2026 Legislative Agenda
MARRIAGE AND FAMILY
SUPPORT: Senate Bill 78 – “Wireless Communication Device”—PASSED
This bill requires schools to adopt a policy that either prohibits students from bringing cell phones, tablets, and smart watches to school or mandates that such devices be stored away during instructional time.
SUPPORT: Senate Bill 88 – “Good Citizen Instruction”—PASSED
This bill mandates that part of the Good Citizenship Instruction include teaching the importance of obtaining a high school diploma and other training before entering the workforce, securing full-time employment, and waiting until marriage to begin having children. Research shows that young adults who follow the success sequence have dramatically lower rates of poverty in adulthood.
OPPOSE: Senate Bill 109 – “Confidentiality of Terminated Pregnancy Reports”—DEAD
After a healthcare provider performs an abortion, the provider submits a terminated pregnancy report to the Indiana Department of Health. This bill attempts to make the report confidential and not disclosed to the public. However, having these reports disclosed to the public is the primary oversight and enforcement mechanism over illegal abortions.
SUPPORT: Senate Bill 119 – “Grooming”—PASSED
This bill expands protections against child predators and sex offenders by prohibiting these offenders from working or volunteering at facilities or events primarily directed for children. The bill also renames the offense of “inappropriate communication with a child” to “sexual grooming,” which covers repeated contact with a child under 14 intended to make them more susceptible to future sexual conduct.
SUPPORT: Senate Bill 139 – “Jury Duty Exemption for Women Breastfeeding”—PASSED
This legislation provides a jury duty exemption for women who gave birth in the last year and are currently breastfeeding.
SUPPORT: Senate Bill 159 – “School Technology Plans and Policies”—DEAD
This bill requires schools to implement policies that enable parents to exercise control over a student’s school-issued technology device while the student is not at school, including strengthening certain filters, blocking access to websites or content, and limiting the use of the device.
SUPPORT: House Bill 1408 – “Restrictions on Social Media Use for Minors”—PASSED
This measure requires social media platforms to seek verifiable parental consent for adolescent users (under 16) to be account holders and defaults Indiana adolescents’ accounts into a highly restricted, parent-supervised version of the platform, with certain addictive features disabled such as no targeted algorithms, limited messaging, no public discoverability, and built-in time controls.
SUPPORT: Senate Bill 236 – “Abortion Inducing Drugs”—DEAD
This bill creates civil remedies to address abortion pill trafficking in our state. The bill imposes liability on anyone who manufactures, distributes, prescribes, or provides an abortion-inducing drug that results in the wrongful death or injury of an unborn child or pregnant woman, and authorizes the mother or father to bring a wrongful death claim for the death of an unborn child. In addition, the bill authorizes private citizens to bring lawsuits against individuals who violate the law, with financial penalties and attorney’s fees awarded to successful plaintiffs. Finally, it authorizes the Attorney General to bring an action on behalf of the state to protect the interests of unborn children and Indiana residents.
OPPOSE: Senate Bill 269 – “Young Peer Support Programs”—DEAD
This bill authorizes school-based peer mental health programs and requires schools to offer annual, confidential online mental health screenings to students in grades 7, 9, and 11. While parents must be notified, the bill does not require affirmative parental consent for the screenings themselves. This expands school involvement in student mental health in ways that can bypass meaningful parental oversight, allowing students to be screened and potentially referred without direct parental engagement. Universal screening risks over-identifying normal adolescent struggles as disorders, labeling students unnecessarily, and triggering avoidable referrals, further shifting primary mental health decision-making away from parents and toward schools. Schools should educate, not medicalize.
OPPOSE: House Bill 1011 – “End of Life Issues”—DEAD
This bill allows individuals with a terminal illness to request an attending physician to assist in the individual’s suicide.
SUPPORT: House Bill 1035 – “Permissible Unsupervised Activity”—PASSED
This bill provides that a child is not a child in need of services solely because a parent allows the child to engage in an unsupervised, independent activity, including playing outside, riding their bike, or walking to school.
SUPPORT: House Bill 1349 – “Government Abortion Funding”—DEAD
This bill would prohibit state and local government employers in Indiana from using taxpayer dollars to pay for or reimburse abortion procedures or abortion-related travel for their employees. In other words, a city, county, or state agency could not create a special benefit to cover abortion costs using public funds. It is aimed at preventing government employers from offering abortion reimbursement programs like those adopted in some other states.
