According to Sen. Roger “Doc” Marshall, nothing says “I love Kansas” like scheduling seven taxpayer-funded flights to Florida to “visit his children and grandchildren.” While Marshall is soaking in those Sunshine State sunsets and perhaps enjoying steaks at Hyde Park Prime, he’s undoubtedly assiduously pondering strategies to handle the critically waning Ogallala Aquifer or spitballing ideas on how to fix his state’s broken foster care system.
Sure, sure. But then there’s that pesky little bugaboo called “reality.”
Based on last week’s bombshell reporting by Politico and The Star, Marshall blew $4,500 in taxpayer dollars visiting his $1.2 million “vacation” home in Sarasota, Florida.
While this is nothing compared to the hard-earned tax money he spends heroically fighting against the “vulgar mockery of Christian faith” at the Paris Olympics opening ceremony, or joining the intrepid reporters on Fox News to make demonstrably false claims that Google supposedly suppresses news stories about Republican political candidates, using public funds for private purposes happens to be, ahem, illegal.
But that’s not even the half of it. And Marshall should know better. After all, as any mediocre student of history (or political scandals) knows: It’s not the crime that gets you — it’s the cover-up.
But before we get there, a little background.
Before being elected to Congress, Marshall was delivering babies as an OB-GYN in Great Bend. Just after he became a senator in 2021, he sold his five-bedroom, four-bathroom house there faster than you can say “heartland values” and moved into a cozy one-bedroom, one-bathroom “ranch” in nearby St. John to live out the rest of his halcyon days as he teeter-totters back and forth between the Sunflower State and the swamplands of D.C. to do the people’s work.
Now he has scored a sprawling, $1.2 million three-bedroom, two-bath “vacation” home on Florida’s Gulf Coast. Marshall — who makes $174,000 a year as a senator, after years as a physician — charged taxpayers $4,500 for seven trips to Sarasota in 2021 so that he could conduct “official” business on his behalf of his beloved Kansas constituents — and apparently also to visit his grandkids over the holidays.
Like most grandparents these days, perhaps Marshall didn’t want to burden his children, who live with their families in Sarasota, by staying in the guest bedroom, so he took it upon himself to purchase a McMansion nearby. Such a selfless sacrifice.
But here’s the truth: If loving Kansas means not living here, the Kansas GOP has this down to an art form. Take former Sen. Pat Roberts, for example, who kept a cozy recliner at the home of two donors and called it his local residence. Hey, at least Marshal upgraded from a recliner to 300 acres — progress, right?
But here’s the thing: If you’re going to claim Kansas as your home when all evidence points to you soaking up Florida’s beaches, at least try to obfuscate better.
Kansas deserves more than sloppy deceptions about primary residences and taxpayer-funded flights to paradise. Maybe take a page out of Missouri Sen. Josh Hawley’s playbook: Use a family member’s address in your home state. Or better yet, get a little more creative. Tell us you’re living in an underground Kansas bunker. Just make it good, because the “ranch” story is wearing thin.
So, Senator, next time you try to convince Kansans you’re one of us, remember: When your idea of “home” is a cozy getaway in Sarasota while you pretend to live in a cabin smaller than a lot of your constituents’ garages, it’s going to take more than good old-fashioned Kansas charm to pull the wool over our eyes. We like our fibbers at least to try to make it believable.
About the author: Ben Stelter-Embry is a native Kansan and resident of Prairie Village. A former teacher and journalist, he practices civil rights and product liability law in Kansas City.
