Good morning:
Hope everyone had a festive and safe Thanksgiving holiday weekend. Also, we hope you are not adversely affected by the winter storm striking the Midwest today.
It’s time to catch up on political news you may have missed throughout the week but still need to know.
Outgoing Gov. Jeff Colyer kept everyone working right up until the close of business the night before Thanksgiving when he signed an executive order extending parental leave to more than 17,000 state employees.
And charges were brought in the cases of two severe beatings at Larned State Hospital. The incidents happened in October, and the state still won’t discuss the matter or if chronic staffing shortages there were a contributing factor.
Let’s look at what else happened last week:
Medicaid expansion a heavy lift?
There’s lots of enthusiasm about the prospects of expanding Medicaid with the election of Democrat Laura Kelly as governor. Kelly campaigned on expanding Medicaid and has said she would like to see that accomplished this upcoming session.
But The Associated Press’ John Hanna looks at the difficulties ahead with a Legislature that will lean more conservative after this year’s general election. Senate Majority Leader Jim Denning has already said he wants any Medicaid expansion paid for, and Republican state Rep. Dan Hawkins, a candidate for House majority leader, tells The AP he’s looking for ways to stop it.
In other Medicaid expansion news, a lawsuit was filed last week in Idaho to block that state from expanding Medicaid after it was overwhelming approved by voters Nov. 6. Here’s coverage from the Idaho Statesman and The Associated Press.
Last week, a judge in Maine ordered outgoing Republican Gov. Paul LePage to implement Medicaid expansion that had been approved by voters last year.
LePage plans to appeal, but a new Democratic governor said she plans to implement it after she takes office in January. So LePage’s court fight may be for naught.
Also, new research due out next year will reveal that college students are most supportive of expanding Medicaid.
David Matsa, a finance professor at Northwestern University, recently wrote about the study he did with Amalia Miller at the University of Virginia that examined who voted for Medicaid expansion when it passed in Maine last year.
Matsa suggests in this piece for USA Today that college graduates may have played a key role in voters passing Medicaid expansion this year in Nebraska, Idaho and Utah.
Sharice Davids backing Pelosi
During her congressional campaign, Democrat Sharice Davids wouldn’t say whether she would support Rep. Nancy Pelosi for House speaker or whether she had attended Pelosi’s donor conference in the Napa Valley last summer. On Saturday, the congresswoman-elect announced her support for Pelosi.
“I have said time and again that whoever would get my vote for speaker had to have a plan for fixing the way business is done (or more recently, not done) in Washington,” Davids said in a statement posted on her website.
“That’s why I appreciated that Leader Pelosi has embraced input from new voices on rules changes that we’ll be voting on as soon as the new Congress is sworn in and I’ll continue to push for that vote,” Davids wrote.
“The proposed new rules include measures that would give the public enough time to read bills before they’re voted on, help end the brinkmanship around the debt ceiling that repeatedly threatens our country’s economy, make it easier to bring measures that have broad support to the floor for a vote, make it harder to raise taxes on the middle class, and generally restore regular order to the House.
“These are good ideas that will begin to make Congress work better for the American people.”
Davids tweeted out her statement on Saturday. It attracted 479 comments as of Sunday morning and had been retweeted about 3,600 times and liked 18,000 other times. Pelosi also tweeted out Davids’ statement as well.
.@ShariceDavids, these — and other issues — are the priorities of the people who have been brushed aside by the Republican special interest agenda. Together, we will deliver progress and fairness. Thank you for your support. —NP pic.twitter.com/Y9kn63jvrZ
— Nancy Pelosi (@TeamPelosi) November 25, 2018
While Davids’ statement was generally well received (lots of “thank yous”), Kansas Republicans had this to say on Twitter:
Who saw that one coming… 🙄#ksleg #2020 #PelosiPuppet https://t.co/I02sSBkj8I
— Kansas GOP (@KansasGOP) November 24, 2018
Republican state Rep. Bill Sutton of Gardner added this on Twitter: “We all expected this. Her coaches just wouldn’t let her say it until after the election.”
Dodge City’s hired gun
The Associated Press last week profiled Bradley Schlozman, the legal eagle hired by Ford County Clerk Debbie Cox to fight the American Civil Liberties Union over the county’s decision to move Dodge City’s polling site to the outskirts of town where it’s not easily accessible.
Schlozman is a former U.S. Justice Department official in the second Bush administration who backed Georgia’s voter ID law, which critics said would dilute minority voting strength and was ultimately struck down as unconstitutional when a judge compared it to a poll tax.
But he also came under criticism nine years ago for using political ideology in hiring Justice Department attorneys.
KU & guns
The Lawrence Journal-World took a look at the impact that concealed-carry has had on the University of Kansas campus.
After 15 months, the LJW found that one violation of gun policy has been reported and that no gun crimes were reported.
There were four other weapons policy violations, but they involved knives, the newspaper reported.
There were no weapons-law arrests in 2017 and no violations so far in 2018, the paper reported.
