INDIANAPOLIS — Similar to Indiana’s first district, residents of the Indiana second district will get the chance to choose whether or not an incumbent will serve in the U.S. House of Representatives.
In the state’s second district, U.S. Rep. Rudy Yakym, R-Ind. District 2 is running for reelection as the district’s Republican nominee, while Lori Camp, a newcomer, is running as the district’s Democratic nominee.
Before November’s election, look below at the platforms of each of the second district candidates and what they believe makes them stand out in this particular race.
Lori Camp
This is the first time that Lori Camp, the Democratic candidate for Indiana’s second congressional district seat in the U.S. House of Representatives, has run for office. Camp told FOX59/CBS4 that it was a last-minute decision.
“I actually really had no intention to, but saw that my opponent was running unopposed,” she said. “Voting is very important in my family. My mom took me when I was young and I’ve been taking my daughter since she was in her baby carrier. So, when I saw no one was running, I was like ‘someone should run.’”
Camp, as a Democrat who is a lifelong resident of South Bend, feels that throughout his time in Congress, he has “been riding on the coattails of (former President Donald J. Trump.)”
“To me, that’s not right,” she said. “There is nothing in their policies that helps regular people and I am a regular person who hasn’t felt represented. That was what was in the back of my mind the whole time.”
Ultimately, Camp said she believes the government should work for the people, not special interests.
“People really are tired of the cruelty and the uginess of the other side,” she said. “I talk a lot about how I want to bring back bipartisanship, kind of like we used to have in Indiana… We’d like to see civility. We’d like to see work done.”
Some of the issues that Camp has focused on during her campaign include:
- Protecting women’s rights
- This includes the goal of codifying Roe v. Wade into law
- Protecting democracy
- This includes supporting the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act and a federal ban on gerrymandering
- Ending LGBTQ+ discrimination
- This includes enshrining anti-discrimination protections into federal law and passing the Every Child Deserves a Family act.
- Honoring Veterans
- This includes supporting funding and accessibility for the VA and ensuring the GI bill adequately covers educational expenses
- Protecting social security
- This includes changing or removing the current social security tax income cap, adjusting the cost of living formula and other common sense reforms.
- Health care
- This includes providing efficient and affordable mental and emotional healthcare, strengthen healthcare protections and improve affordability
- Jobs and infrastructure
- This includes legislation to tackle anticompetitive overreach by large corporations and support for further investment into infrastructure
- Immigration
- This includes the support for the bipartisan immigration reform bill of 2024, expediting the asylum claims process and allotting more federal dollars to the Customs and Border Protection agency
- Climate Change
- This includes the expansion of the environmental quality incentives program and the conservation stewardship program.
Camp said that even if she doesn’t win in November, she expects to run for the position again in the future.
“A lot of people don’t win the first time. Yes, we’re all in,” she said. “We do not want to go back to the policies of my opponent. We will keep pressing forward and doing all that we can to make sure that what Congress is doing, actually what all government is doing, is lifting people up and writing policies that are good for both the constituents in the second district and the people of our nation.”
U.S. Rep. Rudy Yakym, R-District 2
U.S. Rep. Rudy Yakym, R-Ind. District 2, is running for reelection for the position after he was first elected in November 2022 after U.S. Rep. Jackie Walorski died in a car crash in Elkhart County in August 2022.
Yakym first announced his bid for reelection to the position in January, according to previous reports. Yakym was a political ally of Walorski and worked for Kem Krest, an Elkhart distribution company.
Through his time in the U.S. House of Representatives, Yakym, a fourth-generation Hoosier who currently lives in Granger, said on his campaign website that has been a “driving force in shaping policies that reflect the values and aspirations” of the state’s second district.
As a Congressman, Yakym has served on the House Committee on the Budget as well as the House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure, according to his congressional webpage.
“As your Congressman, I have witnessed firsthand the broken state of affairs in Washington, D.C.,” Yakym said on his campaign website. “Our nation’s capital has become a cesspool of partisan gridlock, bureaucratic overreach and a general disconnect from the needs and values of the American people.
Yakym said that throughout his political career, he has “remained steadfast” in conservative principles and his commitment to “limited government, individual liberty and fiscal responsibility.”
“I firmly believe that government should be accountable, transparent, and focused on its core responsibilities,” he said. “It is my mission to cut through the red tape, dismantle unnecessary regulations and streamline government agencies to ensure they operate efficiently and effectively. We must restore the proper balance between federal and state powers, allowing for greater local control and decision-making. It is time to put America first, restore accountability, and build a stronger, more prosperous future for all Americans.”
Some of the issues that Yakym has focused on during his campaign, as well as through his time in the U.S. House of Representatives, include:
- Shrinking the bloated federal bureaucracy
- Restoring fiscal responsibility
- Ensuring veterans receive the care and benefits they have earned
- Supporting agriculture producers and getting government out of the way
- Providing for a strong national defense and paying for the tools and resources they need
- Fight to uphold and defend the second amendment
- Other issues including:
- Border security and immigration
- Energy
- Transportation and infrastructure
- Economy and jobs.
FOX59/CBS4 reached out to Yakym’s reelection campaign but they did not return the request for comment by this story’s publication date. This story will be updated if the request for comment is returned.
