The bears pick Indiana for the win.

Nuclear family declaration divides and the gas tax holiday extended from the television studios at WFYI public media.

It's Indiana Week in Review for the week ending June 5th, 2026.

Indiana Week in Review is produced by WFYI in association with Indiana Public Broadcasting stations.

Additional support is provided by ParrRichey.

The Chicago Bears are coming to Indiana.

As Sarah Neal Estes reports, the team announced Friday that they would be accepting the state's offer to build a stadium in Hammond, Indiana.

The Illinois legislature ended its spring session without passing its version of a bill aimed to keep the team in Chicago.

Lawmakers, including Governor of Illinois JD Pritzker, said they worried about spending money on a new stadium as residents struggle with affordability.

Indiana lawmakers passed legislation earlier this year worth $1 billion to incentivize the team to come.

Speaker of the House Todd Huston led that effort.

He says it's a major win for Indiana.

We're stable.

We we we get things done.

we support, big things here in Indiana.

And this is certainly.

One of them.

In a statement, governor Mike Braun called on Hoosiers to welcome the Chicago Bears.

So what does this mean for the city of Hammond?

It's the first question for our Indiana Weekend Review panel.

Democrat Kip Tew, Republican Chris Mitchem.

Jon Schwantes host of Indiana Lawmakers.

And Ben Thorp, government reporter at WFYI.

I'm Jill Sheridan, managing editor at WFYI.

So, Chris, can you believe it?

Yeah, I mean, it's it's been fascinating to see at least my own personal percentage chances continue to increase.

I think whenever we initially announced that we were even considering it, I was at about 5%.

And then Roger Goodell came and visited.

So that skyrocketed up to about 8%.

and then so now I think obviously this is the biggest, if not the final step towards actually, coming to fruition, which is huge.

And before an hour or so before we were supposed to record this, I was going to say, I think the tone has really shifted towards upwards of that 75 and 80%, because the tone of a lot of Illinois officials changed, I think I think whenever we pass the bill here, Governor Pritzker, I you know, he was calling it cute.

And, you know, it's it's funny that you did that.

And then he was kind of relying a lot on the Illinois legislature to come up with a package.

And then obviously, as of last week, they, you know, fumbled the ball before they could even get in the red zone and they couldn't come up with, you know, a good enough to get, a good enough package or enough agreement to come up with an agreement to rival Indiana's.

So I think if you're the bears, I always like bringing in football into politics when I can, but I think a a real deadline.

You know, they said they wanted to try to get something across the line before the summer.

And I think a big reason of that is the bears are expected to have a really good team this year.

That's arguably the favorite to win their division.

And I think if you're the bears, you don't want this looming of, you know, is this the last time one of the last times they're going to play and you want a lot of that attention to go on your good football team.

So I do think this deadline makes a lot of sense of them wanting to get something across the board.

And so if you're the bears, you know, your two options were, do you want to work with a state that has had five years to try to figure this out and couldn't come up with anything?

Or do you want to work with the state that's shown that it is financially stable and can work at the speed of business?

And I think the decision was pretty clear.

Well, I have to bite my tongue because I was one of many that said it would never happen.

It's not going to happen.

And I think a lot of people, made that bet as well.

but we did hear from Democrats out of Illinois camp that said, you know, for very different reasons why they did not pass a package for the bears.

Yeah, I, I guess what I would first say is one of the reasons the bears are coming to Hammond is because, folks in Indiana work together in a bipartisan way.

This idea originated with Earl Harris, back in the 90s.

And then his son took up the, took up the mantle here, more recently.

And the governor and the speaker and others, were very helpful.

Obviously, Tom McDermott, was huge and huge in this for the city of Hammond.

So you had you had a bipartisan, group of folks working to, to make that happen.

And, you know, I think it it should be, it should be something that we all look at to say, you know, if we do come together and work together, we can get stuff accomplished.

But to me, the bottom line, though, is why I always thought it was possible.

It is because the NFL cares about one thing.

Money.

And, they got a better package deal from, from Indiana than they, you know, obviously didn't get any deal from Illinois, but they got a great package, from the state of Indiana.

And Indiana was hungrier for it.

but it shouldn't be a shock.

The Kansas City Chiefs are moving to Kansas City, Kansas.

The Giants and the Jets play in new Jersey.

I mean, it come down to money.

the owners want more money, and we were willing to give it, and that's why it's there.

But we did.

Ben, you've been covering this story, and you've covered this breaking news for us right ahead of, our recording today.

