Here's who's challenging Rep. André Carson in Indiana's 7th Congressional District

Most of the candidates running in the Indianapolis-based 7th Congressional District, which Rep. André Carson has held very comfortably for 16 years, know the odds are stacked against them.

They aren't even trying to raise money, for the most part, knowing it's a rich person's game to beat a longstanding incumbent. But they at least want to give voters some choice.

"The point is, this is a democracy, people need a choice, and if you think you can do a better job, you should show up and run," said Pierre Pullins, a 58-year-old army veteran who's challenged Carson in the Democratic primary every election since Carson's first.

Carson has two primary election opponents, Pullins and 66-year-old Curtis Godfrey, also an army veteran who has challenged Carson in multiple elections. Neither have any money or even a Federal Election Campaign filing to their names, but Hoosiers will find their names on the Democratic ballot nonetheless.

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There's a three-way race for the Republican nomination, including a candidate who came within 13 points of Carson in the 2014 general election. Most of them have a key criticism in common: They don't feel Carson has much to show for his nine terms in office.

"He’s had plenty of time to do stuff for the people of his district," said Catherine Ping, a 66-year-old army veteran who was the 2014 Republican nominee.

In defending his record, Carson cited various bills he voted for or cosponsored, from capping the price of insulin to the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act outlawing chokeholds and no-knock warrants. But his most tangible and important impact, he said, is in bringing home federal dollars to Hoosiers in the form of budget appropriations and grants, including for transportation projects like IndyGo's bus rapid transit. Those federal dollars total $800 million over his time in office, he said.

"I’m proud of what I’ve accomplished ― especially working across the aisle with different presidents and a divided Congress," he said in a written email response. He campaign said he was unavailable for an interview by the deadline.

The Democratic primary

Pullins and Godfrey each have very specific reasons to want to provide voters an alternative to Carson, who first entered office through a special election in 2007 when his grandmother, Julia Carson, died and left the seat empty.

Pullins first ran against Julia Carson in 2006, and has repeatedly accused local and state election officials of tampering with vote tallies over the years ― he eventually sued the Marion County Election Board and Indiana Election Division in 2020 and appealed the case up to a federal appeals court, which affirmed the district court's decision to dismiss the case.

His dissatisfaction with the elections has been one source of fuel to keep running. The other one, which has become most relevant this year, is Carson's voting record with respect to the Israel-Hamas war.

In the early days of the war, Carson was one of 10 House members who voted against a bipartisan resolution backing Israel and condemning Hamas. He said on the House floor that he felt the resolution was "one-sided" and failed to acknowledge the loss of Palestinian lives, while clarifying that he does condemn Hamas.

More recently, to Pullins' dismay, Carson was one of 44 representatives who voted against a resolution declaring the phrase “from the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” as antisemitic.

"His last vote is truly telling about who we have representing the 7th congressional district, and I think we can do better," Pullins said. "That’s not what the 7th congressional district ought to be about. Our Jewish friends, they need support."

Indeed, the Indianapolis Jewish Community Relations Council has for years criticized Carson for his votes relating to the Middle East conflict.

"We have made our positions repeatedly clear to him, in our advocacy and in conversations throughout his time in Congress, yet we feel dismissed," the JCRC wrote in a statement in July.

Carson said he supports a peaceful two-state solution and a ceasefire in Gaza. Nearly 70% of Americans support the idea of a ceasefire, according to a Reuters/Ipsos poll; more recently, a Gallup poll in March found 55% of Americans disapprove of Israel's military action in Gaza, up from 45% in November.

"I stand against antisemitism, Islamophobia, anti-Blackness, and discrimination in all forms," he wrote. "The United States has a responsibility to stand up to human rights abuses. I join activists in my district and leaders from all faiths in saying the United States cannot condone or fund the killing and forced starvation of 34,000 people abroad."

Godfrey, a commander with the National Association for Black Veterans, has run against Carson in 2016, 2018 and 2022. Godfrey's motivation stems from a bill that he advocated for in 2014 that would make sure the government pays out any accrued benefits of a deceased veteran to their family members. Godfrey says he first tried to work with Carson on the bill, but without success, turned to the late Rep. Jackie Walorski, who ended up cosponsoring the bill with Florida Rep. Jeff Miller. Carson signed onto the bill two months after it was introduced.

Carson's spokesperson Caroline Ellert said Carson's office has worked with hundreds of veterans a year, including Godfrey, to ensure they receive benefits owed to them. She also pointed to his 2022 vote for the PACT Act, an expansion of benefits for veterans who were exposed to toxic substances.

Nonetheless, Godfrey wants to work to get that 2014 bill, which never passed committee, across the finish line.

