Indiana Legislative Update – Indivisible NWI

The 2025 session has ended. All legislation has now been signed into law. Hoosiers will suffer has a result of many of these bills. As a result of your activism, some bad bills became better–and some good bills passed. Contact your legislators and the governor to let them know what you think.

Click on the issue that concerns you most for a list of relevant bills. Unless otherwise noted, all of the bills below have been signed into law.

What’s important to you?

Bills

Budget

HB 1001 State budget: HB 1001 State budget

“A dismal forecast last week projecting a $2 billion shortfall — with an additional $400 million less available in the current budget cycle — hampered Republican spending plans. Under the updated proposal, public health programs, economic development and higher education got bigger cuts and total reserves dropped about three percentage points from the Senate budget to just above 10%. Legislators also increased taxes on multiple forms of tobacco — not just cigarettes — in the final budget compromise. Long-sought universal school choice vouchers will become reality in the second budget year at a cost of roughly $93 million. “Currently, Indiana’s vouchers are available to Hoosiers earning 400% of the amount required for a student to qualify for the free or reduced-price lunch program, or roughly $220,000. An estimated 3.5% of families don’t qualify under the current eligibility guidelines.” (Axios) and (Indiana Capital Chronicle)
From Indiana Democratic Party: The budget “reduces K-12 education funding as a share of the budget, cuts funding for all public universities, and even reduces public health funding by a whopping 72% year over year.” An amendment allowed “Braun’s power grab to appoint all of the members of the Indiana University Board of Trustees, eliminating alumni input.”

Criminal justice

Support: HB 1413 Rape kits. Creates a fund to help law enforcement and testing labs reduce the backlog of untested rape kits. Has been referred to the Appropriations Committee. This bill did not pass out of the Appropriations Committee, so there was never a Senate floor vote.

Education

HB 1002 Educational matters. A final vote in the Senate is will be April 14. Contact your state senator.

Removes requirement that IN Secretary of Education have educational experience, live in Indiana, or have a college degree.
- Guts rights and responsibilities delegated to both State Board of Education and local elected school boards, and removes required offices on the board.
- Allows a public school district to be completely “charterized” – that is, public school districts governed by locally-controlled, elected school boards could be completely dissolved and replaced with charter schools governed by non-elected, appointed boards instead.
- Exempts charter school board members from submitting a statement of economic interest, reduces oversight of charters, and repeals language prohibiting discrimination. Removes liability from charter schools
- Allows students to drop out at 16 without a qualifying reason.
- Allows schools to cut transportation services with just one year’s notice.
- Eliminates the requirement for social and emotional learning, essential to a student’s learning.

Elections-Voting

SB 010 Voter registration. Makes changes to voter registration: School IDs will no longer be accepted for voting ID purposes – even when they meet all requirements. This unduly burdens college students’ ability to vote. From League of Women Voters: The bill also requires the county voter registration office to remove voters from the voting rolls if they have not cast a vote in the two most recent general elections and puts unreasonable requirements on county clerks to verify citizenship. This bill has been challenged in court. (Democracy Docket)

HB 1679 Various election matters. Outlines several changes to election and voting laws – one that would require a county voter registration office to conduct a “voter list maintenance program” at least once every 30 days. These programs can be unreliable and will flag and purge actual eligible voters, in addition to failing to protect data privacy.

HB 1680 Election security and transparency. Brings forth several changes to voter rights. Restricts assisting someone filling out their registration application. Rejects voter registration applications that use a a non residential address, disenfranchising the unhoused population. Encourages voter intimidation by allowing a voter to challenge another voting during the primary election.

