hospitals got, you know, mostly whatever they asked for from the legislature.

But all of a sudden you start seeing the prices come up, especially compared to around states.

And then you saw the legislature start introducing things as draconian as price caps.

So now I think with utilities, you know, it wasn't even a decade ago where we were amongst the lowest utility rates in the country.

That's right.

And then all of a sudden and then when all of a sudden utilities oh, it's been a lot longer than a decade.

But the utilities all of a sudden now are starting to get a lot of things that they asked for.

And now you're starting to see it skyrocket.

So I feel like, you know, some of the similar things you've seen in the health care industry, you might start seeing as the utility industry as soon as next session.

It's not completely like hospitals, because then that means more than half of the counties in Indiana would not have electricity because.

Because now it will be the no.

But I mean, that is of course, I'm alluding to the fact that most I mean, do you think majority of counties don't have hospitals in that sense?

I mean, Micah Beckwith just went through this.

Now, he was a brand new lieutenant governor, obviously new to the role and figuring it out.

But he was very out there publicly on trying to push the legislature on property taxes.

Do you think he can take lessons from that to maybe get a little more of what he wants on the utility bill issue?

He doesn't.

He can win without winning.

And I think this is the point that Chris was making.

And we've seen it with other statewide office holders who proposed things that they know, even if they were, even if they were enacted, which is had zero chance, they would not have solved the problem in all likelihood.

So I think you have, but you can campaign later on the fact that when nobody else was doing anything other than just saying, oh, I'm so sorry, you're you're paying more each month.

I tried to do something knowing that there is a backstop.

on the same by the same token, it's I mean, we look at when fuel prices, for instance, that's been the front burner issue in this state and elsewhere in the country in the past.

And governors and officeholders from both parties have looked to suspend the state sales tax on gasoline and have scored points doing it.

the problem is nothing happens in a vacuum.

You take that money as as you suggested in the open, you take that money off the table.

It doesn't just backfill magically.

Right?

It's got to come from somewhere.

And that's that's this is such a complicated issue, and it's a national issue.

It's a global issue.

There's no this isn't going to fix it.

No easy fix, will.

I I'll say this.

You know, Mike is not going to be alone in his, you know, in the governor's administration calling for some action.

I mean, Mike Braun has started to come out there and say, hey, we need to look at this.

His new, utility consumer counselor.

Basically, one of the first things she did was weigh in on an s, Indiana, rate increase request.

The IU are saying go.

Not only should you not raise your rates, you should lower your rates because you're investor returns don't need to be as high as you want them, which.

Typically isn't actually that influential.

But the fact that it's a broad appointed person and she move this quickly.

Yeah, that's literally the first.

Thing was probably in the works long before.

Point, although she was also, I mean, leading figure in that office.

So my guess is she's probably working on it herself.

But I mean, is that a signal to that?

There is going to be a concerted effort from a lot of different sides, probably in 2026?

Yeah.

I mean, as we've talked about, there's been a ton of momentum around this.

More people higher up are taking it up as like a topic.

And I mean, as you mentioned, Mike Braun, his administration has said that he's going to be focusing on this issue this fall.

there's going to be three vacancies on the IU or C. Those might be a way to appease people.

but I will say that, you know, the energy secretary is going to be, chair of that nominating commission, and she just said this week that, you know, affordability is just one of the five pillars and that, she was very pro, you know, building more data centers, building more, of that kind of thing.

And that cost money.

And it's passed the repairs.

So it's kind of we'll we'll see what they do.

Yeah.

Well, she also she also said that that locals should, you know, be more welcoming to alternative sources of energy and that some that ruffled some feathers among the legislative wing of the party.

Well, I seem to recall that she suggested, companies that are punted from their projects should see those, local units.

Yeah.

Know I think she did say that.

Time now for viewer feedback.

Each week we post an unscientific online poll question.

This week's question is, should Indiana pause the state sales tax on utilities to help address Hoosiers rising utility bills?

A yes or B no?

Last week, we asked you whether an ethics investigation into Jennifer Ruth Green's time as Indiana public safety secretary could hurt a potential congressional bid.

77% of you say yes, 23% say no.

If you'd like to take part in the poll.

Go to wfyi.org/iwir and look for the poll.