"To finish that job, I’ve got to start it," he said.

He also says he's "baffled" by the billions the United States is sending to assist Israel while thousands of Palestinians are dying in Gaza without adequate humanitarian assistance.

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Pullins' and Godfrey's uphill battle cannot be overstated, however. The two garnered 6% of the vote, collectively, in the 2022 primary. Neither have raised money, while Carson has raised nearly $450,000. That's not a good enough reason, though, to not try, Pullins said.

"A lot of people look at it and say it’s too hard. It can’t happen," he said. "Well, if you take that attitude, it’s not going to happen."

A Wild West Republican primary

Meanwhile, there have have been some atypical developments on the Republican side.

Twenty-six-year-old Gabe Whitley, who nicknames himself "Honest Gabe," has garnered the most attention in recent years over his public feuds and lawsuits with local media personalities, and in this election cycle, with multiple questions about his donors and endorsements. He's also the only Republican candidate in the primary who's reported any fundraising.

During Whitley's run for Evansville mayor in 2022, WIBC host Rob Kendall sued him for allegedly calling him a pedophile. After he dropped his campaign in early 2023, the Evansville Courier and Press reported he had raised thousands from donors who say they've never heard from him. This year, in Whitley's run for Congress, Kendall's wife filed complaints with the Federal Election Commission alleging excessive campaign contributions and fraudulent donors. And, prominent veterans advocates have accused Whitley of concocting a fictional veterans organization to pledge an endorsement.

In Evansville, the local GOP blocked Whitley's bid to challenge Democratic state Rep. Ryan Hatfield in 2022 on grounds of the state's two-primary voting law, even though Republicans had no other options.

The Marion County GOP hasn't weighed in on Whitley's headline-grabbing campaign activity.

Whitley says he is an executive board member for a political consulting firm called "Save the USA," which doesn't have an online presence. He is slated to become a Marion County precinct committeeperson, since no one filed to run against him. He told IndyStar via email that he decided to run for Congress since Republicans asked him to because of his experience working on congressional campaigns.

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Of the $364,000 Whitley has reported to have raised, about $120,000 came from himself, and the vast majority of the rest came from out-of-state donors. Most of the $35,000 he's spent has gone to Save the USA.

There's another person, though, who hasn't made the headlines this year but came remarkably close to Carson's vote tally in the 2014 election: Ping.

The retired army lieutenant colonel first ran in 2008, then 2012, but only secured the Republican nomination in 2014 and 2016. In 2014, the year she came within 13 points of Carson in the general, she only spent $11,000 to Carson's $780,000.

It was draining. When she wasn't nearly as successful in the 2016 presidential year, she and her husband decided to retire.

"It’s really hard work when you don’t have the resources Carson does," she said. "I’m going to leave the field open for the rest of the youngsters."

But her thinking changed when she looked at the filings for the Republican race in the 7th District this year and realized they were either people she didn't know or people who didn't seem to have traction.

"We do not want the party to show up without a credible candidate for a U.S. congressional seat ― what an embarrassment," she said.

Jennifer Pace, another candidate who qualified for the ballot, died suddenly in early March of what her family believes was a heart attack. She was 59. Pace also ran for the nomination in 2022, earning 12% of the vote.

That leaves Whitley, Ping and 63-year-old Philip Davis, a retired postal service worker who last year ran for Beech Grove City Council.

He got his "butt whooped," as he describes it, but learned a valuable lesson about just how many voters are disengaged with what's going on in their local government. Looking at Congress, he sees a political machine that's gotten so far away from the business of governing that the founding fathers wrote about in the Federalist and Anti-Federalist papers.

"Everybody’s just looking at themselves," he said. "Nobody’s looking at the public and saying, do we really wanna spend 95 billion on the backs of our grandkids?" He's referring to the foreign aid package President Joe Biden signed into law Wednesday, which also included a ban on TikTok in the U.S. if the app doesn't divest from its Chinese parent company.

They realize the seat is almost guaranteed to stay a Democratic one, but Ping and Davis lament the fact that the local GOP has shown no interest in getting involved. Ping has been taking care of her ailing mother, who died recently, and hasn't had the time or money to get her message out.

"If I lose the primary, I’m not unfamiliar with losing an election. It’s not going to devastate me," she said. "I just hope that whoever the people do elect, it’s a real person who doesn’t have a marker in a grave, and the real person does right by the people and are not in it for themselves. We have enough politicians that are in it for themselves."

The election is May 7.

Contact IndyStar state government and politics reporter Kayla Dwyer at [email protected] or follow her on Twitter@kayla_dwyer17.

This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: Rep. André Carson faces perennial challengers and brow-raising GOP field