Indiana House Republicans pick new leader after big election losses

The Republican lawmaker who led the Indiana congressional redistricting push last year was picked Wednesday as the next leader for the state House of Representatives.

A drastically reduced Republican House majority elected Rep. Ben Smaltz of Auburn as speaker-elect — a day after House Speaker Todd Huston lost reelection and Democrats picked up an apparent 16 seats in the chamber.

That election outcome ends the two-thirds supermajority House control Republicans held since the 2012 elections and reduces what was a 70-30 GOP margin to an expected 54-46.

Smaltz emerged from a 3-½ hour private meeting of House Republicans indicating they would still set the legislative agenda.

“We have a good working relationship with the Democrats. I always have had that,” Smaltz told reporters. “We’re still in the majority. We’re still going to operate like a body in the majority.”

Smaltz called Tuesday’s election results “terribly disappointing” for legislative Republicans and pointed to “a lot of national headwinds that we are dealing with.”

“We’re going to be committed to doing what we are sent here to do,” he said. “We’re sent here by the Hoosiers that want a better life, that want things to be affordable, and that want high-paying jobs, that want a strong economy. And we’re going to focus on that.”

Along with Smaltz in top House positions, Rep. Matt Lehman of Berne will continue as majority leader. Rep. Jake Teshka of North Liberty was picked as majority caucus chair, replacing Rep. Greg Steuerwald of Avon after he also lost his reelection bid.

House Democrats were jubilant with their sizable gains, which gave them their most House seats since they lost the majority with the 2010 elections.

Democratic Leader Phil GiaQuinta of Fort Wayne said Wednesday they would now have “more leverage” on legislation and hoped to see Republicans reaching across the aisle rather than working “on the extremes.”

“When it comes to figuring out ways to lower costs for utilities, healthcare, funding of our schools, and things like that, I do think that we’re going to work together to get that stuff done,” he said. “I also think it’s probably, frankly, a wake-up call that this is what Hoosiers want. So it’s time to come together to work to get things done.”

Smaltz is poised to be formally elected as speaker during the Legislature’s Organization Day on Nov. 17 ahead of the next session beginning in early January.

The House speaker presides over the chamber’s floor sessions, but also appoints committee chairs and leads the party’s legislative agenda.

Smaltz was first elected to the House in 2012 — so he has never served in the chamber without a Republican supermajority allowing them to take action even if  Democrats were not present.

Smaltz was a top lieutenant to Huston as the House Rules Committee chair for the past four years. He previously spent six years as leader of the House Public Policy Committee, which prominently handles gambling and alcohol-related legislation.

Smaltz was in the middle of last year’s Republican push to follow President Donald Trump’s call for mid-decade congressional redistricting in hopes of improving the GOP’s chances of holding its U.S. House majority.

He was the House author of the bill redrawing Indiana’s congressional maps that included carving up two Democratic-held districts with the aim of engineering a 9-0 Republican sweep of the state’s seats.

He acknowledged the proposed districts as “politically gerrymandered” as the plan cleared the House over unanimous Democratic objections.

The proposal failed in the Senate, leading to Trump supporting a political revenge campaign against Republican senators who voted against the plan. 

Smaltz said Wednesday that the success of cooperation rested with the Democrats.

“That’s going to be up to them,” he said. “I mean, they’re going to have to accept us for who we are and we’re going to accept them for who they are.”

When asked whether congressional redistricting could return as an issue for the next legislative session, Smaltz replied: “I’m not sure that’s an issue that’s important to Hoosiers right now, and we’re focused on doing what’s important for them.”