(Updated to include statement from Rep. Tracey Mann)
A petition for lawmakers to sign calling for a special session to redraw congressional boundaries was presented to Republican House members at their retreat Saturday in Wichita.
House Speaker Dan Hawkins on Monday confirmed that House members were given a petition to sign at the retreat where redistricting was discussed. It was not immediately known how many lawmakers signed the petition
Hawkins alluded to Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly’s comments at a Democratic Governors Association meeting where she urged her colleagues to fight back against Republican-backed efforts to draw new congressional districts in Texas.
Hawkins borrowed a Kelly quote from a Politico story where she said “there is a bigger risk in doing nothing,” saying she was “not a big believer in unilateral disarmament.”
“To quote Gov. Kelly, ‘there is a bigger risk in doing nothing,'” Hawkins said in a statement when asked about the petition.
The Senate Republicans will have a similar retreat Oct. 10 when another petition is anticipated to be circulated for signatures.
Meanwhile, U.S. Rep. Tracey Mann issued a statement late Monday, urging the Legislature to draw a new map. He is the first Republican member of the congressional delegation to call for a new set of election boundaries.
Momentum has been gradually building toward a special session in early November for redrawing the state’s congressional boundaries.
Many sources have said the date is set for Nov. 7 with a planned return for Nov. 21 to override an anticipated veto from the governor.
President Donald Trump ignited a national redistricting battle when he called on Republicans to redraw congressional districts in Texas to gain five additional seats in the U.S. House ahead of the 2026 midterm elections.
Missouri and California have already redrawn their boundaries, and Indiana may follow suit.
Any efforts to draw new district lines in Kansas would likely lead to a new map that carves up suburban Johnson County into multiple districts – potentially into as many as three – to give it more of a Republican flavor.
Johnson County has been a stronghold for U.S. Rep. Sharice Davids, the lone Democrat in the Kansas congressional delegation.
Davids has prevailed in two elections since 2022 when her 3rd District was redrawn to give her more rural areas in exchange for urban areas in Kansas City.
Davids has already suggested that a new map drawn by the Legislature would be challenged in court.
“Voters should choose their representatives, not the other way around, but Republican legislators are ignoring Kansas voters and forcing through Donald Trump’s unfair, gerrymandered maps,” David said in a statement Monday.
“They’re cheating because they know their policies aren’t popular and raising costs for folks. This isn’t how Kansans expect their leaders to act. It’s a power grab that silences voters and further divides our country,” she said.
Meanwhile, Mann came out in support of drawing a new map late Monday.
“Just like my Republican colleagues in the Kansas Legislature, I work every day alongside President Trump to get our country back on track and make America great again,” he said.
“Governors from New York, Illinois and California continue to gerrymander their states in a way that drowns out the voices of Kansans,” he said.
“I support the Kansas Legislature fulfilling their constitutional obligation to draw Congressional maps that ensure Kansans have a meaningful voice in Washington D.C.”
It was not known how many House members have signed the petition, although it is believed to be short of the required number of signatures to call a special session at this time. It is believed that maybe a dozen or so of the 88 GOP House members did not attend Saturday’s retreat for various reasons.
Multiple sources said that Republican House members have been warned that they could be under tremendous political pressure if they opt not to sign the petition.
Sources also said that lawmakers who don’t agree to sign the petition might expect to get a call from the president urging them to get on board, a move that many believe could be effective at drumming up the support needed for a special session.
For instance, in Indiana where the Trump administration has applied pressure on lawmakers to draw a new congressional map, one of the state’s first lawmakers to oppose to mid-decade redistricting is “now a rock solid HELL YES.”
The reversal came after two weeks after the lawmaker and his colleagues met with Trump’s administration on redistricting. The Indiana governor has said a special session is likely.
Kansas Republican legislators also have been invited to a conference in Washington, D.C., to meet with representatives of the Trump administration on Oct. 15.
While redistricting is not specifically on the agenda for that meeting, it could give the Trump administration a chance to lobby any legislators soft on redistricting.
The Legislature needs support from two-thirds of its members to call a special session on its own, something it has done only once in state history – back in 2021 when it convened to battle against federal health mandates.
The Senate is believed to have the 27 signatures needed for a special session, although support in the House is murky at best with conflicting views about whether it has the 84 needed to call a session.
There is a sense among some House Republicans that trying to draw new congressional lines could bring with it political repercussions that will alienate a cross-section of Kansas voters and cost the GOP its supermajority.
There’s also an idea that drawing new congressional lines could hurt efforts to pass a constitutional amendment calling for judicial elections next spring if it appears that the GOP is trying to take a greater control of the government.
