Johannes Poulard is a Republican candidate for Indiana State Senate, District 4.  He is one of two from that party and would take on any of the four vying Democratic candidates in the fall.  The seat is open after Karen Tallian-D Portage, vacated the northern Indiana area late in 2021. 

      He is the son of two immigrant parents who were both college professors.  His father came here from France in 1957 and mother first came to the United States from Germany in the early 1960s to study English at Otterbein College in Westerville, OH, where they met.

      He was born in 1971 at Jackson Park Hospital in Chicago, IL and they moved to Michiana Shores, IN in 1974, when he was three and a half years old.  He grew up and currently lives in the same house my parents bought in 1974 in Michiana Shores, so a life-long resident of the Michigan City area.

      Johannes grew up speaking both French and German and later, after moving to Michiana Shores, learning English while interacting with children my age.  Since college, he taught himself Russian, Ukrainian, and Georgian, all three of which he also speaks fluently. 

      His father has a PhD from the University of Chicago in Political Science, and has been a professor at IU Northwest from 1984 to 2020.  His mother had a PhD in English and taught at Chicago State University until she retired in 2000.  His father held a seat in the Michiana Shores Town Council and was even Town Council President for quite some time.

      Mr. Poulard is a practicing Orthodox Christian and attends Divine Liturgy at St George Russian Orthodox Church in Michigan City on a regular basis.

      He decided to run for Indiana State Senate because 2020 was an incredible year which saw phenomenal social and political upheaval in, not only in Indiana, but across the United States and the world.  The COVID pandemic, BLM protests, and a disputed presidential election caused 2020 to be a year that will go down in history, to say the least. 

      2020 was also the year where, for the first time, he felt a serious threat to all our freedoms that we, as Americans, have been accustom to for the past 230 years.  The pandemic and the overreaction of governments, to the pandemic with lockdowns, mask mandates, and later the vaccine mandates have made our political climate extremely volatile. 

       He has questioned the pandemic from day one, after listening to the media and hearing things that contradicted the basic science he has known from childhood.  Having read college level and premed level books on virology and epidemiology at sixth grade, he doesn’t believe that you can be contagious when you’re not symptomatic.  Johannes saw the shelter in place orders, worries that our church could not hold Divine Liturgies, yet big box stores, like Walmart were considered “essential.”  He saw his sales job suffer because many of my repeat customers have lost their businesses which they had put their entire life savings into. 

      The straw that broke the camel’s back, however, was when Michigan City’s mayor, Duane Parry ordered a curfew that forced his church to have our Paskha (Orthodox Easter) Liturgy starting at 6:00AM in 2020, instead of at midnight, as per Orthodox tradition.  The priest had to get a special blessing from our bishop to do this. 

      Johannes saw this and realized that there was an imminent threat to our most sacred liberties in the guise of a virus.  He vowed to himself, he would never let his rights, or the rights of anyone else, whether Orthodox, Catholic, Protestant, Jew, or any other religion to have our most precious right to religious freedom be infringed upon ever again.  He was further disgusted that a Republican governor would call for this shelter in place order.  This devout follower thought this was unacceptable.

      He attended his first freedom rally at the Indiana State House, shortly after Orthodox Easter in 2020 in Indianapolis on May First, 2020.  He met fellow patriots at this rally and joined their groups.  He sat on their steering committees and helped organize other rallies throughout 2020 and 2021 to fight the mask mandate, which Holcomb ordered at the end of July of 2020 and others.

      Mr. Poulard had been politically active for most of 2020 and 2021 and saw that we, the people, can effectively change policy by not just rallying and redressing our grievances, but by calling our politicians day in and day out.  Johannes found that he could effectively force companies to end their mask requirements in their stores by organizing boycotts of their stores.  He saw how effective this was.

      In late June of 2021, when universities, hospitals and other companies started to give their students and employees an ultimatum to either get the experimental COVID vaccine or lose their jobs, he felt it was time to run for office.

      Governor Holcomb has extended the state of emergency 32 times since March 17 2020.  This has to stop.  The people have spoken and we all want this state of emergency needs to end.  Holcomb, as per the Indiana State Constitution, should have called the Indiana General Assembly into an emergency session a long time ago, yet he has refused to do so.

      Johannes would propose to amend the Indiana State Constitution to limit the governor’s emergency powers and give the legislative power back to the General Assembly, where it belongs.  As the Indiana Constitution states currently, when the governor declares a state of emergency, he has the discretion to call the General Assembly into emergency session.  This basically means that the governor can issue a state of emergency and continuously extend it and issue edicts that effect everyone’s daily lives.  Basically ruling over Indiana like a dictator.

      One of the things he plans to do, once elected, would propose to amend the Indiana State Constitution to have the General Assembly automatically convene in an emergency session once the governor calls for a state of emergency.  The General Assembly, which houses the House and the Senate, is the legislative body of the Indiana State Government.  The governor is the Executive branch.  He cannot go on ruling by edict, as Holcomb has been doing since 2020. Thus it only makes sense, to give the power to the General Assembly to convene upon the declaration of a state of emergency, so we can prevent another 2020.     
      He has more ideas which would benefit Indiana, the 4th senate district, and the quality of life for all Hoosiers. See his Facebook Video, and his Youtube Video. You can see them on his website at www.johannesforindiana.com.  You can also contact him at (219) 814-3169.
More Articles You Might Be Interested in:

See More Candidate Radio Interviews Here

Sue Baxter

Susie Young Baxter, CEO, has published PanoramaNOW Magazine for 31 years. Her hobbies are Camping, Boating, Hiking, Nature, Gardening and Outdoor Activities. She is an Artist, Graphic Designer, an Avid Seamstress, Dabbles in Homemade Crafts and Landscaping. Since her Father was a Health Teacher, she also likes homeopathic Health Solutions. Since blogging started over 10 years ago, PanoramaNow has been added to Newsbreak – a national news affiliate.