Climate change predicted to hurt Midwest farmers
A new federal report out last week forecast that Midwest farmers may be more at risk from climate change because of warmer and more humid weather conditions that will hurt their crops.
The report by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration predicts tough times for farmers who, without new technological advances, will see the agricultural economy dip to levels not seen in roughly 30 years.
Here’s coverage from the Chicago Tribune, ABC News, Fox News and the Washington Post via the Harrisburg Patriot-News. Michigan Public Radio also takes a Midwest angle.
Schwab promises a new style
Republican Secretary of State-elect Scott Schwab wants to keep the office out of the media spotlight as he takes over for the outgoing Kris Kobach. “People want things to calm down,” Schwab bluntly tells The Associated Press.
Schwab is already willing to give up the power of the office to prosecute election fraud, although he differs with a proposal to strip the office of the authority to appoint commissioners in Johnson, Sedgwick, Wyandotte and Shawnee counties.
Here’s The AP’s interview with Schwab and how he plans to change the office’s approach and the legislative issues he will likely be confronting in the upcoming legislative session.
Kansas House Republicans dodge disaster
When the votes are finally certified in Kansas, the Republicans and the Democrats should draw even for this midterm election.
It could have been worse for the GOP, especially with a president and a gubernatorial candidate who evoked such deep passions (certainly not the warm fuzzies) with voters.
The president’s party has lost an average of 424 legislative seats nationwide in midterm elections since 1902, the National Conference of State Legislatures reports.
This year, just more than 330 seats nationwide changed hands from Republican to Democrat.
Only six chambers — Colorado’s Senate, Maine’s Senate, Minnesota’s House, New York’s Senate and both chambers in New Hampshire — shifted from Republican to Democrat this year. In President Barack Obama’s first midterm election in 2010, Democrats lost 24 chambers nationally.
The changes won’t be nearly as dramatic in Kansas, where Republicans will still control 85 seats to the 40 held by Democrats after this year’s election.
It was far different in 2010, when House Democrats suffered severe damage as the country saw the rise of the tea party.
In 2010, Kansas House Democrats lost 16 seats, far more than the losses House Republicans incurred in President Donald Trump’s first midterm election this year.
LGBT successes
Brandon Woodard and Susan Ruiz broke new ground in Kansas when they became the first openly LGBTQ members elected to the state Legislature on Nov. 6. But those successes were part of a wave that transcended Kansas and set a record.
Governing Magazine reports that openly gay and transgender people will set a record next year with 129 serving in state legislatures. The previous record was 119.
The magazine reports that seven states hadn’t elected an openly gay or transgender legislator before this year. Kansas was among three of those states that did during this election cycle.
Hardy addresses legislative changes
Republican state Sen. Randall Hardy of Salina isn’t predicting much change following the 2018 elections. “I see things working similar to how they worked the last couple years,” Hardy tells the Abilene Reflector-Chronicle. “A lot of what we accomplished was bipartisan anyway. I don’t see a huge departure from that. Philosophically, we’re going to be about the same.”
Citizens grand jury cleared to probe Kobach
The Kansas Supreme Court last week cleared the way for a citizens grand jury in Douglas County to investigate outgoing Republican Secretary of State Kris Kobach.
The court issued an order Tuesday refusing Kobach’s second request to review a state appeals court ruling that Douglas County District Court must convene a grand jury to investigate the allegations against Kobach. Similar grand juries have been used to investigate obscenity at the Overland Park arboretum and abortion clinics in Johnson and Sedgwick counties.
The secretary of state’s office is accused of not properly registering voters who completed applications at the driver’s license office or on the Department of Revenue’s website. Check out this AP story for more background.
Legislative musical chairs
Democrats will meet this week in Topeka and Wichita to pick senators to replace Gov.-elect Laura Kelly in District 18 and her running mate, Lt. Gov.-elect Lynn Rogers in District 25.
Precinct committee members will meet Thursday to select a candidate for District 18. State Rep. Vic Miller is believed to be the front-runner to replace Kelly.
Meanwhile, precinct committee members will meet next Saturday to pick the replacement for District 25.
Attorney Kelly Schodorf, the daughter of former state Sen. Jean Schodorf, is believed to be the only candidate for the seat that Rogers is vacating.
Humphries running for GOP caucus leader
Republican state Rep. Susan Humphries of Wichita is running for majority caucus leader.
In a letter sent to Republicans, Humphries said she would bring collaboration, administrative structure and creativity to the position.
“I am committed to work with leadership, with each of you, to design subject matter conversation that will be varied, informative and applicable,” she wrote in a letter to House members.
“Leveraging the deep experience that so many of you bring, with the spirit of readiness to learn and contribute from our newer numbers, inspires me to press forward in January.”
KDHE spokeswoman leaving
Theresa Freed, deputy secretary of public affairs at the Kansas Department of Health Environment, resigned last week to take a job in the public information office with Johnson County government.
During her time with the state, Freed also worked as the communications director for the Kansas Department for Children and Families as well as public information officer for the Kansas Department on Aging.
Freed has bachelor’s degrees in broadcast journalism and political science from the University of Kansas.
