The FFRF Action Fund’s opening “Theocrat of the Week” for 2026 is Indiana Gov. Mike Braun for recently filing a federal lawsuit to reinstall a Ten Commandments monument on the Indiana Statehouse lawn.
Braun, alongside Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita, ushered in the new year by asking a judge to vacate a longstanding ruling that bans a Ten Commandments monument from being placed on state Capitol grounds. After a Ten Commandments monument was vandalized outside the Statehouse in 1991, a replacement monument was constructed in 2000, dedicated to the Ten Commandments and, to a lesser extent, the Bill of Rights and the Preamble to the 1851 Indiana Constitution.
The Indiana Civil Liberties Union (currently known as the ACLU of Indiana) successfully filed a lawsuit to prevent the monument from being placed on the lawn. Now that federal courts lean conservative, Braun and other Christian nationalists are reigniting efforts to reinstall the religious monument on state grounds.
“This monument reflects foundational texts that have shaped our nation’s laws, liberties, and civic life for generations,” Braun stated in a press release. “Given the clear shift in constitutional law and the long history of similar displays across the country, we ask the court to lift this outdated injunction. Restoring this historical monument is about honoring our heritage and who we are as Hoosiers.”
Rokita boasted that the Ten Commandment monument belongs on state grounds because it serves “as a reminder of core principles that have guided our nation.” (By such ignorant and divisive statements, the governor and attorney general are callously disenfranchising the 34 percent of Hoosiers who are not Christian, including the almost a third who are atheists, agnostics or have no religious affiliation.)
Although the Supreme Court no longer applies the Lemon test that its decision in the Indiana Ten Commandments case was predicated on, federal and state governments still cannot favor one religion over another, or religion over nonreligion. Judges across the country have repeatedly blocked impositions of the Ten Commandments.
Braun and Rokita’s effort to install a religious monument at the Indiana Statehouse are an egregious attempt to merge church and state. It is shameful that the governor is violating his oath of office to uphold the secular Constitution, including the First Amendment’s language barring government establishment of religion.
FFRF Action Fund is a 501(c)(4) organization that develops and advocates for legislation, regulations and government programs to preserve the constitutional principle of separation between state and church. It also advocates for the rights and views of nonbelievers, endorses candidates for political office, and publicizes the views of elected officials concerning religious liberty issues.