Well of course Kansans decided to elect Laura Kelly to another term as their governor. Yes, it was close — did anybody expect otherwise? — but while this is famously a Republican state, it’s not a reliably conservative state.
There is a difference, even now. We know that because Sunflower State voters overwhelmingly rejected the “Value Them Both” abortion amendment in August.
We know that because Kelly beat conservative Kris Kobach to win the governor’s office in 2018.
We also know that because Kansas Republicans have won an outright majority of votes for the state’s top office just three times in the last 30 years. One of those was conservative Sam Brownback’s first run in 2010 — he squeaked by with just 49.8% of the vote for reelection four years later. The other two times were accomplished in the 1990s by Bill Graves, a moderate who had to fight off challenges from his right flank.
And we know that because over those same three decades, Kansans have not-infrequently chosen to send Democratic women to Cedar Crest — Joan Finney, then Kathleen Sebelius twice, and now Laura Kelly twice.
In a state known for its redness, conservatives keep missing out.
Did Derek Schmidt know that history? It’s hard to believe he didn’t — the outgoing attorney general has been around Kansas politics for a long time. In any case, he took a look at the state’s tradition of electing moderates to the governorship, and then chose to run straight to the right.
Transgender youth athletes. Drag shows. A video endorsement from Donald Trump. Schmidt ran an angry, ugly campaign that didn’t talk all that much about how to make Kansas a better place to live. Nor did he didn’t try to appeal much beyond his right-wing base. He lost.
Laura Kelly won. So what’s next?
Probably not as much as she’d like. Kelly had some good items on her agenda — during the closing week of the campaign, she talked about good ideas like finally expanding Medicaid and legalizing medical marijuana. We know that Medicaid expansion is popular, with more than two-thirds of Kansans in support, and the state is one of the last remaining holdouts against medical marijuana. It’s time to join the 21st century.
BUT THERE’S A huge obstacle: the Kansas Legislature, which remains overwhelmingly in the hands of Republicans — and they’ll be in no more mood to cooperate with her than they have been over the last four years. Which is to say, not very much. Kelly handed out vetoes right and left during her first term in office, and it’s likely she’ll have to do more of the same during her second. There just isn’t a lot of room for her to operate.
That shouldn’t stop her from trying, particularly on Medicaid expansion. It’s not just popular — voters in red states such as Missouri and South Dakota have now passed it into law — but it’s also needed by the tens of thousands of Kansans who would benefit from medical coverage they can’t otherwise get and by rural Kansas hospitals that were struggling financially even before the pandemic. It’s the right thing to do.
And that’s the thing: Despite Schmidt’s efforts to paint Kelly as another out-of-control progressive, the stuff that Kelly wants to do — the stuff she can do — is far from out of the mainstream. She ran a campaign that talked constantly of bipartisanship and steering toward the middle, and maybe that’s the only way a Democrat can get elected or govern in Kansas. But it’s also apparent that voters actually like that stuff.
There’s evidence that approach can produce positive results: Grocery taxes in the state will soon start coming down because both Kansas Republicans and Kelly agreed that was the right thing to do. There will be more opportunities to accomplish good things for Kansans over the next four years. But the only way to get it done will be if both sides meet in the middle.
