Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations

Now A Libertarian, Former GOP Chair Will Try To Unseat Tim Brown

John Pickerill / Facebook

A week after he announced he was stepping down as head of the Montgomery County Republican Party, John Pickerill now says he’ll run for the Indiana House.

Pickerill says he'll seek the Libertarian nomination to run against House Ways and Means Chairman Tim Brown.

The party's state committee will decide those nominations in two weeks.

Pickerill unseated an incumbent chairman three years ago by a single vote.

Since then, he's been battling rivals within the party who he charges haven't followed a true conservative line.

He complains Republican legislators shut down an attempt to have the General Assembly proclaim the federal health care law unconstitutional, and charges Indiana's new education standards are just a rebranded version of Common Core.

Pickerill found himself at odds with a more moderate wing of the Montgomery County Republican Party headed by Crawfordsville Mayor Todd Barton – a moderate wing that won two-third of precinct committee seats in May’s primary election, signaling the beginning of the end of the tenure of the now-former chairman.

Pickerill also lost his own campaign for a county council nomination in May.

Unlike some Republicans nationally, Pickerill says his exit has nothing to do with Donald Trump.

He says Trump's success illustrates voters' dissatisfaction with the major parties' ability to represent them.