GENDER AND HUMAN IDENTITY
SUPPORT: Senate Bill 182 – “Sex Definition/Birth Certificates/Men in Women Prisons/Boys in Girls Bathrooms”—DEAD
This bill would define the terms “sex,” “male,” “female,” and “gender” for the entire Indiana Code. It would also ensure that the sex designation on an individual’s birth certificate cannot be changed. This bill would protect women in women’s prisons from having gender-confused men live with them. This bill provides safety and privacy for girls and women in K-12 schools and colleges and universities from having to share restrooms, locker rooms, and housing facilities/overnight stays with boys and men.
RELIGIOUS FREEDOM AND NATIONAL IDENTITY
SUPPORT: Senate Bill 174 – “Medical Freedom”—DEAD
This bill provides expansive medical freedom protections in many areas. Among its core provisions, the bill would prevent schools, employers, health care facilities, and higher education institutions from mandating medical interventions, including vaccinations, and from penalizing or excluding individuals who choose not to receive them. The bill also requires a parent to be physically present before a School-Based Health Center may provide medical care and limits schools from conducting mental health screenings or medical assessments except in emergent medical situations. In addition, it promotes transparency by requiring schools and childcare programs to disclose the ingredients in the foods they serve so parents know what their children are consuming.
SUPPORT: House Bill 1086 – “Display of the Ten Commandments”—DEAD
This piece of legislation would require schools to place a durable poster or framed picture representing the text of the Ten Commandments in each school library and classroom. A similar bill was passed in Louisiana in 2024. During session, the Indiana bill was later amended to include the Ten Commandments as a protected writing instead of a display in all classrooms.
SUPPORT: House Bill 1196 – “Employment and Vaccinations”—DEAD
This bill would fortify employees’ rights to refuse immunizations required by their employer, with a civil penalty of $5,000 per violation.
SUPPORT: House Bill 1224 – “Indiana Vaccines Adverse Event Reporting”—DEAD
This bill establishes an Indiana Vaccination Adverse Event Reporting System for childhood vaccines. Such a system allows regulators and scientists to identify unusual or rare patterns that may signal a potential safety concern requiring further study. Having state-specific adverse event data also enables policymakers to assess local impacts rather than relying solely on national trends.
SUPPORT: House Bill 1389 – “Religious Liberty for Adoption and Foster Care”—PASSED
This piece of legislation would prohibit the state from discriminating against adoption agencies, foster parents, foster care providers, or adoptive parents based on their religious beliefs.
FAMILY PROSPERITY
SUPPORT: Senate Bill 76 – “Immigration Matters”—PASSED
This comprehensive immigration enforcement measure strengthens state and local cooperation with federal immigration authorities by requiring government bodies to honor federal immigration detainer requests and establishing enforcement mechanisms. The bill also bans knowingly hiring unauthorized workers, requires certain reporting on immigration-related data, and sets training and inspection requirements for county jails.
SUPPORT: Senate Bill 250 – “Hemp Regulations”—DEAD
This bill, most importantly, closes the loophole that has allowed intoxicating products like delta-8 and similar compounds to be sold with minimal oversight and significantly tightens THC limits. It also creates a comprehensive regulatory system for hemp-derived cannabinoid products in Indiana. The bill imposes strict age restrictions, location limits, advertising rules, and testing and labeling requirements, and treats products that do not comply as illegal marijuana under state law. While marketed as “hemp,” these products often contain concentrated THC compounds from the same cannabis plant as marijuana and can be equally or more intoxicating than traditional marijuana products. Overall, it restructures the hemp market to limit access to potent, largely unregulated THC products and place them under stronger state control.
OPPOSE: House Bill 1038 – “Relocation of Gambling Operations”—PASSED
This measure would allow the riverboat casino located in the City of Rising Sun to relocate its gaming operations to a casino in either Allen, DeKalb, Steuben, or Wayne Counties.
SUPPORT: House Bill 1099 – “Foreign Adversaries”—DEAD
This bill strengthens current law by placing new limits on certain foreign individuals and companies buying land, receiving government contracts, or accessing sensitive academic programs in Indiana. Countries such as China, Iran, Russia, and North Korea are engaging in cyberattacks, theft of trade secrets, and other efforts that threaten American security and economic strength. Limiting their access to strategic land, technology, research, and public contracts is intended to protect Indiana’s economy, national security, and local communities.
OPPOSE: House Bill 1191 & Senate Bill 286 – “Legalizing Marijuana”—DEAD
Both bills significantly change Indiana’s approach to marijuana. While HB 1191 does not create a regulated retail market, eliminating criminal penalties for possession of up to two ounces effectively makes personal possession lawful in practice. SB 286 would create a fully legal, regulated adult-use cannabis market with taxation and a state oversight commission. Marijuana legalization increases adult use, expands retail access, and normalizes consumption, which can lead to greater youth exposure, higher rates of impaired driving, accidental ingestion of high-potency products, and other risks to children and community safety. Read more here.