Nine candidates are running in the Republican primary for Indiana’s 9th Congressional District on May 3, 2022. Incumbent Trey Hollingsworth (R), first elected in 2016, is not running for re-election.
The Indianapolis Star’s Kaitlen Lange said the Republican primary is “poised to be the most watched and one of the most hotly-contested primaries in Indiana” as the 9th Congressional District is the only open congressional district seat in the state.
Media attention has focused on candidates J. Michael Davisson, Erin Houchin, and Mike Sodrel.
Davisson is an Army veteran who has represented Indiana’s House District 73 since Oct. 28, 2021, when he was appointed to complete the term of the former incumbent — his father, Rep. Steve Davisson — who died in office. Davisson said he was running “to combat the liberal one-party rule stranglehold that’s currently allowing Washington to destroy our economy, take away our jobs, and allowing socialism to undermine the future of Southern Indiana.”
Houchin represented District 47 in the Indiana State Senate from 2014 to Feb. 4, 2022, when she resigned. Houchin said, “My conservative record demonstrates that the 9th District can count on me to stand up to the radical Left and the Biden agenda that has led to disastrous issues at our southern border, the highest inflation in 40 years, and a liberal laundry list for more spending that the country cannot afford.” Houchin previously ran for the seat in the 2016 Republican primary. In that primary, Trey Hollingsworth defeated Houchin and three other candidates.
Sodrel represented Indiana’s 9th Congressional District for one term from 2005 to 2007 and was the Republican nominee for the seat in 2002, 2004, 2006, and 2008. Sodrel said, “I am not running to create a political career. Like our current Representative, Trey Hollingsworth, I believe in term limits. I am not a career politician. I have only run for one office in my life. This is the place I believe I can best serve God and country today.”
Also running in the primary are Jim Baker, Stu Barnes-Israel, Dan Heiwig, D. Eric Schansberg, Bill Thomas, and Brian Tibbs. As of Feb. 2022, the three race-rating outlets considered the general election as Solid or Likely Republican.
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