06/08/2026
🚨I Voted for Blythe Potter. Here’s Why I’m Supporting Beau Bayh.
I’ve been biting my tongue for a while. Not because I don’t have an opinion. Anyone who followed my congressional campaign knows that’s never been a problem.
I’ve kept quiet because I genuinely respect the people involved.
Over the last year, I got to know both Blythe Potter and Beau Bayh. They both became friends of mine, and I spent a good amount of time with each of them at events across Indiana.
What made this decision difficult is that I wasn’t choosing between a friend and a stranger. I was choosing between two people I genuinely respect.
I got to know them beyond campaign speeches, social media posts, and political talking points. I got to see who they are when the cameras are off and the event is over.
I’m proud to call both of them my friends, and I have no doubt that if I picked up the phone and needed help, either one of them would answer.
That’s what made this decision difficult.
Blythe and I became friends during this campaign cycle, and the more I got to know her, the more I respected her. She brought energy, passion, and a fresh perspective to the race. More importantly, she made a lot of grassroots Democrats feel heard. There were a lot of people who felt overlooked, and Blythe gave many of them a voice.
That’s ultimately why I voted for her.
At the same time, there were things happening around the race that concerned me. Some of the rhetoric coming from supporters crossed lines I wasn’t comfortable with. Not everyone, obviously, but enough that I noticed. I saw Democrats attacking other Democrats in ways that felt personal, angry, and destructive.
On the other side, there were aspects of Beau’s campaign that gave me pause as well. There were donors connected to the campaign that I frankly wasn’t thrilled about. People have every right to ask questions about those relationships. I certainly did.
But when it came time to vote, I realized I couldn’t make my decision based on a donor, an endorsement, or the loudest voices on social media.
I had to evaluate the candidates themselves.
What I saw in Beau was steadiness. He wasn’t easily rattled. Even when he was taking incoming fire from every direction, he remained disciplined. I saw leadership.
What I saw in Blythe was courage, energy, and a willingness to challenge the status quo.
Most importantly, I saw two people who had both chosen a life of service. Both served their country. Both willingly stepped into the arena knowing they would be criticized, attacked, and scrutinized. Both deserve respect for that.
After weighing everything, I voted for Blythe Potter.
The delegates weighed everything and chose Beau Bayh.
That’s democracy.
And while I didn’t get the outcome I wanted, I respect the process enough to accept it.
What has bothered me isn’t the outcome.
I’m proud of both Blythe and Beau. They both ran strong campaigns. They both put themselves out there. They both earned my respect.
What has bothered me is the reaction.
Over the last several days, I’ve watched some Democrats threaten to withhold support or walk away from the party because they didn’t get the outcome they wanted.
And honestly, I think that reaction says something much bigger about why Democrats struggle in states like Indiana.
Before anyone gets upset, let me be clear.
Candidates should earn votes. Candidates should answer questions. Candidates should be challenged. Candidates should be held accountable. Nobody is entitled to anyone’s vote.
I understand that as well as anyone. I spent more than a year running for Congress. I knocked on more than 23,000 doors. I drove tens of thousands of miles across Indiana’s Sixth District. I poured my heart into that race.
And I lost.
It hurt. A lot.
But what I didn’t do was decide everyone else needed to lose too.
I didn’t decide democracy only mattered when it produced the outcome I wanted. I didn’t decide the voters were wrong. I didn’t decide the process was illegitimate.
I accepted the result and supported the nominee because this was never supposed to be about me.
That’s the part I think some people are forgetting.
The argument I keep hearing is that Beau Bayh is unacceptable.
Fine.
Let’s assume that’s true.
What happens next?
That’s the question nobody seems willing to answer.
If Beau Bayh loses in November, who wins?
A Republican.
That’s the reality of the election in front of us.
And every time I ask that question, I get everything except an answer. I get lectures about capitalism, donors, corruption, Israel, AIPAC, party insiders, and even distractions about grammar or whether I used AI.