And we, did hear, you know, Illinois lawmakers say that for reasons that they did not, pass the bill and, and, and where we're at today and you talked to, Todd Huston about that as well, just shortly.

That's right.

I think it's it's worth mentioning that, you know, earlier this week when they were talking about why the bill failed, people like J.B.

Pritzker were saying, look, we didn't feel like we wanted to cough up the money for this project at a time when so many of our residents are struggling with affordability.

I talked to Todd Huston about that and basically said, hey, how do you how do you feel about that reticence?

And he was like, listen, we think this is going to bring a lot of jobs to the region.

We think that this is an important driver and we think it's worth it.

I also kind of asked about his confidence.

You know, we were talking about like how confident you felt at every step of this.

And I think even when they were looking at this bill all the way back in February, they seemed so sure.

Or Todd Huston specifically seemed so sure that this was going to happen.

I think, as so many of us were like, this can't be real.

This can't be a thing that's going to happen.

and so, yeah, he was today like, look, this is where I've been the whole time.

Can you I mean, we've talked about this so much, the, you know, the, the impact it's going to have on Northwest Indiana and Hammond specifically.

It's going to be enormous.

Oh, it's huge.

And it's one of those things.

It's a, the quintessential cottage industry it produces.

It's not just the it's a bunch of concentric circles.

You've got the people who benefit directly from stadium construction and stadium operation, but then you've got the next layer out with hospitality, with food and beverage and hotel.

It's and transportation and transportation.

It's it is huge.

Big changes there to get to get to the stadium.

Oh, absolutely.

I mean, I'd like to say I saw this coming.

I'd like to be able to say that when Kip and I were undergrads back at IU, sipping a beverage and looking to the future, we were going to say, you know, our state of Indiana is going to have two NFL franchises and the best college football team in the country.

I we had zero then, and we weren't the best college football team in the country.

But we had faith.

But I didn't I'd like to say I saw that coming.

I didn't I thought this was going to be in some ways like another, back in our post-college days, it was a push on Indiana's part to become the third regional airport for Chicago to make Gary the third airport.

And a lot of it was invested in that.

And that's what's going to be the big be all and end all for economic development.

There didn't happen despite a lot of effort.

And I thought ultimately, in the end, this would be a bargaining chip in, in a sense, to help the bears get across the goal line.

you said get across the board.

So I'm not sure what if you're playing chess there or not.

There.

But.

But all the puns are appropriate.

but it's great.

It's great for Indiana.

It's great for Hammond, probably great for everybody.

But Governor Pritzker, I'm not sure since he is has presidential aspirations.

It could cut both ways.

One, he's concerned about the average, pocketbooks and and meat and potato issues.

He's not going to have government support of of big, you know, big name athletes.

The other side is you can keep a team in your state.

I don't know how that cuts, but that's a big question.

How are the fans going to react?

I mean.

I think it's very easy to, you know, lean on that meat and potatoes point to your point.

But it's also that begs the question of, okay, so why is your state and the and that's it anyways.

You have a one that's neighboring, that's a Republican led state that obviously had the reserves and the, the cooperation to get it done.

So, Governor Pritzker, what's what's different?

I can see the spot now.

He the bears have been there since.

You don't have the.

Oh it's a guy from the NFL films say but governor Pritzker couldn't keep them practically right.

Soldier field.

Do you think there's a chance that this deal falls through, though?

Because that's kind of what I'm already hearing.

A lot of people saying, oh, it's still not going to happen.

Yeah.

Some people are predicting that.

I mean, I think it's a very big step today.

So I think it's, if I were betting, which I did bet on this, and I'm getting dinner from a friend, but, I'd say we're in very good shape.

It's.

Of course, it could still fall apart.

There are environmental questions about this site that has been picked.

Yes.

there is the possibility that they'll get in there and realize it cost too much money to clean that side up.

but I think it's, you know, if the bears are playing poker here, they're playing pretty good poker.

I think it's pretty good.

I think one could argue the bears latest move is just them trying to really kick start a lot of those details that a lot of Indiana legislators were saying.

We still have to work out.

I think the bears are now saying, let's keep this in too high.

We're trying to figure it out.

Huge news today.

Well, now it's time for viewer feedback.

Every week we pose an unscientific online poll question.

This week's question Will the bears move to Indiana?

Have a positive impact on the state vote?

Yes or no?

The last question posed to viewers should property tax relief be expanded to all seniors, 65% saying yes, 35% saying no.

If you would like to take part in the poll, go to WFYI.org/i w I r and look for the poll.

Governor Mike Braun declared June to be Nuclear Family Month, causing intense backlash online as Pride month also begins.

