Unprecedented as it was, Donald Trump’s decision to launch a nationwide mid-decade gerrymandering campaign last year made some raw political sense. He clearly thinks it’s important that his party hang on to its governing trifecta in Washington and knows the odds for continued GOP control of the House are low on both historical and public-opinion grounds. At the same time, the midterm House battleground is small enough that rigging a relative handful of elections might make a big difference. Trump’s remarkable power over Republicans everywhere made it feasible for him to order sudden gerrymanders in states where the GOP is all-powerful, particularly since the U.S. Supreme Court has removed most judicial limitations on partisan gerrymandering. His exercise of brute power over congressional mapmaking spurred surprisingly effective Democratic countermeasures in California and Virginia, making the whole proposition iffy, but you can understand why Republicans tried it.

What’s less rational is the obsession Trump and his MAGA allies are exhibiting over the setback they experienced in Indiana, where last December the GOP-controlled state Senate rejected a new congressional map that would have extinguished the state’s Democratic representation entirely, netting two new House seats. It was a galling defeat, to be sure, which involved defiance of direct orders issued by Trump, J.D. Vance, Governor Mike Braun, and U.S. senator Jim Banks. And it was an emotional defeat for some would-be gerrymanderers, who conceived of it as a kind of tribute to the recently assassinated MAGA leader Charlie Kirk. “They killed Charlie Kirk — the least that we can do is go through a legal process and redistrict Indiana into a nine-to-zero map,” Banks reportedly said at one gathering to plot the Hoosier gerrymander.

Still, the whole mid-decade gerrymandering campaign was simply a means to an end, not some matter of deep principle. You’d think Trump and his friends would move on and focus on making the best of the congressional maps they will actually face in November.

But no. As Politico Playbook reports today, the desire to wreak vengeance on Indiana’s rebellious Republicans burns bright in the White House and in affiliated groups like Club for Growth and Talking Points USA that had devoted a lot of time to the failed gerrymandering plan:

Trump hasn’t forgotten about the political defeat a group of Hoosier Republican state senators dealt him in December when they voted down his plan to redraw the state’s congressional map.Now, MAGA’s best effort at retribution is hurtling toward them in the form of a more than $5 million national money parachute into the Hoosier State ahead of Indiana’s May 5 primary.Hoosier Leadership for America, Sen. Jim Banks’ political nonprofit run by Andrew Surabian, the longtime Team Trump operative and close adviser to JD Vance and Donald Trump Jr., plans to carpet-bomb seven state Senate races with $3 million alone, according to a person familiar with the strategy. Turning Point USA and Club for Growth are expected to join the effort.

Trump hasn’t forgotten about the political defeat a group of Hoosier Republican state senators dealt him in December when they voted down his plan to redraw the state’s congressional map.

Now, MAGA’s best effort at retribution is hurtling toward them in the form of a more than $5 million national money parachute into the Hoosier State ahead of Indiana’s May 5 primary.

Hoosier Leadership for America, Sen. Jim Banks’ political nonprofit run by Andrew Surabian, the longtime Team Trump operative and close adviser to JD Vance and Donald Trump Jr., plans to carpet-bomb seven state Senate races with $3 million alone, according to a person familiar with the strategy. Turning Point USA and Club for Growth are expected to join the effort.

Millions of dollars in state-legislative races in a place like Indiana is a lot of money, which could probably do some good in competitive general elections there and elsewhere. But you get the sense from what MAGA folk are saying that keeping an iron grip on the GOP is more important than actually winning elections:

“Every RINO who was foolish enough to oppose redistricting will be crushed in their upcoming primaries,” Alex Bruesewitz, the Trump adviser who came to Indiana twice last year to rally support for a redraw, told Playbook. “They’ve betrayed not only their constituents but the entire nation.” …“Simply put, they’re about to face a wave of conservative activism that they’ve never had to see and compete with in their careers,” [said] Brett Galaszewski, Turning Point Action’s national enterprise director.

“Every RINO who was foolish enough to oppose redistricting will be crushed in their upcoming primaries,” Alex Bruesewitz, the Trump adviser who came to Indiana twice last year to rally support for a redraw, told Playbook. “They’ve betrayed not only their constituents but the entire nation.” …

“Simply put, they’re about to face a wave of conservative activism that they’ve never had to see and compete with in their careers,” [said] Brett Galaszewski, Turning Point Action’s national enterprise director.

Perhaps these Trump satraps are just following the boss’s orders or seeking to assuage his bruised ego after an unanticipated rebuff. It does seem, however, that the pure joy of the RINO hunt, the endless determination to wipe out dissent, has become an end in itself.

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