Several major election reform bills scaled back or fail to advance in Indiana Senate

Several major Indiana election reforms advanced by the Senate Elections Committee this session either failed to get approval by the full Senate or were significantly scaled back.

Those included bills to cut the state’s early in-person voting days in half, SB 284; force primary voters to register with political parties, SB 201; and move all city and town elections to presidential election years, SB 355.

Both the early voting days reduction and closed political primaries legislation did not come up for a vote on the Senate floor before the session’s first half deadline.

They would’ve faced a difficult road in the House, where Speaker Todd Huston (R-Fishers) said he doesn’t see the need for changes.

“I think our election laws have been good. I think our election laws have been well-regarded nationally. We seem to run good, efficient elections,” Huston said.

The Senate did send some significant election reforms to the House. The bill moving all local elections to presidential ballots now allows towns to opt out of the shift, and cities would have to opt in to move their elections at all.

READ MORE: Senate narrowly approves bill making school board races partisan; House version fails to advance
 

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Another bill, SB 287, would force school board races to become partisan. But Senate President Pro Tem Rodric Bray (R-Martinsville) said he knows that measure will be a challenging one in the opposite chamber.

“But these are some things that people think are important and we debate them and decide whether they can move forward,” Bray said.

The House had its own partisan school boards bill, HB 1230, which it did not bring up for a vote on the floor. And it debated legislation to move municipal elections to presidential election years, HB 1633, but turned the measure into a study on the issue.
 

Brandon is our Statehouse bureau chief. Contact him at bsmith@ipbs.org or follow him on Twitter at @brandonjsmith5.