by Casey Smith
In night two of back-to-back debates, Indiana’s three candidates for governor shared the same stage for the first time. While some of the topics had previously been discussed at length, questions around private school vouchers and government restructuring drew novel responses from the trio.
This round, Republican Mike Braun and Democrat Jennifer McCormick were joined by Libertarian Donald Rainwater.
Braun and McCormick sparred in the first general election gubernatorial debate Wednesday evening, but Rainwater did not meet the standards set by Fox59 and CBS4 to appear.
Thursday’s debate, which aired live from the WISH-TV studios in downtown Indianapolis, lasted one hour. It took place just days before early voting is set to begin in the Hoosier state.
Moderators additionally asked about property taxes, immigration, abortion, marijuana legalization, workforce preparedness and affordable housing.
While the Democrat and Libertarian teamed up to criticize Braun’s voting record on immigration in the U.S. Senate, a question about Indiana’s private school voucher system also pitted candidates against one another.
McCormick, specifically, was also targeted by her competitors over her tenure as Indiana’s superintendent of public instruction — a role she held from 2016 to 2020 when she previously identified as a Republican.
Even so, both McCormick and Braun declared victory at the debate’s conclusion. Both candidates made the same claim the night before.
Public vs. private education
Braun, who lists “universal school choice” high among his platform points, emphasized that Indiana “has been on the leading edge of choice and competition … where we’re putting the parent as the main stakeholder in his or her kid’s education.
“That’s the way it should be. When you have one-size-fits-all, it’s called a monopoly,” he said, adding that while his family has access to a “great public school district,” not all Hoosiers have “that same advantage.”At one point, Braun additionally pointed to public schools in southern Indiana’s Pike County, which he criticized for previous financial mismanagement. The solution, he said, was a charter school. Charters, however, are not private schools.
Rainwater wasn’t far off, saying that he’s “been around long enough to know our public school system is failing.” The Libertarian made clear he believes “thoroughly” in universal school choice.
McCormick refuted.
“We have a lot of people in Indiana who profess to be education experts, and it’s unfortunate, because I believe in fiscal responsibility, and I believe we’re going to have a program that puts $1.6 billion into private education,” she said, referring to Indiana’s Choice Scholarship program. “We should be looking at the results, and the results aren’t good. Also, make no mistake, this is not about parents choosing. This is about a school choosing.”
McCormick said in particular that private schools’ admission policies should be scrutinized, given that voucher schools are allowed to reject students for their religion, disability, sexual orientation, gender identity, or academic ability, among other reasons.
She also called out the current income ceiling for voucher-seeking families — raised in 2023 to roughly $220,000 for a four-person household — saying a limit that high “is certainly not serving Hoosiers.”
“If I show up with a child, and the school does not like the academic performance or the color of their skin, or how they identify — LGBTQ — or their religious belief, they do not have to take them,” she continued. “Our state constitution is clear. It says to fund common schools, which are determined to be public schools. Public dollars need to go to public schools. That whole program needs to be reviewed.”
Her comments led Braun and Rainwater to attack her previous work overseeing Indiana’s educational performance.
“If you were in charge for four years and results never got any better, I think you’ve got to be held accountable when that’s the one thing you did in state government,” Braun said of McCormick.
Rainwater alleged that standardized testing protocols McCormick set — and changed — during her time in office were a “waste of time.”
But McCormick pushed back, saying was not responsible for setting rules, but rather was tasked with implementing Republican policies.
“I wasn’t the one responsible to change the state law to make us keep changing standards and keep changing assessments,” McCormick said. “That’s not fair, and it’s not accurate. That’s on the 20 years of Republicans leading our state.”
Thoughts on reducing administrative government
Opinions later swirled around ideas to restructure and reduce funding for Indiana’s governmental agencies.
“I’m guessing there’s not an agency there that doesn’t have room to be run more efficiently,” Braun said. “For me, I did that for 37 years in a small business — scaling it into a regional and then a national company. That will be easy to do. We’ll find those things to reduce costs and actually make them run more efficiently.”
Braun’s response prompted McCormick to take on Braun’s touted record as a business owner.
She called out past issues of unpaid overtime to workers at Meyer Distributing, Braun’s Jasper-based autopart distribution. It’s been a talking point for Democrats since Braun ran for U.S. Senate in 2018.
At the time, the Associated Press reported that “lawsuits filed against his companies — backed up by federal trucking and labor records — present a picture of a boss who has overworked and underpaid employees.”
“It’s super interesting that Mr. Braun keeps bringing up his business as an example of how he successfully did it, when he had problems with overtime wages that everybody knew about, ” McCormick said. “But for me, it’s about efficiency and effectiveness and making sure that we are being due diligent with taxpayer dollars.”
Rainwater pointed to his 25 years as a software engineer, during which he contracted with “several” state agencies.
“We need to look at our state government, all 50 some agencies, and we need to identify where we are managing contracts badly, where overpayments exist, where the money is going out the back door, so that we can then determine what we need to do from there,” Rainwater said.
McCormick doubled down that she’s “the only candidate who’s been in charge of a state agency.”
“That experience will serve me well when I am reviewing and making those decisions about state agencies,” she said. “We’ve got a lot of great people in the state of Indiana that work in those state agencies, and they have great ideas. Why would we not listen to them and say to bring some practical solutions to the table, and let’s get some savings for Hoosiers?”
In a final rebuttal, Rainwater maintained that “unfortunately, someone may have years of experience, but when they’ve never actually fixed anything, that concerns me.”
The deadline for Hoosiers to register to vote is Oct. 7. One’s voter registration status can be checked online at indianavoters.in.gov.