Well, the state Budget committee this week approved nearly $16 million for the Indiana Department of Correction to prepare its Miami facility to house undocumented immigrants detained by U.S.

immigration and Customs Enforcement, or Ice.

DOC Commissioner Lloyd Arnold says the state money will be used for structural changes, equipment and temporary housing for staff to open up a portion of the facility that's gone unused for the last few years due to staffing shortages.

DOC entered into a contract with Ice this week for housing up to 1000 adult males over the next two years.

The state will receive about $291 per person per day from Ice, nearly four times as much as the $75 a day it costs to house state prisoners at the facility.

Arnold says Indiana wouldn't enter into the contract without making a profit.

He says DOC will use that money to boost pay for correctional officers at Miami from 24 to $28 an hour.

Arnold hopes that will boost personnel levels by better competing with other local employers.

The facility needs about 170 more staff.

If I can go work at Subaru and May 20th $8 an hour and not have anybody punch me in the face or spit on me or assault me, I'm going to go do that.

Some lawmakers expressed concern about the conditions of other facilities used by Ice in recent months to house detainees.

Arnold said detainees will be treated like offenders incarcerated by the state, and the DOC adheres to national standards.

You're trying to even refrain from the the moniker name that was given.

We still got Miami Correctional Facility because that's what it is.

we're going to have it a detainment center for those people that are in our care, to ensure to get back to their country of origin in a safe manner.

Democratic Representative Greg Porter sharply criticized the state budget committee's decision to allow state funds to be used to prep the facility.

In a statement, he said, quote, they couldn't find the money to avoid cuts to social services, but they found the funds for this job twice.

Is the state going to end up making money from this deal?

I think they probably will.

It would be hard not to, you know, when you look at reimbursement rates that are likely for these types of, not inmates, detainees, and the and the scarcity of space for any number of reasons, legal challenges that we saw against alligator Alcatraz down in the Everglades and other places.

This, I guess, in the current climate, is something of a growth industry.

now that you didn't ask me about, if that's the good thing or bad thing, you ask me.

The dollars and cents question.

And I guess from a dollars and cents standpoint, there's probably it would be hard for the state not to come out ahead, I guess.

I think there were questions, when the state started signing, the 287 agreements, with Ice, several weeks ago, there were questions about like, what state resources are going to have to be spent here, and how confident are you that you'll get reimbursed for them?

Because we've seen in the first several months of the Trump administration, them just shutting off federal coffers to any number of things across the country.

But in this case, when it comes to Ice, you have the one big beautiful Bill act or whatever.

that, I mean just exploded the Ice budget beyond any level we've ever seen before.

It seems.

Should the state have confidence it's going to get the money and makes any relatively smaller investment that it has to make early on worth it?

I mean, this is a centerpiece of the Trump administration's, you know, platform right now.

So I think it they would assume it's a pretty safe bet.

But I do want to say, like another issue here is staffing.

The Miami facility is like 1200 beds under capacity right now because they don't have the staff for it.

And some of this higher, you know, reimbursement rate, it's much higher than it actually costs them to house these detainees.

it sounds like some of it is going to be used to raise salaries so that they can bring in, you know, enough staff to add a thousand beds.

But, I guess the question is like, is higher pay alone enough to fix such a deep staffing problem?

That's my question.

They need a 107 with Lloyd Arnold said this week was they want they need 170 more, correctional officers to to make this fully operational, if you will.

is raising, hourly pay by $4 an hour enough.

And what is the set due to the other correctional officers around the state?

Well, I know he did talk about moving correctional officers from other facilities to Miami.

But they're.

Not.

Replaced by somebody.

That creates a question about shortages.

There's no question that there's money to do it.

I mean, they reimburse and they say they cost them $75 a day.

And this is going to be somewhere north of $270 a person.

So there's money to do that.

So this is a you know, on one hand it's a it's a money making operation for the state.

On the other one, this is one of Trump's highest priorities.

And if you would governor Braun and you were concerned about repercussions, it seems to me it could work both ways.

If the Governor Braun knew how to negotiate, because we could shut this down.

If we have penalties for not having a special session or redistricting.

Well, a few weeks ago, we were talking to about the notion of the state reducing the amount of voucher, the the value of vouchers for child care, which again, I know is a bit of an apples to oranges, but it's just on the age continuum.