Environment-Climate-Energy

Three anti-consumer bills that will charge utility customers for the cost of small nuclear reactors are making their way to the governor’s desk. They are costly and unproven and so far there are none in the U.S. Even if utility companies fail to bring a SMR online, utility customers will foot the bill. From Citizens Action Coalition:

Senate Bill 424 offers public utilities working on small modular nuclear reactors (SMRs) a path to recover 80% of pre-construction costs, including anticipated spending, from customers within three years — and before they obtain certificates of public convenience and necessity from the Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission. The other 20% would be part of a general rate case;

SB 423 Small Modular Nuclear Reactor Pilot Program establishes the small modular nuclear reactor partnership pilot program, authorizing a utility to partner with multiple entities to petition the IURC for approval of a pilot program to invest in SMRs. The eligible partners are educational institutions, military installation (Crane), military base reuse area (Newport), a customer willing to host an SMR on their property or use the electricity from the SMR, a capital partner, and an SMR manufacturer. Additionally and like SB424 and HB1007, the bill provides the utility a massive tracker that forces customers to assume all of the financial risk and foot the bill for the SMR development costs before the utility has even sought approval from the IURC to construct an SMR, and even if the utility never seeks approval to construct an SMR and cancels the project.

HB 1007 Energy generation resources: Forces Indiana electric utility customers to foot the bill for SMR [small modular reactor] design, engineering, planning, and permitting costs before the utility seeks approval to build the SMR, and even if they never seek approval and cancel the project.

These are all interrelated bills that would require electric utility customers to pay for the engineering, planning and permitting costs before a utility even seeks final approval to build SMRs. SMRs are a yet unproven technology for which ratepayers should not have to pay. Costs associated with project delays, budget overruns, and cancelled projects will fall on ratepayers if this legislation is signed into law.

HB 1037 – Storm water management. Allows builders to sidestep local erosion control rules.

Support: HB 1380 Supplemental fee for electric vehicles. Provides that the supplemental fee to register an electric vehicle does not apply to a motor driven cycle

Healthcare

SB 002 “Under Senate Bill 2, those enrolled in the Healthy Indiana Plan — which covers low- to moderate-income Hoosiers between the ages of 19 and 64 — will need to either work or volunteer for 20 hours each week, with several exceptions for caregivers, disabled beneficiaries and more. That group is essentially the expansion population authorized by the legislature in 2015. The bill also moves toward retroactive eligibility, rather than presumptive eligibility, and restricts the advertising of Medicaid services.” (Indiana Capital Chronicle)

Thanks to advocacy from Hoosier Action and other healthcare advocates, SB 2 has been transformed from a highly damaging bill that would have threatened healthcare coverage for more than 750,000 low-income Hoosiers by making extreme changes to Indiana’s Medicaid programs, into a bill more narrow in scope. However, “work reporting requirements and quarterly eligibility checks remain in the bill. According to the fiscal analysis of this bill, all of these new requirements will ‘significantly increase costs’ of running Indiana’s Medicaid programs. Making Indiana’s Medicaid programs more complicated will also increase the likelihood of eligible Medicaid members losing their coverage. This includes elderly people, persons with disabilities, and children.” – Hoosier Action

HB 1004 retained a provision to strip nonprofit hospitals of their tax-exempt status under Indiana code as well as enhanced reporting metrics. The bill also allows the state to phase out the Healthy Indiana Plan, which covers low- and moderate-income Hoosiers, if federal funds are not allocated. (Indiana Capital Chronicle)

Support: SB 486 Family and social services matters. Requires county law enforcement to help incarcerated individuals eligible for Medicaid to apply for Medicaid before their release. Requires child care workers to be trained in pediatric first aid and CPR.

Support: SB 486 Family and social services matters. Requires county law enforcement to help incarcerated individuals eligible for Medicaid to apply for Medicaid before their release. Mandates insurers to respond within 60 days to Medicaid claims. Prohibits denying claims just because of lack of prior authorization. Requires child care workers to be trained in pediatric first aid and CPR.

Support: SB 119 Repeals the certificate of public advantage concerning hospital mergers. Removes the COPA (which approves hospital mergers) requirement. “Indiana is one of 19 states that have COPA laws, which allow hospital mergers that the Federal Trade Commission otherwise considers illegal because they reduce competition and often create monopolies.”
Learn more.

Immigration

SB 430 Grants for participation in the 287(g) program. Establishes the 287(g) agreement grant program, turning local law enforcement into federal immigration agents.
Although this bill passed out of the Senate, it did not receive a vote in the House.

