Exit Mike Pence, enter Secretary of State, Todd Rokita.  The rumor, as I first saw it, appeared on twitter.  Todd Rokita was thinking about a potential challenge to Evan Bayh and joining, an already crowded field of those seeking to knock off our Junior Senator from Georgetown.  The rumor came from, what I consider to be, very reliable sources.  Then I started getting emails.  Finally, it made local and national news cycles and Rokita issued a statement.

“I continue to receive a lot of encouraging phone calls and emails from a diverse group of people. I certainly share Hoosiers’ concerns that we need real leadership in Washington – leadership that we simply aren’t getting today. As Kathy and I prepare for the birth of our second son, we still think and pray about how we can best serve Indiana in the future – this great state that we love.”

So is he or isn’t he running? We know Mike Pence isn’t. So what about Rokita? Well, we need to look at the challenges.  And first things first, the signatures.  If anyone knows the signature gathering rules better than anyone, it would be our Secretary of State.  With precious little time before the deadline for those signatures – filing deadline is February 19th – he’d probably have to pay to get the signature process done.  But don’t let that get in the way of your opinion.  Mike Pence would have had to do the same thing if he ran.

So, let’s assume Rokita get’s the signatures (which, again, is a big assumption with the deadline drawing so much closer).  Is he our best chance at finding someone to really challenge Evan Bayh? It’s hard to say if he represents our “best chance” – that was probably Mike Pence – as the Rasmussen poll that came out didn’t poll Rokita since he wasn’t part of the race.  That said, he has run two successful statewide campaigns for SoS and has decent name ID.

(Read more after the leap)

Of the candidates who are currently in the field, I consider John Hostettler the strongest current candidate running against Evan Bayh, which is backed up by the results in the Rasmussen poll.   My personal guess is if Rokita did jump in, his numbers would probably be similar to that of Hostettler’s.

One other thing to consider is the establishment vs. anti-establishment meme.  This is where I differ from my good friend Scott Fluhr who opines that “If he runs, Rokita could become something of an establishment candidate in a field of conservative outsiders. That’s a bad place to be in a year such as this.” While I agree with Scott that being an “establishment candidate” is a bad place to be this year, I wouldn’t qualify Rokita as as an establishment candidate.  Todd Rokita seems to ride the middle of that line.  He doesn’t have strong connections to Mitch Daniels or Richard Lugar (long considered establishment types), but he’s not exactly anti-government or anti-party either.  In that way, he can actually appeal to both crowds.  He’s not “owned” by any one group.

I know people have bemoaned his “social street cred”.  I personally don’t know how that came about.  I’m sure my social brethren can enlighten me, but I know Rokita to be strongly pro-life and strongly pro-second amendment.

Also, Rokita is coming to the end of his second and final term (due to term limits) as Secretary of State.  There have always been the rumors he would be seeking the governor’s office in 2012.  But with a two year gap between now and then (and with a looming potential run by Mike Pence for Governor in ‘12) time, in this case, may not be on his side.  Rokita’s name has been floated in the past for running for three different federal seats including Senate, as well as House in the 1st and 4th Congressional District seats.  Even though “Slippery Pete” Visclosky is still  under investigation by the House Ethics Committee, a Republican winning in the 1ST CD seems unlikely.  And Steve Buyer, despite his problems with his shady Frontier Foundation, appears to have another term practically locked up.  So time, in this instance, may be on his side.

As I mentioned before the biggest and most urgent hurdle for any Senate candidate in Indiana is the signatures needed to get on the ballot. If Rokita does run, he needs 500 unique signature of voters in each congressional district to get ballot access.  If that’s going to happen, Rokita needs to make his mind up, and soon, as to whether he will run or not.

So what do you think?