Kansas Democrats are outpacing Republicans in new voter registrations since the 2018 primary election, another sign of the wave of energy the GOP is facing as this year’s elections approach.
Democrats have registered a net of about 21,000 more voters than Republicans during the last two years, state voter registration data show.
They have registered 50,907 new voters since 2018 primary, giving them a total of 486,947 heading into the Aug. 4 primary. They now make up 26% of all Kansas voters.
Meanwhile, Republicans have registered 30,099 new voters since 2018, giving them 819,863 or roughly 44% of state’s electorate.
At the same time, the number of unaffiliated voters has shrunk by about 24,000 since 2018, giving them 534,264 voters.
Democrats attributed the increased voter registration numbers to their presidential primary, which gave them an opportunity to attract new voters.
“This early recruitment positioned us to increase the number of registered Democrats statewide and engage with our membership early to lay a foundation for the August and November elections,” said Ben Meers, executive director of the Kansas Democratic Party.
Other Democrats see it as a sign that the Republican brand is tarnished after years of Sam Brownback as governor and former Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach making headlines over unsubstantiated claims of voter fraud.
“I think it’s a sign of how extreme the Kansas Republican Party has become in that they are leaving large swaths of voters who identify as independents or centrist Republicans,” said Democratic state Rep. Brett Parker.
“They’ve actively sought to purge those kind of people from their party.”
The registration numbers come at a time when Democrats are gaining steam in Kansas.
They took a congressional seat in the Kansas City suburbs and picked up more legislative seats in Johnson County.
This year, state Sen. Barbara Bollier is mounting a serious campaign to become the first Democrat elected to the U.S. Senate since 1932.
And Democrats are positioning to grab a seat in the 2nd Congressional District where Topeka Mayor Michelle De La Isla has been already outraising her potential GOP rivals.
Kansas Republican Party Chairman Mike Kuckelman wasn’t sure why Democrats were seeing more success at registering voters.
“Democrats must be working at getting people registered and we need to be working harder,” Kuckelman said.
“Apparently, the Democrats are active this election cycle in registering people, more than they have been historically,” he said.
“Obviously, that is something that is concerning to me and we’ll want to address that.”
Shannon Golden, executive director of the Kansas Republican Party, said the GOP is doing well nationally in voter registration, especially in battleground states.
In Pennsylvania, for instance, Republicans have registered about 165,000 voters since that state’s 2016 primary election while Democrats added about 30,000 even as they hold a 800,000 lead in voters over the GOP.
And a Democratic data firm recently found that while new voter registrations had plummeted during the COVID-19 pandemic, new voters registering in battleground states tended to whiter, older and less likely to be a Democrat.
“In Kansas, there is unmatched enthusiasm for President Trump and Republicans,” Golden said in an email.
“As the Democratic party continues to show voters a radical agenda like defunding the police, the Green New Deal and so on, more and more people will turn to the Republican Party and we welcome that.”
A large chunk of the increase can be traced to Johnson County, where voter registration for Democrats has jumped by 27,551, or 27.6%, since July 2018.
Republican registration in Johnson County over the same time, however, was up 4,824, or just 2.7%.
The issue is starker if you go back to 2016.
Since then, Democrats have registered 35,540 voters in Johnson County compared to 8,198 for Republicans.
At the state level, Democrats only have seen about 10,000 more new voters than Republicans when compared to 2016.
Democrats in Johnson County have worked to discourage moderates and progressives from employing a longtime strategy of registering as a Republican to counter the influence of conservatives in primary elections.
“If you consider yourself to be a moderate or progressive, and are registered as a Republican, then you are contributing to a ‘black hole’ in our political ecosystem that distorts everything from candidate recruitment to the allocation of resources from national and state level organizations for campaigns,” Johnson County Democratic Party Vice Chairman Greg Shalton wrote in The Kansas City Star in 2019.
“This distortion contributes to the political dysfunction that we all agree needs to end.”
The party has made a video trying to encourage people to match their political philosophy with their political affiliation.
It also dedicated a page on its website campaigning against the idea of registering as a Republican in an attempt to vote for a lesser candidate in the primary with the idea of electing a Democrat in the general election.
“Candidates will run for office if they believe they can win,” Johnson County Democrats argue on their website.
“And when voters affiliate with a political party that aligns with their priorities they are encouraging new or more candidates to run for office; because their votes in primary elections offer a path to victory.”
