He wasn’t on the ballot, but President Donald Trump was the big winner in Indiana’s primary.
The president scored decisive victories in a slate of state primaries in the solidly red Midwestern state, another sign that his immense grip on the Republican Party remains rock solid.
The political world was closely watching Indiana’s primary because it was the first of a series of major tests this month of Trump’s endorsement power in GOP nomination showdowns, and the president cleared his first hurdle with ease.
Five months ago, Republicans in the GOP-dominated Indiana state Senate withstood immense pressure from Trump and his allies and voted down congressional redistricting, which would have given Indiana two more right-leaning U.S. House seats ahead of the midterms.
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Fast-forward to Tuesday and eight of those state senators faced GOP primary challenges. Seeking retribution, the president endorsed challengers to seven of the eight Republican lawmakers who voted against the redistricting bill.
Five of the Trump-endorsed candidates won, with one incumbent surviving and one race yet to be decided as of early Wednesday morning.
“Everyone in Indiana politics should have learned an important lesson today: President Trump is the single most popular Republican among Hoosier voters,” Republican Sen. Jim Banks of Indiana, a top Trump ally in the Senate, said in a statement as the results poured in.
Banks, who was a key part of the team of Trump allies and advisors in the effort to defeat the incumbent GOP state senators, emphasized that “Indiana is a conservative state, and we deserve conservatives in our State Senate who have a pulse on Republican voters.”
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Trump and his team started flexing their political muscles soon after the president’s push for redistricting in Indiana came crashing down last December.
A Republican source familiar with the effort to defeat the incumbent GOP state senators told Fox News Digital over $8 million was spent on TV and digital ads between the American Leadership PAC and Hoosier Leadership for America, two outside groups aligned with Banks and steered by Team Trump strategist Andrew Surabian.
The source added that Team Trump operatives began organizing this plan in February and were responsible for the vast majority of the money raised that was spent by the two groups.
Republican Gov. Mike Braun of Indiana also donated several hundred thousand dollars to the effort.
Two well-known national groups, Turning Point USA’s political wing and the Club for Growth, also had the president’s back in Indiana.
The intraparty battle was seen not just as a test of fealty to Trump but rather a fight between MAGA forces and more traditional conservatives for the future of the GOP.
Club for Growth President David McIntosh told Fox News Digital “this is a big win for Trump.”
And McIntosh, a former congressman from Indiana, said the primary victories are “a signal to the entire party that our base wants us to fight for what we believe in.”
Trump appeared to be closely watching the results. As each race was called, the president took to social media to tout the victory of another Trump-endorsed state Senate challenger.
The besieged incumbents significantly outraised their challengers and were also boosted by the Indiana Senate GOP caucus.
But the outside spending and get-out-the-vote efforts by the pro-Trump forces proved decisive.
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“The resources that he [Trump] can bring to a state Senate race are overwhelming,” veteran Republican strategist Marc Short, who served as a key official in the first Trump administration, told Fox News Digital.
Short, a longtime top Pence advisor, said the showdowns in Indiana were “about allegiance to Trump,” and that the president “still has enormous sway in the party.”
Trump’s clout will be on the line once again in a week and a half, in the Louisiana primary.
Sen. Bill Cassidy is facing primary challenges from two Republicans: Rep. Julia Letlow and former Rep. John Fleming, who is currently the state treasurer. Trump earlier this year weighed in on the race by endorsing Letlow.
Cassidy was one of only seven Senate Republicans who voted in early 2021 to convict Trump after he was impeached by the House for his role in the violent Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol by supporters who aimed to upend congressional certification of former President Joe Biden’s 2020 election victory. Trump was acquitted by the Senate.
But since the start of Trump’s second term 15 months ago, Cassidy has been supportive of the president’s agenda and his nominees.
If no candidate cracks 50% of the primary vote, the top two finishers will face off for the nomination in a June 27 runoff election.
Another major test comes three days later, on May 19, in the primary in Kentucky’s 4th Congressional District, where Rep. Thomas Massie is facing a challenge from Trump-backed Ed Gallrein.
Massie has long been one of Trump’s most vocal GOP critics in Congress, repeatedly taking aim at the president over the Epstein files and foreign policy.
Trump allies have spent big bucks to boost Gallrein, a former Navy SEAL, and to take aim at Massie.
The president’s endorsement is also being tested in Georgia’s GOP gubernatorial nomination, which is being held on the same day, in the 2026 race to succeed popular term-limited conservative Gov. Brian Kemp.
Trump has endorsed Lt. Gov. Burt Jones, who is trading fire in a high-profile, competitive and combustible battle with healthcare executive and mega GOP donor Rick Jackson, who has infused millions of his own money in his bid. Among the others battling for the nomination in a crowded Republican field are state Attorney General Chris Carr and Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger.
While MAGA enjoyed a big night in Indiana, there were more midterm warning signs for the GOP in neighboring Michigan, a key Midwestern battleground state.
Republicans were hoping to flip a Democrat-controlled vacant state Senate seat in a special election, where the Democratic majority in the chamber was on the line.
But Republican candidate Jason Tunney was trounced by Democrat Chedrick Greene in the showdown in Michigan’s 35th Senate District, for a competitive seat in Midland and Saginaw in the central part of Michigan’s lower peninsula.
Greene’s victory was the latest overperformance by Democrats in special elections and off-year contests in the more than 15 months since Trump returned to the White House, energizing them as they work to flip the GOP majorities in the U.S. House and Senate in this autumn’s midterm elections.
