Latest / Breaking The Meta / Indiana Teacher Fed Up With MAGA Politician Decides to Run Against Him | Cindi Clayton
Transcript
- Breaking The Meta: you you Hello everyone and welcome to Breaking the Meta. My name is Mike Winson. Today we are sitting down with Cindy Clayton, who is running for state senator for the Hoosier State of Indiana. I remembered that. had to remind myself what Indiana was, but I remembered it. ⁓ Very exciting, very excited to sit down and learn about her and why she decided to run in 2026, which is for most of us feels like a crazy thing to do. but more power to you. Hello, Cindy. Thanks for being here. Thanks for having me. feel like ⁓ Hoosiers are well known now for a good thing as a football school. My daughter attends law school at IU Bloomington. So we're all very excited about that. If we could take a second and learn about you and why you decided to run in the first place. ⁓ So I have never. been involved in politics. I've always voted and I have, you know, in my younger days, it was, have my beliefs and I have my opinions and I keep them to myself and I vote, you know, my conscience and never told anybody about that. And as the last decade has unfolded, including the fact that, you know, as I approach middle age and because of by virtue of what I do as a public educator, I saw that what was happening in Indianapolis and DC as well was affecting people that I care about and I care about, you know, most people, but ⁓ it was time for me to step up and do something. And so ⁓ when this time last year came around, I am the board chair for a nonprofit at Children's Advocacy Center. And I've served there for a decade. And on day one, know, the Sharpie comes out and we're freezing grant funds that have already been allocated. And frankly, the funds that we worked off of were already collected from court fines and fees. And so I'm thinking, ⁓ my gosh, we're not going to be able to serve these children. And then every day was a new fresh hell. And ⁓ some of my former students who I'm so close with took me to a meet your legislators event. encouraged me to go and I had a conversation with our state senator because what was happening in Washington was beyond my control. So I started tracking bills in Indianapolis and I asked my senator who is now my opponent, Jim Toms. There was a bill regarding ⁓ ban on trans athletes and one of the punishments that could happen or one of the recourses for another team if they suspected a girl was a male. was that she could be subject to a genital inspection. Now this intersected not just with my relationship with college students, but also my work in sexual abuse. And ⁓ when I brought that to his attention, that that would not be ⁓ appropriate, he said to me, ⁓ well, how else are we supposed to know what they are? And the lightning struck through my body and I said, well, that's actually, it's sexual abuse if you do that. he goes, well, it's not like we're going to have the janitor do it. And so my kids, I call them the 30 now, but we're upset beyond repair and no one had run against this guy in the last two elections. That's eight years. And so I tried to find somebody to run, couldn't find anybody. And here I am. So that's the long story short, guess, if it's short. And now that I'm in it, I see how much my life experience and my work can play into making me a good legislator for my part of the world. I have worked in human resources for 25 years of my career. I worked in human resources and most of that was in the government sector. And so whenever a bill is signed in DC or Indianapolis, ⁓ it immediately has an impact. our legislators largely don't have that experience of knowing when I move this pen, this is what's going to happen in real life. And I have 25 years of that experience to offer to say, wait a minute, now this is a consequence of that. What are we going to do about that? One of the things that we obviously are in dealing with a lot in this country is a lack of accountability, especially when it comes to our politicians. What does accountability look like to you? What does accountability look like in terms, in regards to the people of Indiana and how you hope to be held accountable? Yeah. So, one of the, one of the big pieces for me is, you know, when I've worked in HR and in the government sector, everything that I would write or do was subject to a FOIA request. So I knew that transparency was baked in. And I think what happens when the public is trying to be involved in politics is the websites and the information that's given is like drinking from a fire hose and it's not user friendly and people are busy and they're raising children and, you know, they've got busy lives. And so one of the things that I intend to do is to use social media and say, you know, here's, you know, quick weekly update of what's happening in the state house. I want your feedback. Because I would be a representative and not someone who's there to push my ideology and my personal beliefs onto the people of my district. That's not the legislator's role. And they have gotten that completely upside down. And now it's their dogma, their individual dogma that they're shoving down on us. And Indiana used to be a state where it was a state of small government and leave people alone. And now it's gone on 180 because of this, this MAGA movement. And my Senator is a proud MAGA. And it's gone, it's gone in the reverse that every little thing, what's in somebody's underwear, especially children's underwear is just an obsessive thought for some of these folks. And so I want to get back to a place where we're about business. What do we need to do in order to improve the lives of people in our district? We have the, some of the highest utility rates in the country and it's a monopoly and our current legislators are receiving ⁓ campaign money, but more importantly, the bigger part is the lobbyist money that they're getting on the back end. know, they're going to Colts games and they're, you know, having nice dinners and all this on the utility lobby. ⁓ And the fun fact, so we have CenterPoint and Central Indiana has Duke. So they're playing this game where Duke gives to our senators. and representatives and Centerpoint gifts to central Indiana, hoping that people are too dumb to realize that that game's going on. And so I want to make it like, first of