Attorney General Todd Rokita declared victory in his reelection bid early Tuesday night. (IBJ photo/Mickey Shuey)
By Alexa Shrake, Indiana Lawyer
Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita claimed victory in his bid for re-election shortly before 7:30 Tuesday night at the GOP Watch Party at the JW Marriott.
However, his Democratic opponent Destiny Wells has not conceded. At the time of Rokita’s announcement, about 15% of the vote had been counted and he had 62% compared with Wells’ 38%. Significant vote totals from Democratic strongholds in Lake, Marion and Monroe counties had yet to be counted.
With 22% of the vote counted, Rokita had 64% to Wells’ 36%.
Attorney General Todd Rokita declared victory in his reelection bid early Tuesday night. (IBJ photo/Mickey Shuey)“My opponent spent hundreds of thousands of dollars running false negative TV ads and radio ads. She’s part of the far left of the state, which does exist in Indiana,” Rokita said Tuesday night. “I am proud to tell you my fellow Republicans that I did not run a negative campaign.”
“The people of Indiana have rejected this push to the left, and because of this overwhelming vote tonight, I will continue to put us first, to put Indiana first,” Rokita said.
Wells’ spent much of the campaign reminding voters of Rokita’s frequent diversion into social issues, especially abortion, that she believes stretches the bounds of the office.
Among Rokita’s recent efforts have been: a call for the federal government to help investigate the citizenship of 585,000 registered Hoosier voters; an advisory opinion that says the Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission is duty-bound to prevent the closure of coal-powered power plants until a utility finds a “dispatchable” replacement power source; suing some local communities over their “sanctuary city” policies; joining a lawsuit with 14 other states to challenge federal protections for transgender care; and issuing an advisory opinion that says neither state nor federal law requires the usage of preferred pronouns in the workplace.
Rokita’s biggest hot-button controversy came in 2022 when he strongly criticized OB-GYN Caitlin Bernard for publicly discussing a medication abortion she performed on a 10-year-old rape victim, who was forced to come to Indiana for the treatment because her home state of Ohio prohibited it at that time.
In an interview with Fox News, Rokita called Bernard an “activist acting as a doctor” and said his office would be investigating her.
Rokita was publicly reprimanded by the Indiana Supreme Court for the comments, which the court said had “no substantial purpose other than to embarrass or burden” Bernard.
The court later unsealed the conditional agreement with Rokita which contained the reprimand.
That decision came after the state disciplinary commission complained that Rokita’s statements following the reprimand were inconsistent with what he committed to in the conditional agreement.
If elected, this would be Rokita’s second term as attorney general. While in office, Rokita said has attained a 94% success rate in keeping criminals behind bars and collected a record $1 billion from corporate wrongdoers over three years.
In 2020, Rokita led all Republicans on the statewide ticket, drawing more than 17 million votes. Rokita has never lost a general election.
He was first elected to public office as Indiana secretary of state in 2002 and served two terms. He then was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives where he served for eight years until he lost the primary for U.S. Senate to Gov. Mike Braun in 2018.
