(Updated to include comment from Watkins campaign)
Kansas Treasurer Jake LaTurner announced Wednesday morning he hired political consultant Pat Leopold in his primary bid to knock off Republican incumbent Steve Watkins in the 2nd Congressional District primary.
Leopold served as Watkins’ campaign manager last year. He worked as chief of staff for former Congresswoman Lynn Jenkins and helped get her elected in 2008.
He was paid $2,500 by the Watkins reelection campaign as recently as April 1 and another $2,500 on Feb. 1, federal campaign finance reports show.
“Pat has tremendous experience winning elections in the 2nd Congressional District and will be a huge asset to my team,” LaTurner said.
“We are delighted he has chosen to join us as we work hard to earn the support of the voters and ensure that the seat stays in Republican hands next November.”
Watkins campaign fired back, arguing that the hiring of a political consultant has little to do with the issues voters care about
“The only people who care about political consultants are political consultants – particularly one who asked to be hired back by us less than a month ago,” campaign spokesman Bryan Piligra said in a statement.
“This race is not about D.C. insiders, it’s about the Republican Primary voters who came out to support Steve Watkins in 2018, and they are going to turn out for the Congressman in 2020,” he said.
Leopold’s hiring is seen as another defection from the Watkins team as the 2020 election approaches. Watkins hired a number of Jenkins’ staffers when he went to Washington this year.
However, he recently lost Colin Brainard as his chief of staff. Brainard had worked formerly as deputy chief of staff for Jenkins.
Watkins has been battling rumors and innuendo in recent weeks and speculation that he would resign.
He went so far as to try to cut those rumors off by issuing a statement saying he was the subject of a whisper campaign. He later posted on Twitter that he wasn’t resigning.
Last week, LaTurner announced that he was dropping out of the U.S. Senate race to run for Congress at the urging of former Gov. Jeff Colyer.
LaTurner was in Johnson County on Tuesday night, where he told a Republican audience that Watkins demonstrated a “general lack of seriousness” as a congressman.
“Serving in Congress is a serious job,” LaTurner said after the meeting. “I think that maintaining the seat in Republican hands is a very big deal.
“In order to do that, it takes a lot of fundraising, a lot of coalition building throughout the district, it takes a lot of hard work that I and a lot of others feel has been lacking.
“It is deadly serious making sure Nancy Pelosi doesn’t get another vote from Kansas.”
Leopold recently joined with Jenkins to form the lobbying firm, LJ Strategies LLC. He also has been hired to run Sara Hart Weir’s campaign for Congress in the Kansas 3rd District.