all, I'm not taking any corporate money. That's not what I'm in this for. I'm a teacher. you know, I don't, if I'm not in this for money, I'm in this because I can leave my job for three or four months a year and be a part-time legislator and still be connected to the community. And so all of that, would be, I would be more than happy to be completely transparent about, ⁓ I won't be up there looking for a good time on the backs of constituents. And so I know this is about transparency and politicians say a lot of things when they're trying to get elected. But, you know, I've been a parts of community for 30 years and a lot of people know me because of my role in teaching and at, ⁓ at the university that's part of our community. And so they know I'm serious. I'm somebody who is stubbornly principled and I'm not interested in taking any money that will cause me to have to do things that I can't sleep at night. Obviously also one of the things that we deal with in this country is at least this idea of division, whether or not division really exists. It's definitely something that is on the mind of people and has been pushed by many legislatures across the country. Indiana, unfortunately, is not estranged to that problem. As you go around and interact with people, what has been the response of those who are Republicans when they find out you're running with a D next to your name? Yeah. So it's interesting because the local Republicans that ⁓ are in our County office. We are actually right now led mostly by Democrats, our sheriff, our mayor, our Democrats, but the Republicans who are part of that here in Evansville, we are tight. We are there to do a job. And so the local Republicans, for the most part, the ones I've dealt with that are in office are, I'm extremely close to. So our prosecutor, for example, is a Republican and Because I work for, I serve an agency that tries to get justice for children who are victims of intimate crime. ⁓ She's fantastic. And she's just a dogged ⁓ advocate for children. And I absolutely adore her. We have a Republican Senator in a different part of our district whose name is Venita Becker. And she's a very awesome, level-headed, reasonable person. as long as someone is reasonable and they're not just completely gone with dogma, we can work. Like I can work with anyone. mean, one of my favorite activities when I'm in a leadership role is finding out who's tough and winning them over. So I have many years of experience of that. And so there are going to be some times we just flat out disagree on some things. ⁓ But I don't have any desire to get into any sort of nastiness with anyone. ⁓ It's just, it's different here in this community. And that's the only way that I can do business. ⁓ And I will stand up for myself. mean, I was raised pretty hard Scrabble. ⁓ I'm small, but I'm feisty. ⁓ but I also, my core value is people's dignity. And so I would never. someone's dignity from them in any interaction. We're also dealing with some realizations that America's place on the world stage has changed from what we have been historically. What we started 80 years ago ⁓ has changed in one year, unfortunately. ⁓ Whether you're talking Greenland, Venezuela, the tariffs, and everything that has come from that. How do you see America's place on the world stage moving forward? Yeah, I mean, I think it's both our global presence and our internal presence ⁓ has changed. And I think Mark Carney said it best, that some of what the world order was prior to January 2025 was an illusion. And we have somebody now who has no interest in norms or laws or rules or traditions or niceties. And so all that's been stripped away. And we got through 2025 and I think we had to sort of come to terms to survive it with our nervous systems intact. It's just different now and it's going to be. And so for me, I'm running for an Indiana state office. So this is less of something that I can affect. But certainly we need leaders in every corner who can reshape. What does it mean to be a global citizen? What does it mean to be a leader in the United States? ⁓ What does it mean to do the right thing when no one is looking? And especially when you're the biggest, baddest boss and you restrain yourself, that is power to, you know, to me. And that is the way that ⁓ any moral person or entity should behave. And so ⁓ in terms of in Indiana, one of the things that happened, ⁓ we have a Lieutenant Governor who ⁓ is a very strange little man. And he came down to Southern Indiana. He put the most bizarre things on Facebook, but he came down here and caused a big scuffle, calling constituents ugly names and trying to bait people against each other. it was so it's an active, like he seeks out to enrage. And that's what's happening in DC. And I'll tell you. I go into high schools and I talk to students about getting a business degree and what it means to be a business leader. And they're absorbing this. The next generation is absorbing, why would I do the right thing? None of our leaders do the right thing. And they get away with it. They have all the power. So if I want to be powerful, I also have to be petty and cruel and a thief and all these horrible things. ⁓ And that's just the wrong image. And so it does, it goes from all the way down to, you know, a child looking at what's happening and taking notes about how to behave all the way to globally, how we get treated. This is an economic issue. This is a freedom issue because I used to travel to the UK all the time. I didn't need a, you know, the blue passport was the golden passport and I didn't need a visa or anything like that. And so our Our movements are going to be restricted because of these shenanigans. And it's all because of the lack of integrity. And our governor is a proud MAGA as well. And so he is less so about the total destruction of laws and norms, but that's where we are as a state. And so we're only going to fix. our global presence ⁓ and our national presence, one leader at a time. Yeah. I want to apologize. I have had, you are my fifth interview today and I am trying to keep track of where everyone is. You are not running for federal Senate like I, like I happened to hint at in the beginning, you are running for Indiana State Senate District 49. But thank you for thinking that I would be capable of a federal job. you know what? We've been