Brownback compares Value Them Both loss to the first battle of the Civil War

Former Gov. Sam Brownback is urging abortion opponents to keep up the fight after the failure of the Value Them Both amendment, even as other Kansas Republicans move to distance themselves from the political fallout.

In his first speech since the Aug. 2 election, Brownback compared the loss to the first major battle in the Civil War.

“The Union lost the First Battle of Bull Run of the Civil War,” Brownback told listeners on the Culture Shield Network’s weekly prayer call Aug. 28. “When you get this level of something that’s entrenched, it’s just very hard to dislocate. And we’ve just got to keep at it and got to keep fighting at it.”

Brownback, a former ambassador for international religious freedom in the Trump administration, was referring to the proposed Value Them Both amendment that sought to remove the right to an abortion from the Kansas Constitution. It lost a statewide vote by 18 percentage points.

Culture Shield Network, founded by longtime Wichita anti-abortion activist Donna Lippoldt, pushed unsuccessfully to remove ballot drop boxes statewide ahead of the vote. It has vowed to campaign against five out of six Kansas Supreme Court justices up for a retention vote in November in an effort to overturn the 2019 Hodes decision that said the Kansas Constitution included the right to an abortion.

Brownback — citing a Wall Street Journal column that contended Kansas legislators went too far with the Value Them Both amendment — acknowledged that a majority of Americans support abortion rights, especially early in a pregnancy.

“That’s just where the public is,” Brownback said. “This is a democracy, and so you’ve got to work through the system. And we will.”

Kansas Republican legislators placed the Value Them Both amendment on the Aug. 2 primary ballot before the U.S. Supreme Court, boosted by three conservative Trump appointees, overturned decades of federal protections for abortion rights. The decision energized abortion rights supporters ahead of the nation’s first post-Roe state referendum on abortion rights.

With the fall of Roe, Brownback suggested a more incremental approach to introducing new abortion restrictions in Kansas. If it were to succeed, it would result in a conservative takeover of the Kansas Supreme Court (to change the interpretation of the constitution) and local television news stations (to shape public opinion and serve as “mouthpieces” for the anti-abortion movement), he said.

Central to Brownback’s strategy is unseating a majority of Kansas Supreme Court justices in November or, if that fails, changing how justices are selected, giving power to the GOP-dominated Senate to confirm or deny an appointment to the state’s high court.

“We’re running into, in Kansas, the same thing we did federally where the U.S. Supreme Court was creating a constitutional right that’s not there,” he said.

Brownback said he supports a different approach to political messaging by abortion opponents. He said they should focus their energy on “targeting” the number of abortions performed on African American women and “remind(ing) people” that “there are very few Down syndrome babies because they all get aborted.” He said the short-term goal is reducing the number of African American abortions and Down syndrome abortions by 50%.

“I think we need to put these practical things in front of people,” Brownback said.

Another way to increase public support for abortion restrictions, Brownback proposed, would be creating right-wing partisan local news stations in Kansas.

“Something else I think we’ve just got to do is hope a group of conservatives can come in somewhere and buy a major TV station in the state — in Wichita, Topeka, Kansas City — to start getting out the news; instead of calling it the ‘anti-abortion forces,’ call them the ‘pro-life forces.’

“We need a Fox News in Kansas that’s an actual conservative — and like Fox or more conservative, but they can broadcast the local news in this state,” Brownback said.

The Associated Press Stylebook, adopted by The Wichita Eagle and other news organizations around the world, says not to use “pro-choice” or “pro-life” outside of quotations to remain neutral in reporting.

It’s unclear how much influence Brownback’s ideas will have on the Republican Party. There has not yet been a visible campaign against retaining Supreme Court justices in November.

Attorney General Derek Schmidt, Republican candidate for governor, did not respond to questions asking whether he supported Brownback’s suggestions. He told reporters Thursday that the election result “has to be respected going forward.”

Following the defeat, most GOP campaign messages have avoided abortion entirely. Instead, they aim to tie Kansas Democratic candidates, especially Kelly, to inflation and the Biden administration while Democratic campaign messages try to hitch Schmidt to Brownback, who left office in 2017 as one of the least popular governors in the country.

Lauren Fitzgerald, campaign spokesperson for Kelly, said the abortion issue has been decided and that Kelly is ready to focus on other priorities, such as “a balanced budget, cutting taxes, fully funding schools and attracting new businesses to the state.”

Danielle Underwood, spokesperson for Kansans for Life, part of the Value Them Both campaign, said in a written statement that the organization was not aware of Brownback’s comments.

“Looking into the future, Kansans for Life is focused on staying vigilant in our efforts to expose the lies of the abortion industry and its allies as they work to remove abortion limits,” Underwood said. “We are also planning to increase our efforts to inform everyday citizens about the dignity of the human person and the dangers of a predatory abortion industry.”

Ashley All, spokesperson for abortion-rights advocacy group Kansans for Constitutional Freedom, said it’s clear the fight over abortion rights will continue well beyond August, even though the vote sent a message that Kansas voters “believe women deserve the right to make their own private medical decisions.”

“Apparently, Sam Brownback and his supporters think they know better,” All said. “Abortion is already heavily regulated here. Kansans should be outraged by attempts to deceive voters with misinformation, attack our Kansas Supreme Court, and interfere with our private medical decisions.”