Caroline Beck reports on what the governor's response was.

The declaration claims that the nuclear family consists of, quote, one husband, one wife and any biological, adopted or fostered children.

It also later states that research supports children living with their quote, married biological parents are better off.

But the declaration saw intense backlash online from single parent households and LGBTQ Hoosiers, saying the proclamation is insulting to them.

Braun told reporters on Tuesday that the point of the declaration was simple.

This isn't about any other statement other than the nuclear family is important.

You're going to have others that might say otherwise, but that's not the case.

Tennessee's governor, Bill Lee, also signed a similar resolution in April.

So does this declaration send a message, even though the governor says it isn't meant to?

Well, the governor can say it wasn't meant to, but as lieutenant governor, said, the exact opposite right after it happened in congratulated the governor for saying what we all said it says, which is, we are downplaying, Lbgtq Q rights.

We are ignoring Pride Month, and we are, going backwards more than 11 years.

It was 11 years ago this month that Obergefell decision was handed down.

It gave, gay people the same rights as the rest of us to be married.

And, apparently the state wants to go back in the stone ages.

When it comes to these kinds of things, I find it intensely outrageous.

I'm deeply offended, and it makes me very angry.

And it makes a lot of my friends very, very angry.

And they're mad at the state, and they don't want to live here.

When people are this intolerant.

And I just can't understand why the governor of the state of Indiana felt the need to go backwards.

I mean, I have also heard from a lot of people who were personally offended by this.

It's just just maybe poor timing.

No, I mean, I think the timing is intentional.

obviously, you know, I wonder what the response would be if this was, you know, done in July, you know, rather than June or something like that.

But I think it's important to clarify to folks, and I've seen it said otherwise online that this is a this is a resolution.

Right?

So there's no laws being changed.

There's no policy shifts, you know, being encouraged by this or anything like that.

it's about worth what, you know, the paper that it's on.

And so if you take that into account, you know, I on the surface, I think it's honestly a pretty good, you know, proclamation of what public health data says is the best form of family structure moving forward.

And I don't think you have to abandon others in order to praise that.

You know, the CDC says that the nuclear family has the best outcome for children long term, the best outcome for family structures moving forward.

I always, you know, like to use my, my, my grandma is one of my heroes.

As an example, she was born in Montgomery, Alabama in the 40s, moved up to Anderson to work at the GM plant and raised, was a single mother to five kids.

My dad being one of them and all of them now have healthy families, you know, healthy relationships, good financial stability.

And I think that should be celebrated.

But I don't think we can lie to ourselves and say we want to encourage that kind of family structure, because I think, you know, a single mom with five kids is so difficult, and they face a lot of challenges.

And I think as a state, we should be trying to encourage and celebrate family structures that are, kind of more sustainable moving forward.

And like I said, I think you can celebrate that without having to necessarily abandon others.

And unfortunately, I think right now in America, a nuclear family is almost seen as a as a luxury that not a lot of people really get to enjoy anymore.

So I would hope that, you know, declarations like this can celebrate that.

And, you know, not encounter a lot of, I think the manufactured concerns that a, a declaration like this would have.

I mean, John, this, many families in Indiana are not, quote unquote, you know, traditional nuclear families.

And this does exclude quite a few people when you make a resolution like this.

Yeah, I, I think it was intentional.

I don't think it was.

The timing was accidental.

The question then is why, this is all about messaging because as as Chris points out, this is not doesn't have any weight behind it.

Next week, he could just as easily do exercise and and eating fruit and vegetables is good for the health.

and gainful employment is good for people's long term finances.

I mean, so what?

Yeah.

I mean, you could make an argument that there are lots of issues that we face as a state right now.

And was this really the best use of time and effort, even though it was a piece of paper and even though somebody drafted it or was probably boilerplate taken from Governor Lee's office?

I don't know.

but it's how does it really affect Hoosiers who are struggling to pay their bills right now?

I guess is the question.

and it tells me that he needs the governor and the administration feel a need to shore up, certain aspect, their support in certain aspects of that.

You know, we didn't deliver redistricting for you.

I tried, but we had those recalcitrant Republicans in the Senate.

But I'm still, you know, I'm one of you.

I'm still fighting the good fight, and showing it through things like this.

So to me, that tells me this is a chance to to gin up support.

that may or may not be flagging.

I don't know what his polling shows within that segment of the Republican Party.

but to what end?

I mean, it's.

I mean, he does mention, you know, governor Lee and, and other states have have made this resolution is, Governor Braun just sort of following suit, do you think, Ben.