talking now for a little bit and I could definitely see the possibility. So actually, let's do what I was originally going to do if I knew, if my brain had processed it. Could you let everyone know What area of Indiana encompasses District 49? So Evansville is the third largest city in Indiana. We're in southwestern Indiana where Illinois and Kentucky meet with Indiana. And so that the county, Posey County, that borders those other states and then Evansville in Vandiver County. So I have about 83,000 voters in my district. and most of those are in Vanderbilt County, includes Evansville. Gotcha. And again, it's one I think I've just been staring at the screen too long today. Could you give us as obviously you live there, so you experience a lot of it. What, what are the kinds of things that your district struggles with? What are the pain points? What are the things that that are on the mind most of the people in your district? So obviously the the utilities issue is the biggest issue. ⁓ As I mentioned, we pay the some of the highest rates in the nation for our utilities. We are under a monopoly system. So it's supposed to be regulated by a board. ⁓ And then also they can the state legislature can enact allow them to enact fees. And so we have a full page on our bill of fees now. Wow. A delivery fee, nephew fee, whatever. you know, that's the worst fee of them all. It's the worst fee, but honestly, it really, we should be charging them that because that's how we feel. Yeah. And so, I mean, we're talking a 700 foot square foot apartment might be five, $600 a month. Just for you know, keeping it at where your pipes aren't freezing. Yeah, and so people can't afford to live here We have two universities in this town and we are losing talent They're either going back going to the Indianapolis area where Duke Energy is slightly less ⁓ awful and Or they're leaving the state and so we're losing our best and brightest because of that ⁓ And that is a major issue because it is a monopoly. And so it makes it very complicated to try to regulate it. It's also a for-profit company. And so their sort of only role is to make money. Their CEO makes over $9 million a year and ⁓ on the backs of Indiana taxpayers. so... Um, that's, that's very problematic. The other thing is in the Evansville Vandiver School Corporation is the second large school corporation in the state of Indiana. Over the last 20 years, we've had a Republican super majority in our state legislature. And every year the schools get defunded a little bit more and a little bit more to the point now where we have local referendums to raise local fees so that the schools don't starve to death. And then federally, when the Department of Education was, you know, whatever kind of state it's announced, even a real thing anymore, ⁓ you know, that also affects a very large school corporation like ours. ⁓ And so those are the two main things. And then third is, you know, like we were talking about earlier, when I knock doors, people are telling me I am sick to death of all this finger pointing and name calling and back and forth and back and forth, grow up, act like adults. act like professionals and do your job. So those are the things that I hear from constituents and they're certainly the things that affect, you know, me as well as a citizen. We are at this point now where people have been listening, they've gotten to this point. What's one thing you would want them to take away out of everything that we've talked about? You want to make sure that they remember. What's that one most important thing? Being a legislator. is a job that needs to be done. so whenever you look at an individual that you get to vote for, if you could take a lens of not, I'd like this person or I don't, it's do I want to hire this person or not? So who's better qualified and who is the type of personality and thinker that I want to represent me in? the state house, will I be proud of saying that's my senator? Will I be proud of the work that they do, even if I disagree with what the majority of my neighbors have asked him or her to do? And I think if we look at it, it's become like almost like football teams. You know, it's like people have their flags, literally. And they have made it their whole identity. so, you know, when we see some people that we've known our whole lives that are really invested in some things that we don't maybe agree with them on, ⁓ because they've embraced it so tightly and bought the merch and it's just kind of their whole identity now, it's too hard to turn back on. And we've got to get back to a point of this isn't my salvation and this isn't my football team. This is. person who works for us. And that person needs to do the job that they were enacted to do and not shove their beliefs onto everyone else. Cindy, I appreciate you coming in here and speaking with us for a little while. It was great to hear from you and hear what you hope to do for the people of District 49. If people want to learn more about you and support you, where can they find you? So Cindy for Senate, C-I-N-D-I ⁓ for Senate, F-O-R, dot com is ⁓ my website. And then I'm on socials at C-I-N-D-I for Senate. Perfect. And we'll make sure all that gets down below. Thank you so much for sitting here with us and giving us this opportunity to learn about you. For everyone else that listened this far, thank you so much. I really do appreciate it. Please hit all those buttons below. It really helps to make it possible. for me to keep doing what I'm doing, which is trying to raise the voices and raise the visibility of people that may not get the kind of media coverage as some of these bigger, more ⁓ battleground areas, ⁓ especially progressives. If we really want to make these changes, we need to learn about who's running in our area and push for people that really want to make change. And that's even it. That's even the issue more than anything is we want people that are making change, not just living with the status quo for anyone that is new to this podcast. We are very focused on having hard conversations, breaking the status quo, having real change and understanding that all people, no matter your race, religion, gender, or identity deserve rights, respect, dignity, and safety. Thank you again, Cindy, for being here and we will see you all next time on Breaking the Meta. Bye guys.