What I don’t get is an answer.
Because the answer is uncomfortable.
Refusing to support the Democratic nominee doesn’t create a third option. It doesn’t build power. It doesn’t move the ball forward.
It simply changes the odds between the two outcomes that actually exist.
That isn’t ideology.
That’s math.
And before anyone argues that withholding support has no effect on the outcome, let’s be honest about how elections work.
When Democrats lose support and Republicans don’t, Republicans win.
Whether that was your intention or not doesn’t change the outcome.
That’s reality.
What concerns me most is the mindset underneath all of this.
Somewhere along the way, parts of our party started confusing agreement with loyalty.
We say we want a bigger tent. We say we want to build a coalition. We say we want to welcome new people into the movement. But then someone disagrees with us on an issue, supports a different candidate, or comes from a different wing of the party, and suddenly they’re being asked to prove they’re a “real Democrat.”
Think about that for a second.
How can we ask Republicans, independents, and young voters to join our coalition if we keep finding reasons to push Democrats out of it?
Politics has never been about finding the one candidate who agrees with you on every issue. That candidate does not exist. Neither does the perfect voter, the perfect Democrat, or the perfect human being.
Our system was never designed around perfect people agreeing on everything. It was designed around imperfect people finding enough common ground to move forward together. That’s not a flaw in democracy. That’s the entire point of it.
The problem with purity tests is that they never end. The list of acceptable people keeps getting smaller, the coalition gets weaker, and the people we’re trying to beat keep getting stronger.
That’s not a winning strategy.
That’s self-inflicted damage.
When I ran for Congress, there were Democrats who disagreed with me on healthcare, cannabis, immigration, gun policy, wages, and energy.
That didn’t make them enemies.
It made them Democrats who disagreed with me.
Coalition building is hard. Compromise is hard. Winning is hard.
Losing is easy.
When you lose, you never have to test your ideas in the real world. You don’t have to govern. You don’t have to make difficult decisions. You don’t have to build anything.
You can stay angry, stay pure, and stay convinced everyone else is the problem.
Winning requires something much harder.
It requires governing.
The convention is over.
The delegates voted.
The nominee was chosen.
You don’t have to like the outcome. You don’t have to celebrate the outcome. You don’t even have to agree with the outcome.
But at some point you have to decide whether your goal is to improve people’s lives or simply prove that you’re right.
Because those are not the same thing.
I keep hearing people say young voters are leaving the Democratic Party.
Maybe some are.
But I don’t think it’s because they’re being asked to support Democrats.
I think it’s because they’re watching Democrats spend more time fighting each other than fighting for them.
They’re watching people who agree on 80 or 90 percent of the issues tear each other apart over the remaining 10 percent. They’re watching people demand perfection in a profession that has never once offered it.
And they’re wondering why nothing ever seems to get accomplished.
The truth is that politics is messy. Coalitions are messy. Democracy is messy.
That’s not a flaw.
That’s the system.
The alternative isn’t perfection.
The alternative is losing.
Indiana Democrats have spent decades losing elections. We’ve spent decades finding reasons why this candidate wasn’t good enough, that candidate wasn’t pure enough, and some hypothetical future candidate would somehow be better.
Meanwhile, Republicans keep winning.
At some point we have to decide what matters more.
Being right or winning.
Because if our goal is actually to protect democracy, strengthen public education, defend workers, support our communities, and move Indiana forward, then eventually we have to win something.
The question now isn’t whether Beau Bayh was your first choice.
Mine was Blythe Potter.
The question is whether we’re going to spend the next five months fighting Republicans or fighting each other.
I’ve watched Indiana Democrats lose too many elections to keep making the same mistakes.
The convention is over.
Now we have a choice.
We can spend the next five months relitigating a convention that’s already over.
Or we can spend the next five months trying to win a statewide election.
I know where I stand.
I voted for Blythe Potter.
The delegates chose Beau Bayh.
And in November, I’ll be doing everything I can to help Democrats win.