Yeah.

Although, again, I think, as others are saying, it's hard not to be a little bit cynical about what's happening and read that he's trying to make this declaration in a way that's supposed to undercut Pride Month.

And again, I think, as you mentioned, Kip, the lieutenant governor, I think, tweeted out an image that said something like, we're we're taking back the rainbow.

if we take him at his word, I think that there's a there's a way to grade him here.

when we look back on the, you know, Braun administration and a couple of years and, and basically ask, did he make it easier to build a family in Indiana?

Did he make it easier to afford, you know, childcare?

Did he make it easier, you know, to to do all of the things that are part of this kind of nuclear family?

and right now, obviously, I think he's taking steps towards things like child care.

But the question will be, did he ultimately make it a place where it was easier for folks to build a family?

Well, also this week, governor Mike Braun announced he would further extend a pause on Indiana's gas and excise taxes and an effort to keep Indiana Gas affordable.

Our very own Ben Thorpe reports.

The governor says the longer gas holiday is allowed under a state energy emergency statute.

Braun had previously said he would only be able to extend the pause in gas taxes for 60 days.

Now, the governor says he can extend that pause for up to 120 days without input from the state legislature.

Braun acknowledges that the suspensions are costing the state roughly $140 million every month, which the Department of Transportation should be able to cover with reserves.

But long term road funding is an issue.

The legislature is going to have to take up, and all Hoosiers are going to have to have that discussion.

House and Senate leadership both released statements supporting Braun's move.

Senate Democrats also supported the relief, but noted that gas prices were rising because of U.S.

policies in the Middle East, which the governor and his, quote, political allies support.

So, Ben, how big of an impact has this gas tax holiday had for this year?

I mean, I'm just going to say, you know, at the gate kind of personally, I have friends who live all across the country and they're talking about $5 a gallon, getting close to $6 a gallon.

And when I hear stuff like that and then, you know, as I'm walking in today, I see $3.40.

I'm like.

Feels pretty.

Good.

But I think what's interesting about the announcement that came this week is you're you're seeing a lot of people start to be like, we're spending a lot of money to keep gas prices down right now.

even folks like, Senate President Pro Tem Roderick Bray were saying, yeah, okay, it's good that we're doing this, but we need to start thinking about road funding.

You heard Governor Braun even saying there may be some consequences down the line.

We need to start thinking about, a road funding package around this.

And so this is costing us a lot of money.

I think that the price tag that the governor, quoted was something about $140 million every month that we do both the gas and the excise tax.

And so that is obviously adding up for the state.

the Indiana Department of Transportation is saying at this point that it can afford it, that this is kind of coming from reserves.

But I think we have to start asking, do we want to do this long?

But it's just not it's.

Not just state, it's.

It's locals and locals.

The ones are getting impacted.

They're going to have to start canceling projects all across all across the state, very quickly if we don't figure out a way to help them as well.

And I haven't heard state lawmakers or the governor talking about locals in that instance.

And that's that's the real difficulty there.

And I just have to add, even though you didn't.

Know.

That we wouldn't be in this situation if we didn't have a president who sent us into war and ran, it caused the Straits of Hormuz to close and cause oil, oil futures just to rock it up.

And, all of the Republicans support Donald Trump and what he's doing in Iran.

And that's where the problem is.

The problem is he started a war.

We don't really know why he's giving us three different reasons.

None of those reasons have come to pass, and we all are suffering for it.

And now we're going to be closing, projects that are desperately needed in, municipal plant infrastructure.

I was a little, confused like the last time he increased it.

He said that's a we would have to have a special session, but I guess not.

Yeah.

I mean, I think the the fact that you have the lowest gas prices in the country, to Ben's point, I mean, the triple AA has come out and said that by a pretty good margin.

I think it's like $0.30 or something like that.

that's really good PR and I know that there's a lot of, again, long term ramifications, but I do sound like a, like a broken record sometimes on the show when I say Indiana's reserves again, get us out of a really potentially bad situation that could impact, you know, the everyday Hoosier.

I mean, go back to the, you know, $200 million that was just allocated to the child care waitlist.

You don't have to go as far back to Covid.

It's fact that we're still in such a financially healthy situation.

And this is just the latest one where it's like we have the reserves to weather some of the storm to Kip's point, I think the local government concern, you know, the head of the, the association that represents a lot of the local government said that as of right now, we're still okay.

But if this continues to move forward, we're going to have to really accelerate those conversations.

When it comes to what does a long term road funding plan look like?