HB 1393 Immigration notice. Requires a law enforcement officer to provide the name, address, and other identifying information to ICE after arresting or issuing a summons to an individual suspected of not being lawfully present in the United States. Will lead to increased racial profiling.

Other

HB 1461 Road funding allows the Indiana Dept. of Transportation to make interstates in Indiana into toll roads. (WFYI) An amendment to the bill increased the electric vehicle registration fees from $221 to $340 in 2026 and increased the hybrid registration fee from $74 to $170 in 2026. (Chicago Tribune)

HB 1390 primarily provides clarification on Bureau of Motor Vehicles procedures. However, the bill also includes language prohibiting advertising in any medium for products containing marijuana or listed as a Schedule 1 controlled substance. (WTVB)

Support: HB 1292 Professional sports development commission. Authored by local representative Earl Harris Jr. Establishes the northwest Indiana professional sports development commission. Authorizes the commission to study various plans and recommendations that are proposed with respect to attracting a professional sports franchise to northwest Indiana. Authorizes the commission to prepare a comprehensive master plan for building the facilities and other infrastructure necessary for attracting and developing one or more professional sports franchises in northwest Indiana. Creates the professional sports development fund.

Support: SB 142 Eviction issues. Automatically orders an eviction expungement (rather than requiring the tenant to request expungement) once the tenant has satisfied a money judgment. Indiana has one of the highest eviction rates in the country, and eviction records impact the ability to acquire housing in the future.

SB 197 Various property matters. SB 197 makes it a Class C misdemeanor, with a penalty of 60 days in jail or a $500 fine, to “camp” or sleep on public land. This does not fix the problems currently contributing to homelessness – like lack of affordable housing, lack of good-paying jobs, and skyrocketing healthcare costs. It will only compound these problems; criminalize vulnerable, nonviolent people; and reinforce the poverty cycle.
This bill did not pass the House

Property taxes

SB 001 Local government finance (renamed from the original) “SB 1 cut residential property taxes. About two-thirds of Hoosier families will see cuts of under $100 per year, and about half of those will see no property tax cuts. The wealthiest third of households will see cuts of $250-$300 per year. These residential tax cuts are very modest, but the business tax cuts are large. The legislation raises the minimum threshold for filing business property taxes from $80,000 to $2 million, phased in over a couple of years. This will exempt the vast majority of Hoosier businesses from any property tax…Altogether, this leaves a budget shortfall of more $1.4 billion in local government in Indiana over the next three years. With large cuts to local governments that will be made up by new income taxes, we should expect most Hoosier households to ultimately see a tax increase as a result of SB 1. In contrast, almost every Hoosier business will see big cuts.” (Journal & Courier) Amendments to this bill included the unprecedented dissolution of a local, rural school district. Read more at Indiana Capital Chronicle.

In closing: From MadVoters: Indiana is a cannabis-prohibition island. Illinois, Michigan, and Ohio have all legalized adult-use of cannabis, and Kentucky have legalized medical use. While these states are bringing in millions of dollars of revenue to help fund their healthcare, roads, and schools, Indiana is cutting millions of dollars in services:

In the state budget alone

We cut funding for special education.
We cut funding for childcare vouchers (CCDF).
We cut funding for On My Way Prek.
We cut funding for universities.
We cut funding for libraries.
We cut funding for public health.
We defunded PBS.
We defunded the Dolly Parton Imagination Library program.
We defunded the Indiana Commission for Women.

“Earlier this month, legislators learned the state would likely have to slash as much as $2 billion due to a revenue shortfall in the wake of President Donald Trump’s tariffs. As the session lurched to a close last week, lawmakers rescinded millions of dollars initially budgeted for different programs. That included cuts to local health departments and $3.675 million in annual state funds for Indiana Public Broadcasting Stations − the umbrella organization for the state’s NPR and PBS operations. (Illinois brought in more than $147 million in adult-use cannabis sales in March 2025 alone…Michigan took in over $276 million in adult-use sales in March 2025..)” (Courier & Press)