Indiana

How Indiana will be won

Keep an eye on northwest Indiana, where a small group of counties could make it a late night.

By Steven Shepard

If either of Tuesday’s presidential primaries in Indiana is closely contested, the nation's attention could turn to a small group of northwest Indiana counties located in the Central Time Zone, where polls will close an hour later than in the rest of the state.

And if that’s the case, prepare for a late night.

That was the case in 2008, when the Democratic primary wasn’t decided until the overnight hours, as vote-rich Lake County failed to report results of the race between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama for hours.

The episode led to an ugly, televised confrontation between the mayors of the county’s two largest cities: Hammond Mayor Tom McDermott, a Clinton supporter, accused then-Gary Mayor Rudy Clay of withholding vote totals from his city in order to benefit Obama, whom Clay had endorsed.

“Release the numbers, Mayor Clay, because this is ridiculous. It's midnight,” McDermott said on CNN shortly after 1 a.m. Eastern time after the primary. (Polls close in Indiana at 6 p.m. local time.)

When all the votes were finally tallied Obama ended up with 57 percent of the Lake County vote — not enough to overtake Clinton’s narrow statewide margin.

Elections officials that year blamed a system that mixed voting machines with paper ballots for the delay in reporting results.

Lake County was Obama Country in 2008, but this time around the overwhelmingly Democratic county is expected to favor Clinton in her race with Bernie Sanders. That's no small matter: Only one other county in the state produced more votes in the 2008 primary. Roughly one-in-ten Democratic primary votes in 2008 came from Lake County, compared to just about 3 percent of the statewide GOP primary vote.

Still, as a result of the GOP delegate allocation system — each of the state’s nine congressional districts will award three delegates to the winner — whichever Republican wins Lake County is likely to carry Indiana’s 1st District.

Statewide, on the Democratic side, the Clinton-Obama race is instructive — though Clinton is seeking to retain her support in southern Indiana while also winning black voters in Lake County and the Indianapolis area. Bernie Sanders hopes to peel off some of those 2008 Clinton voters, combined with college-age Hoosiers at Indiana University and the state’s other universities.

Few analogs exist for this GOP race — the last time the Indiana Republican presidential primary was contested to this degree was 1976 (Ronald Reagan defeated then-President Gerald Ford in Indiana that year). But Donald Trump is hoping a split field delivers him victories in the congressional districts around Indianapolis, along with polls that show him strong in southern Indiana.

Ted Cruz, on the other hand, is hoping to win the socially conservative corners of the state, in addition to courting establishment voters near Indianapolis who would have supported John Kasich before the tenuous Cruz-Kasich alliance was forged to challenge Trump in Indiana.

Here are six other places to watch as results trickle in Tuesday evening — and possibly Wednesday morning:

Marion County: The state’s most populous county includes Indianapolis and its immediate suburbs — and it accounted for about 15 percent of the vote in the 2008 Democratic primary and 12 percent in the 2012 Republican primary.

Driven by African-American voters in Indianapolis, Obama carried 67 percent of the vote in Marion County in 2008. But many of these voters could back Clinton.

In the Republican primary, most of the county sits within the solidly Democratic 7th District, where relatively few voters will decide which candidate wins three delegates.

Hamilton County: Just north and west of Marion County is Hamilton, anchored by Carmel and Fishers, the state’s fifth- and sixth-largest cities. It’s also the center of the state’s GOP establishment: Despite losing statewide by a wide margin, then-Sen. Dick Lugar ran neck-and-neck with tea party favorite Richard Mourdock here in the nationally-watched 2012 Senate primary.

Hamilton is entirely contained within the 5th District, which continues running out from Indianapolis to the north and west, but also includes Marion County’s northern suburbs.

The 5th District is an establishment-friendly seat — but it figures to be Cruz’s best chance is if voters choose strategically and pick him over Kasich.

Hamilton was Obama territory in the 2008 Democratic primary: The then-Illinois senator won 61 percent of the vote here.

Allen County: Fort Wayne, with a population of roughly 258,000, is the state’s second-largest city. And the 3rd District, which includes Allen County and the entire northeast corner of the state, is Indiana’s most Republican.

Both Trump and Cruz are courting voters in this area: Trump held a rally here on Sunday, and Cruz followed with a visit on Monday.

Cruz isn’t the only underdog counting on the 3rd District on Tuesday: Republican Rep. Marlin Stutzman is vacating his reliably red House seat to run for Senate. Trailing fellow Rep. Todd Young in the polls, Stutzman needs a big turnout in his home district to have a shot at winning the GOP nomination.

St. Joseph County: St. Joseph County is home to South Bend — the state’s fourth largest city — and Notre Dame, the nation’s most famous Catholic university.

South Bend is in the 2nd District, which appears to be a battleground between Trump and Cruz.

St. Joseph County was battleground territory in the 2008 Democratic primary, narrowly tilting to Obama. Mourdock carried it by a margin roughly equal to his statewide advantage in the 2012 Senate primary.

Monroe County: Sanders needs to win big in Bloomington, home to Indiana University, the state’s largest college.

Obama won 65 percent of the vote in Monroe County, even as Clinton won all the bordering counties, including some by nearly two-to-one margins.

In the GOP contest, Monroe is part of the expansive 9th District — another possible Trump-Cruz battleground.

Trump is backed by former Indiana University basketball coach Bobby Knight — famed in this basketball-crazy state for his intensity, and fired by the school after 29 seasons in 2000 after Knight confronted a student who called him “Knight,” without the honorific “Mister” or “Coach.”

Clark County: Clark County sits just across the Ohio River from Louisville, Ky. — and this was Clinton Country in 2008. Clinton won a resounding 68 percent of the vote in Clark County.

Nearly nine-in-10 residents of Clark County are white, and they are a prime Sanders target. But if Clinton can hold large segments of the vote here and combine them with black voters in the cities, she can make it harder for Sanders to overtake her statewide.

Campaigning in the Louisville area is also a two-fer for Clinton and Sanders: Kentucky Democrats will go to the polls two weeks later (Republicans held a caucus in March).