And you've seen the legislature continue to tackle that issue?

I mean, with the amount of just options, it's like a plethora of tools that a local government can use to raise taxes.

Right.

so I think this is only going to accelerate that conversation going into next legislation or the, the next, session.

As to, you know, maybe we propose a bill or we propose a financial structure that is a little more heavy handed than the ones were before.

Let me deal with that.

Is that the answer?

I mean, the road funding and the formulas involved?

Yeah.

I mean, we've been a lot of our roads and our bridges are in fragile condition and that's not news.

And it's that way across the country our infrastructure is sort of bleeding.

so we do need to deal with that.

I'm not surprised that the appeal of this for the governor, because think of all the things that the governor in the state can do that may or may not have an effect.

You know, in a generation on the state of Indiana.

Here's something that governor can say with the stroke of my pen, I'm going to save you X amount at the gas pump that has real appeal.

Now, whether it's he had 60 days authority to do it or now 120 days, I think what we're seeing, and maybe this comes out of the white House is do it first and ask questions later.

I see executives, throughout government saying, well, I don't know, challenge me.

Right.

And who wants to cut step forward as a general Assembly and say, I'm going to challenge your ability to cut Hoosiers costs at the gas pump?

Yeah.

So he could probably now say, you know, I've researched it further, I'm going to do it for 365 days.

because no one's your only challenge, your only limitation on your executive power, as we've seen, apparently in Washington, is the ability of someone to call you on it.

And no one's going to call him on it.

Well, I'll be filling up before I head out today.

Voting rights and the possibility of a second redistricting effort.

We're top of mind among lawmakers and voters this past weekend.

Caroline Beck reports on a discussion and a first of a series of town halls hosted by the Indiana Black Legislative Caucus and for you, because.

We want to see that the caucus reviewed bills, passed and failed in the last legislative session and took questions from voters.

Some top concerns are affordability and the US Supreme Court's major blow to the Voting Rights Act.

Lawmakers in the caucus are concerned Indiana's minority voters could lose representation.

Chair of the caucus, representative Earl Harris, says voters should engage with their lawmakers.

Now.

Reach out to reps and senators.

Now tell them, hey, if you're thinking about doing this, if you're thinking about moving us backwards in time, you should not.

We're the people that vote you in the office.

We can vote you out.

The caucus will hold seven town halls across the state into September.

The next is scheduled for June 13th in Jeffersonville.

So, John, are these priorities aligned with what we're hearing out of elections?

Oh, I would say this is front and center.

you're seeing across the country what many minorities feel is an assault on the Voting Rights Act of the 1960s with Supreme Court decisions and, and the the rush of so many states, particularly in the South, to make these emergency, restructuring of their maps, usually at the expense of minority, districts.

And so, if you don't have strength at the ballot box, and a level playing field, everything else is sort of secondary.

So I think this in many ways, this is the perfect alignment for, sort of the cause.

Celeb or the The North Star for this group as it moves forward.

I mean, are we going to, you know, redistricting could come up very well again next session.

And, that was a top concern.

Yeah.

I think they actually have a really unique opportunity right now because all signs are pointing to, you know, Democrats potentially winning some seats, winning some governorships around the country here.

And the upcoming midterms.

So I think they have a really unique opportunity to really tailor their, their priorities to things that can actually get done in Indiana.

You know, God bless them.

I understand redistricting is a big concern, but you can only control so much for the Supreme Court's doing.

Right.

So I think if they were to really tailor down into issues that they can impact specifically for improving black communities, I think they could have a really big impact going to next session.

And affordability of Cap is going to be obviously top, I think.

I think this the seven town halls are going to have they're going to be hearing mostly about affordability, and it is where Democrats have been.

what we've been talking about for the last year.

Again, I reiterate, we have a president who's causes chaos.

He puts in tariffs, he starts a war that we don't need to start, and our prices go up.

And, we can't control that.

But hopefully Republicans can help us control him going forward.

Well, that's Indiana Week in review for this week.

Our panel has been Democrat Kip Tew, Republican Chris Mitchem, Jon Schwantes host of Indiana Lawmakers.

And Ben Thorpe, government reporter at WFYI.

You can find Indiana Week interviews, podcasts and episodes at WFYI.org/IWIR or on the PBS app.

I'm Jill Sheridan, managing editor at WFYI.

Join us next time because a lot can happen.

And in Indiana week.

The views expressed are solely those of the panelists.

Indiana Weekend Review is produced by WFYI in association with Indiana Public Broadcasting stations.

Additional support is provided by ParrRichey.