There's a contest among Democrats for mayor of Evansville — for now

EVANSVILLE — It's a two-person race for the Democratic nomination for Evansville mayor — but maybe not for long.

Vanderburgh County Democrats have filed a challenge to the candidacy of Brian Alexander, a 31-year-old, self-described advertising planner for Spectrum Reach. For now, Alexander opposes Vanderburgh County Council member Stephanie Terry, who declared her candidacy for mayor last week. There will be no other candidates for the Democratic nomination, as the deadline for filing passed at noon Friday.

Why the challenge to Alexander?

Party leaders cannot prevent any Democrat from filing for mayor as long as that candidate voted in Democratic primary elections the last two times he or she participated in primaries in Indiana, according to state law. But Alexander has voted in just one primary election, according to voter registration data — the 2016 Democratic contest in Warrick County.

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There's that and, well, the fact that party leaders think Terry — a County Council member since 2011 and executive director of the Children's Museum of Evansville (cMoe) — is a much stronger candidate. So Democratic chair Cheryl Schultz will not certify Alexander as a member of the party, which would allow him to bypass the two-primaries law.

"To be honest with you, we have a very qualified candidate (Terry) who's already filed to run and announced her candidacy," Schultz said. "So therefore, I am not going to wave someone onto the ballot who doesn't meet the requirements when we already have someone filling that role as our candidate. And we are all 100% behind Stephanie (Terry)."

Republican Party leaders are challenging one of their party's mayoral candidates on the same grounds. GOP chairman Mike Duckworth points out that Caine Helmer, a front-end worker at Target, hasn't voted Republican in his last two primary elections. For the moment, the race for the GOP's mayoral nomination includes Helmer, County Commissioner Cheryl Musgrave and Natalie Rascher, senior talent acquisition advisor at Clifton Larson Allen.

Democrat Alexander pointed out that Schultz did allow Noah Robinson to seek the party's nomination for Vanderburgh County sheriff last year even though Robinson hadn't voted in two consecutive Democratic primaries.

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Robinson had cast a Democratic ballot in 2020 primary elections but voted in the Republican primary in 2018. In 2016, Robinson did not cast a ballot. In 2014, he voted in the Republican primary. In 2012 and 2010, Robinson did not vote. In 2008, Robinson voted in the Democrat primary.

Robinson said at the time that he is a "proud Democrat" who had voted in a GOP primary when competitive races appeared on the ballot or when he wanted a more moderate Republican to win the race.

Schultz pointed out that Robinson cranked up his campaign for sheriff in 2021, when the law said candidates only needed to have voted in one of their party’s primaries. The two-primaries law went in effect in 2022. Robinson was qualified when he started campaigning in 2021.

Besides that, Schultz said there's a "huge difference" between Robinson and Alexander.

Robinson was a strong enough candidate to defeat Jason Ashworth in the Democratic primary despite the fact that term-limited Sheriff Dave Wedding and past Democratic sheriffs had endorsed Ashworth, a major in the sheriff's office. Robinson then defeated Republican Jeff Hales in the general election by a 56-44% margin, becoming the only Democrat to win a countywide election.

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"Half the elected officials of our party were supporting (Robinson), and we had a lot of elected officials supporting Jason Ashworth," Schultz said. "We didn't have a consensus candidate. With Stephanie Terry, 100% of our elected officials are behind her.

"There's a huge difference in somebody who's worked a year raising money, knocking doors and building support — it's the difference between somebody just coming in at the last minute who's not been involved with the party or run before, to file."

Alexander said he has tried twice — in 2019 and earlier this year — to get support from party leaders to run for mayor, but they haven't been interested.

"Both times I was kind of turned down," he said, noting that Democrats didn't even field a candidate for mayor four years ago. "They said they didn't want to risk the (City) Council races."

There's a reason he hasn't voted in many of the springtime intraparty contests, Alexander said.

"It's hard to come out to vote in primaries when (Democrats) weren't running anybody," he said. "If you only run uncontested primaries and don't put anybody up for mayor (as was the case in 2019), it's difficult to take a day off or go on your lunch break to vote in a primary where it won't make a difference."

Calling himself "practically a lifelong" Democrat, Alexander said he'll support Terry if he's disqualified.

"From Obama up, I've been voting for Democrats," he said. "I've volunteered on several mayoral campaigns, several City Council campaigns. I've phone banked for them."

Party leader Schultz conceded that Alexander is currently a Democratic precinct committee chairman, "but I can honestly tell you I have not seen him at any of our events."

"And if he's worked for other candidates, I'm not aware. I'm not saying that he hasn't," she said.

If Alexander does survive his party's challenge, he's got a platform ready for a primary contest against Terry. He says "fighting the increased energy costs and increasing wages" would be his top priorities as mayor.

He will get the chance to make his case at the next meeting of the Vanderburgh County Election Board, which will hear the challenges to his and Helmer's candidacies. No date has been set.

This article originally appeared on Evansville Courier & Press: There's a contest among Democrats for mayor of Evansville — for now