Do you care for people at that age or.

Yeah, or 18 years old?

I mean, Boy Arnold talked about the idea of like the money that they're hoping to make from this.

Like he's hoping it has a ripple effect across the rest of the budget because, I mean, part of what you saw on this last session was almost every state agency got cuts and in some cases, deep cuts.

But DOC was one of the three places where they actually increased the funding because they absolutely.

Had child care.

And at that facility.

Child care and education.

There are lots of places that cut that need it.

There's no question.

He was spending more than it was given.

So they really just needed to fill those holes.

And I think it's important to clarify that the role of the state budget agency that allocated this money, right.

They're not pulling from other sources.

They're they can only allocate money that's already there.

Right.

So the idea that, you know, we're pulling from all of these things, this particular there particular one looking out there.

So Trump does it.

Trump Congress says no.

And Trump says I'm going to spend it anyway.

Right.

Yeah.

So the idea that you're pulling from other things is just not the case in this particular instance.

And I think this is one of the most common sense wins that you can give the broad administration.

I mean, you're literally getting paid four times the amount of money to house these detainees for spots that aren't even used yet.

Sure, you can argue the staffing and things like that, but I mean, it's and you can go towards longer term benefits at that particular facility, but also just money straight into.

The if you then agree that that gives us negotiating power with Washington doesn't.

It.

Yeah, absolutely.

They can add that to the win list.

Oh there you go.

There you go.

Indiana Secretary of State Diego Morales says his office provided the personal information of the state's registered voters, nearly 5 million Hoosiers to the U.S.

Department of Justice.

Morales says he's complying with a letter from the Trump administration sent in recent weeks, the U.S.

Department of Justice has sent letters to many, if not all states in the last few months asking for officials to turn over voter roll information.

A few weeks ago, Morales said, attorneys in his office were reviewing the request.

Now, he says he's turned over all the personal information the DOJ wanted.

Everything we do has one purpose, to safeguard Hoosier elections and ensure only US citizens are voting in our elections.

The information turned over to the Trump administration includes names, addresses, driver's license numbers and the last four digits of voter's Social Security numbers.

It does not include voting history.

Other states have refused to turn over the information, citing privacy concerns.

Leslie, are Hoosiers going to be comfortable with this?

you know, I think there's a lot of uncertainty about how this data is going to be used.

So a lot of, you know, experts have kind of been sounding the alarm about this.

but, I mean, the Department of Justice has confirmed that it is sending sharing some of the information with the Department of Homeland Security for use in what is a criminal and immigration related investigations.

but they were also pretty blunt in a statement that they gave to state Line.

They just said, we are going to quote, you know, remove aliens from the voter rolls.

So, I think I forget where I was going with this, but, I mean, yeah, I mean, it's confidential information.

And there's also, I think they told, wrote Reuters that they, plan to be giving feedback to states.

So there also opens up the opportunity for them to kind of be pushing states into making changes, potentially.

I got more emails about this story than any story I've written in a very long time from people very, very angry about this.

And I don't think they were all Democrats.

Is this something that even some Republicans are going to have a problem?

I think as a society, we look at voting as something that is precious, and it is if there's anything that's sacred, it is.

I mean, that building block of our democracy, the notion of, nothing standing between you in the ballot box and this is part of a long line of, of of measures and moves.

And we hear about mail in voting.

We hear about, you know, yes, I think people are concerned.

I think it's important to remember, too, that he tried this in his first administration.

And Connie Lawson, who was who was in that same position, said, no, because you're not entitled to that.

All right.

That's Indiana Week in Review for this week.

Our panel is Democrat, Ann DeLaney.

Republican, Chris Mitchum, Jon Schwantes of Indiana Lawmakers, and Leslie Bonilla Muñiz of the Indiana Capitol Chronicle.

You can find Indiana Week in Reviews podcast and episodes at wfyi.org/iwir or on the PBS app.

I'm Brandon Smith of Indiana Public Broadcasting.

Join us next time because a lot can happen in an Indiana week.

The views expressed are solely those of the panelists.

Indiana Week in Review is produced by WFTYI in association with Indiana Public Broadcasting Stations.