As Armando Corpus joyfully blew his kazoo on the corner of Hohman Avenue and Fayette Street in Hammond Tuesday evening, he wondered what the donors were eating inside the digs across the street.
Corpus, of Highland, is the chef for the St. Joseph Catholic Church soup kitchen down the block from The Banc, where the NWI Development Group and Republican Indiana Victory Committee PAC hosted a $10,000-a-plate dinner for Governor Mike Braun. For the 200 people who come through his chow line, $10,000 “would do a lot of good.”
Nick Egnatz, of Munster, uses a megaphone during a protest outside a fundraiser attended by Indiana Gov. Mike Braun for the Indiana Victory Committee at The Grand Reserve in Hammond, Indiana on Tuesday, December 2, 2025. (Andy Lavalley/for the Post-Tribune)
“In a city struggling to recover, it’s so effing rude,” Corpus said of the dinner. “Every opportunity we have to defy this regime, we should take it.”
Around 30 protestors braved the frigid weather outside the nearly $20 million mixed-use development, which formerly housed Bank Calumet, as Braun and his donors dined inside at $10,000 a pop. Hammond Police blocked off Fayette Street, which runs perpendicular to the building, and the protestors, who at one point stood in the building’s vestibule to warm up, were moved across the street.
Absent from the peaceful protest was its original ringleader, Mayor Thomas McDermott Jr. McDermott over the weekend posted about the event and said Braun’s camp reached out to his Chief of Staff Scott Miller several times to let them know his posts posed “a security risk,” a point with which McDermott vehemently disagreed because he was within his First Amendment rights.
When reached by text Tuesday night, McDermott was less defiant.
Steve Jarzombek, of St. John, holds a sign above his head during a protest outside a fundraiser attended by Indiana Gov. Mike Braun for the Indiana Victory Committee at The Grand Reserve in Hammond, Indiana on Tuesday, December 2, 2025. (Andy Lavalley/for the Post-Tribune)
“I was strongly discouraged from attending the protest … as such, it was better for me to leave it to the democratic officials who ran the protest,” McDermott said, referring to Hammond Common Councilmen Alfonso Salinas, D-3; and Scott Rakos, D-6.
Earlier Tuesday morning, McDermott announced on WJOB that he and Braun were meeting at Meats by Linz, which would be the first time he and the Governor were meeting in person, according to what McDermott told the Post-Tribune Monday. When asked if that meeting had anything to do with his not showing up Tuesday night, he demurred.
“I really can’t get into that … without getting myself into more hot water,” he said.
But McDermott’s absence didn’t ruin the protestors’ good time at all. Bob Cavallo, of Hammond’s Hessville neighborhood, tried to crowdsource a ticket to the shindig so he could talk to Braun and other attendees about the redistricting battle going on in the Indiana House of Representatives earlier Tuesday.
Jim Zmuda, right, talks with a Hammond police officer during a protest outside a fundraiser attended by Indiana Gov. Mike Braun for the Indiana Victory Committee at The Grand Reserve along Hohman Avenue in Hammond, Indiana on Tuesday, December 2, 2025. (Andy Lavalley/for the Post-Tribune)
“If I had $10,000, I’ll go in there for a drink. Anyone?” Cavallo said jokingly. “But this redistricting is crap. I looked at the new map, and I knew it was going to be bad, but it shocked me; there are 150 miles between one corner of Lake County to the other corner in Marshall County.”
Rakos pointed out that the city, at its Monday night Common Council meeting, learned it won’t receive a Community Crossings matching grant for its roads for 2026.
“It’s not just the gerrymandering,” Rakos said. “The governor’s paid no attention to Hammond and won’t work with the mayor, and now we’re losing (Community Crossings). It’s a mess,” he said.
“There are starving kids, and they’re paying $10,000 a plate to eat. It’s a disgrace,” Jessica Morgan, of Cedar Lake, added.
Javier Silvares, of Highland and a soup kitchen volunteer with Corpus, joined him on the kazoo. Born in Spain, he knows what authoritarianism looks like.
“I was born under (Spain dictator Francisco) Franco, and I saw what the first stages (of authoritarianism) look like,” Silvares said. “The U.S. is supposed to be the richest country in the world, but the difference between classes is so huge, you can’t say it’s fair.
“But I do think we make a difference by being out here.”
Michelle L. Quinn is a freelance reporter for the Post-Tribune.
