'Good question, um': Trump-backed Republican's telling stumble raises eyebrows

A GOP lawmaker who's endorsed by Trump struggled to answer a basic question about why voters should support Trump's call to unseat Republican Indiana state senators with retaliatory gerrymandering.

"Good question, um. Gosh, okay, defining issue. What's it about?" Republican state Rep. Michelle Davis from Indiana responded to a Politico reporter on Thursday. "Well, what I say, what it's about is, that we need real, true conservatives out there. We need someone who's going to stand with the GOP Party."

Davis was speaking at a conservative rally in Indiana hosted by Turning Point USA when the question seemed to catch her off guard. The question came as Trump seeks revenge for Virginia voters siding with Democrats and gerrymandering their state with a ballot measure that passed on Tuesday.

Indiana voters will have to decide during primary elections on May 5 whether to oust eight of their state's GOP lawmakers who refuse to get on board with Trump's demand to redistrict and water down the Democrats' advantage in Virginia. Republicans are looking for Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis to make a similar counterattack.

After stumbling over a few words, Davis said that primary voters need a candidate campaigning on "stuff like common sense, stuff like making sure that boys aren't in girls locker rooms, boys don't play in girls sports, making sure that we don't stand up for parental rights, yeah, those are the kind of defining things I think are out there."

Davis is running against state Sen. Greg Walker with Trump's endorsement, but she didn't mention him, the Politico article noted. She confessed, however, that "when I'm knocking on doors, not one person was talking to me about redistricting."