2052 Indiana gubernatorial election (Blackford)

The **2052 Indiana gubernatorial election** was held on November 5, 2052, to elect the governor and lieutenant governor of Indiana. The election was held concurrently with the U.S. presidential election as well as numerous state and local elections. Incumbent Republican governor Jorden Ferrell was eligible to run for re-election to a second full four-year term, and chose to do so at the request of President GIlbert Melendez despite initially announcing his intention to retire from politics. He was faced in the general election by Democratic nominee Spencer Webb, a moderate Democrat serving as mayor of Vincennes who had previously been the party's nominee for Lieutenant Governor of Indiana in 2044 and Indiana Secretary of State in 2046, only narrowly losing both races.

Webb ultimately defeated Ferrell by a borderline landslide margin, ending a streak of Republican victories for Indiana's governorship dating back to 2004, and another Republican would not be elected governor for twelve years. Despite Webb's large margin of victory, it was still lower than the margins of victory Democrats saw in most other statewide races in Indiana that election cycle, which was seen as a blue wave with Democrats flipping both chambers of the Indiana General Assembly while also winning most other major elections in the state. This also made Ferrell the first ever Indiana governor to lose re-election while running for a second full term, as Democrat Joe Kernan, who lost re-election in 2004, had not been elected to the office and had instead been elevated to the office after incumbent governor Frank O'Bannon's death in September 2003.

## Background

The Republicans had occupied the Governor's Mansion since 2005, when Mitch Daniels was sworn in after defeating Democratic incumbent Joe Kernan in the previous year's gubernatorial election, and Indiana's governorship was traditionally seen as a safe Republican seat. Analysts initially expected the seat to remain that way going into the 2052 election cycle, with the politically moderate Ferrell enjoying high approval ratings from both sides of the aisle and being widely regarded as one of the country's most popular governors entering 2051. However, this would change with the 2051 Wabash Valley earthquake, which left nearly 200 people dead in the state of Indiana alone. Ferrell's administration almost immediately became the subject of heavy criticism for its slow and ineffective response, and his approval ratings began to see a sharp decline in the second week of June, with a large majority of Hoosiers disapproving of Ferrell's response to the earthquake by early July. It was around this time that analysts first began to mention that Ferrell's position could be in danger going into the 2052 election cycle, and confidence in his ability to win re-election begin to wane.

Among the cities most severely impacted by the earthquake was Vincennes in the southwest of the state, located on the Wabash River, which saw over half of its buildings damaged and 7 people killed in the city. The city's mayor, Spencer Webb would begin to rise to prominence as a harsh critic of Governor Ferrell's response to the earthquake, and began to hint at a run for governor in 2052. In early August of 2051, an opinion poll showed Webb defeating Ferrell 49-38% (with the remaining 13% being undecided or other) in a theoretical match-up between the two, and Ferrell unexpectedly announced his decision to not seek re-election several days later. With Ferrell out of the race, and the Republican Party's popularity further declining after an economic crash in August, most pundits considered the Indiana governor's race to be a pure tossup by September of 2051.

**THIS IS A WORK-IN PROGRESS!**