STATE HOUSE–Gov. Eric Holcomb may have an easy time being re-elected. While he has a Democrat challenger and may have a Republican challenger, Holcomb has not faced much hatred or even had a tough time from people in either party during his first term.

“Eric Holcomb, compared to previous governors , has been very much below the radar,” said Andy Downs, with the Mike Downs Center for Indiana Politics at Purdue University Ft. Wayne. “So he’s sort of quietly gone about doing what he does. There’s a significant chunk of the population who don’t know who he is. He, of course, can raise several million dollars pretty quickly and take care of the name ID problem.”

Holcomb’s likely challenger on the Republican side is Brian Roth, a businessman from Carmel, who runs a leadership consulting firm.

“Basically a well-liked governor, who in a lot of ways appears to be doing a very nice job, is challenged by anyone in a primary- that’s kind of surprising,” said Downs, who was a guest on Abdul-at-Large, this weekend.

“There is a willingness and even an interest on the part of people to unseat those with whom they have a disagreement. In the past these are folks who would have just given money to a campaign or backed somebody. Now they’re saying, I want to run for office. I don’t like the way they’re doing their job. I don’t want to work around them. I’m gonna try to get them out of office.”

Downs said, despite that sentiment from what he believes is a low number of perspective candidates, even the Democrat challnger will have a tough time making a dent against Holcomb in the 2020 race.

“Even the Democrats in the House and the Senate don’t say terrible things about him.” Dr. Woody Myers, former state health commissioner, announced earlier this year, that he’ll run against Holcomb. No other Democrats have announced their candidacy.

“It could be there are some quality candidates who are thinking, you know what, 2020 is not gonna happen. I’ll wait until 20214, when it’s an open seat,” said Downs.