Four years of serving as the last elected Indiana superintendent of public instruction - as a Republican - hasn’t been Jennifer McCormick’s only public service.
The Democratic Party’s candidate for Indiana governor also served as a teacher, administrator and local school superintendent, which she reminded her opponent, Republican U.S. Sen. Mike Braun, of that during the final governor’s debate on Thursday. The debate also featured Libertarian Donald Rainwater.
In an interview Friday evening at Starbucks in Warsaw, McCormick said she felt really confident in her performance in the debates and won all three.
“I think that’s an example of how people are appreciating - Republicans, Democrats and independents - that we’re staying true to the issues that they’re worried about,” she said.
Explaining why she switched parties from Republican to Democratic, McCormick said, “So when I ran in 2016, I’ve always been fiscally conservative. I’ve always been, as an educator, telling kids and adults that character mattered. I’ve always been very concerned about individuals and families and communities. I grew up in a very philanthropic home and school community where everybody took care of everybody and it was the community spirit.”
She said it was her values that initially took her into that position but also why she changed her party.
“I didn’t change my values. The people that voted for me in ’16, I am the same person. I’m committed to kids and family and community, and character still matters. Still fiscally conservative, but the (Republican) party has just gone so far that it’s unrecognizable,” she stated.
If McCormick and her lieutenant governor candidate, Dr. Terry Goodin, are elected on Nov. 5, she will be the first Democrat Indiana governor since Joe Kernan 20 years ago.
“So for me, it was about staying true to my values. I’m a mom, I was an educator beforehand, so I’m never going to put a political party over my values or over my family or over others. It’s about people. To me it wasn’t about moving from one to the other, winning and losing, it was about making sure I stay true to my values,” she said.
After 20 years of one-party rule with the Republicans in Indiana, McCormick said many of their policies have been very difficult to implement and really hard on traditional public schools.
She said, “$1.6 billion has gone away from our traditional public schools into privatization, and sometimes that means with very little if no accountability. And so, for education, it’s been tough.”
The Covid pandemic starting in 2020 wasn’t kind to education. “But then you take away the resources from 90% of our kids and our families, and it’s hard because you still have to deliver those services. I also am a firm believer that literacy - we need to focus on literacy - but that doesn’t start when they walk in the doors in kindergarten.”
McCormick said the states that are doing it well are really focusing on childcare and universal pre-k, not just for school readiness but also for economic development because of making sure employees can get to work.
“That’s a win-win, but Indiana just hasn’t taken the aggressive steps that a lot of states have taken,” she said.
After high school, students must decide whether they want to continue their education at a college, a trade school or go directly into the workforce. Republicans are pushing kids away from the importance of education, McCormick said.
“So I’m a firm believer that you’ve got to get through K-12 and have a rigorous and well-rounded education, whether you’re going into skilled trades or whether you’re going into the military or two-year, four-year, four-year-plus institution,” she said. “You’ve got to have a rigorous and well-rounded education. So my fear is the state’s de-emphasizing the need for further education and a well-rounded high school experience.”
Regardless of what a student does after high school, they need to have some academic transferable skills.
In Braun’s campaign ads against McCormick, they accuse her of being a crazy liberal who wants to ban gas stoves.
McCormick said, “I think it’s amazing because I got over 1 million votes in 2016 and I was very proud because I got a lot of votes compared to a lot of the statewides and I ran as a Republican. Again, I’m the same person, same values, but now I have a proven track record that I can get things done. We did amazing work as a team at the Department of Education and I believe your local schools and your superintendents and teachers would tell you that.”
She said it’s interesting that the same person the Republicans once celebrated in 2016 as a party is now calling her “liberal.”
“It really goes back to putting the pressure on someone to define that. What does that means? So if I’m a woke liberal, there are a lot of Republicans that are woke liberal, or those who have decided to switch parties. It’s nonsensical, it’s kind of silly. But it’s politics so that’s what happens in a campaign when you’ve got nothing else. And they know I’ve got a proven track record and I’ve got a lot of great bipartisan support so they start making stuff up. That’s what’s happening,” she said.
McCormick doesn’t care what kind of stove someone uses.
One of the biggest issues nationally in this election cycle since Roe v. Wade was overturned in June 2022 by the U.S. Supreme Court is abortion.
“For 50 years, Roe stood as a standard, and I would support returning back to Roe and so would the majority of Hoosiers. And it’s not just women, it’s also men, but I trust women, I trust our healthcare providers to make decisions that are very complex and very difficult,” she said, noting that she’s been pregnant and had one live birth and her son is thankfully healthy now. “But I’ve had a lot of friends and family that their pregnancies did not go well, and given the new law today, they would have to leave the state of Indiana or they would have to risk their lives. And, we’ve already had women die in Indiana, we’ve had many of their lives put at risk. My opponent, just last night, said it was a ‘good product.’ The extreme abortion ban was a ‘good product.’ And to define the extreme abortion ban as a good product is beyond insulting, but it also tells you a lot about his viewpoint on women and our healthcare providers.”
Later in the conversation, she added, “I think it’s important for people to know that my opponent’s ticket has mentioned that they want to carve out rape and incest as exemptions, which is beyond scary. They also are looking at birth control and IVF as far as going after the access to that for Hoosiers. So I think there’s a lot of misinformation on that regarding what will happen, what won’t happen, but they just have to go look at their comments and it’s frightening.”
Another issue that McCormick has talked to a lot of healthcare providers on, as well as people who are struggling, particularly veterans who are struggling with PTSD and cancer survivors and people with Parkinson’s disease, is the legalization of marijuana.
“They’re wanting it for medical purposes and every state around us is legalizing to some level and we are losing a lot of money consistently,” she said. “Here, Hoosiers are using, they’re just bringing it across state lines where it’s not legal and they’re put at risk.”
McCormick’s campaign has put out a common sense legalization of cannabis plan. “And it’s been very well received by over 90% of Hoosiers who are, the polls show us they want it legalized. And a lot of research from our universities show it.”
She said efforts to legalize cannabis would start out with having a commission, who would start with medical use to make sure the state has a well-regulated industry. Then it would go into adult use.
“We’re talking around $170 million revenue, and that’s conservative, eventually, to bring into Indiana, for a lot of different reasons - our roads, our schools, our police, you name it. And then we’re also looking at hundreds, if not thousands, of jobs that would be on the line,” she said.
The commission would work with law enforcement, agriculture, business and industry to make sure it’s being done in a smart way.
Some of the other topics McCormick discussed during the 20-minute interview included her support for the U.S. 30 project that runs through Kosciusko County, the bi-annum budget in 2025, property tax relief for all Hoosiers and Medicaid.