‘Building a lot of relationships’: Davids campaigns for rural votes in redrawn district

Rep. Sharice Davids was nearing the end of a campaign stop at a rural bed and breakfast 33 miles southwest of downtown Kansas City when someone asked about her priorities as a new member of the House Agriculture Committee.

“I can tell you right now my priority on the Ag Committee is to learn,” Davids replied.

It’s the kind of question Davids, a Democrat representing Kansas’ 3rd Congressional District, will be hearing a lot more from now on.

After the state Supreme Court upheld a Republican-drawn congressional map that added a swath of largely white, rural areas southwest of the Kansas City metro to the 3rd District – while removing half of diverse, urban Wyandotte County – the two-term congresswoman is trying to quickly adapt. She faces a tough re-election fight in a year where Republicans nationally appear poised to make gains in Congress.

Davids asked to join the House Agriculture Committee last month, providing a boost to her agricultural and rural bona fides. And after Davids formally launched her re-election campaign at a brewery in Mission on Tuesday evening, her first campaign stops the next day were in rural areas previously outside her district.

The outreach underscores the transformation of the 3rd. What was previously an almost entirely urban and suburban district full of independents and Democrats centered on Johnson and Wyandotte counties is now a more geographically expansive area that also includes Miami, Franklin and Anderson counties. While the district is still composed of a large number of metro area voters, it now includes additional rural voters who often vote Republican.

The district’s new, rural areas are also less racially and ethnically diverse. Wyandotte County is 40% non-Hispanic white, for instance, compared to 92% in Miami County and 93% in Anderson County.

Repeatedly, when Davids is asked about the new voters who have been added to her district she answers the same way: she will listen and learn. With four months until the November general election, that promise has become a prominent part of her campaign.

On Wednesday at Casa Somerset, a bed and breakfast outside of Paola, Davids, one of the first two Native American women elected to Congress, told a crowd of a few dozen about how her past work with tribal communities had involved working with the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) on rural development.

She also said she had recently participated in her first Agriculture Committee hearing.

“We were talking about the dairy provisions in the farm bill that was coming up and I was furiously writing notes because in addition to learning the language of ag, I need to learn a lot about the markets, about what’s covered and what isn’t,” Davids said.

Davids’ likely Republican opponent, businesswoman Amanda Adkins, also doesn’t have an extensive agricultural record. A former Cerner executive, Adkins chaired the Kansas Republican Party a decade ago. The PAC of the Kansas Farm Bureau, an influential group among farmers and other rural residents, hasn’t endorsed in the 3rd District race but is supporting Republicans in every other congressional race in the state.

Still, Republicans have an electoral advantage in rural areas that will likely aid Adkins. In the 2020 presidential election, former President Donald Trump won Miami and Franklin Counties by a little under 40 percentage points and won Anderson County by more than 56 percentage points.

Republican Rep. Jake LaTurner, who represented both counties until redistricting, won 66% of the vote in both counties in 2020.

“I have spent extensive time in Miami, Franklin, and Anderson counties and have heard time and again concern regarding Joe Biden’s policies supported by Sharice Davids,” Adkins said in a statement. “Citizens in these counties deserve a real plan to cut inflation, provide energy security, and keep our communities safe.”

In May, prior to the Kansas Supreme Court’s decision on the congressional map, the 3rd Congressional District Republicans hosted a pot luck at the Paola Country Club. Adkins spoke at the event, focusing her pitch on tying Davids to Biden and inflation, echoing President Ronald Reagan with the question, “Are you better off today?”

Adkins’ campaign declined a request for an interview on outreach to the new counties in the district.

Davids, speaking to reporters this week, emphasized the importance of listening to constituents in the new areas of the 3rd District. Asked about Biden, Davids said she’s “here to represent the Kansas 3rd.”

“We don’t need another divisive, extremist voice in Congress because all that does is take us backwards. I think we all know that I have an opponent who has aligned herself with some of these extremist politicians,” Davids told supporters at her campaign launch, before noting Adkins’ longtime connections to Republican Gov. Sam Brownback.

Rural votes important

Davids is unlikely to win the new counties in her district given their Republican lean. But in a tight race, reducing the size of losses in those areas could prove crucial to defeating Adkins.

Brian Biggs is the type of voter Davids will need to make that happen. Biggs co-owns Hedgewood Farms, a family farm near Paola focused on sustainable organic agriculture, and came out to Casa Somerset to hear from the congresswoman.

A self-described centrist, Biggs said he doesn’t decide who to vote for until the day before the election. Biggs said he didn’t know much about Adkins, but called Davids “impressive” based on what he had read about her.

“As far as I know, she’s off to a good start,” Biggs said.

Paul Davis, former Democratic leader of the Kansas House who ran an unsuccessful campaign for the 2nd District in 2018, said people were always receptive when he campaigned in rural areas. The new rural parts of the 3rd District were previously in the 2nd District.

“I think in rural areas, showing up counts for a lot and people appreciate anyone who is willing to show up and attend community events and listen to people’s concerns,” Davis said. “There’s no doubt that is tough territory for any Democrat, but I think Congresswoman Davids is wise to spend some time there and listen to people’s concerns and demonstrate to people she will represent them.”

Dakotah Parshall, chair of the Miami County Republican Party, said voters locally have been more receptive to Adkins than Davids, however.

“The concerns I have heard time and time again are that voters in these three rural counties feel that they will have inadequate representation with Sharice Davids,” Parshall wrote in an email.

On the other side of the region, Democratic Rep. Emanuel Cleaver spent years building relationships in the rural areas of his Missouri district, which before redistricting this year stretched from downtown Kansas City to the eastern edge of Saline County for 10 years.

While he no longer has rural counties in his district, Cleaver recounted spending a lot of time attending rural football games and going to small-town festivals. He said that time helped him earn the trust of people who would have otherwise never voted for him.

Davids will have to do the same in her district, Cleaver said, and remind voters that Kansans in Johnson County face similar challenges to those in Miami County.

“It’s going to take time,” Cleaver said.

Cleaver said that every year, he spends Halloween at his congressional office in downtown Higginsville handing out candy to children who trick-or-treat down mainstreet. One year, a man came right up next to him, looked him in the eye and said “I’m going to vote for Donald Trump… and then I’m going to vote for you.”

“People felt connectivity with people with whom they had some contact,” Cleaver said.

Making connections in new district

Davids began her speech at Casa Somerset by acknowledging the task ahead, calling the meet and greet the “beginning of really building a lot of relationships up in the new parts – particularly in the new parts – of the Kansas 3rd Congressional District.”

Davids’ efforts to build connections on Wednesday also included stops at several businesses in downtown Ottawa.

At a guitar store, Davids listened to an impromptu banjo recital and discussed with employees whether the band Nickelback has a Kansas connection — they’re Canadian. She also took in the aroma of a nearby store that sells goat milk soaps.

And she shook hands at a local eatery, Roasted Cafe. Owner Angela Hooper said Davids’ office had assisted the restaurant in obtaining pandemic aid after LaTurner’s office had been unhelpful.

Kathye Knight watched as Davids worked the room. Knight, who recently moved to Ottawa after spending time in Texas and North Carolina following the death of her husband, said she’s politically “probably off a little bit” from Davids.

Davids supports abortion rights and has made the topic a regular part of her campaign, especially since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade last month. Knight said abortion is difficult for her to accept, saying she has “spiritual feelings about what’s happening to a baby before it’s born.”

Knight’s uncertain about what she’s looking for in a candidate. Still, she said, “I can’t expect that person to just be like me.”

John Coen, president and CEO of the Ottawa Area Chamber of Commerce, said the community tends to vote Republican, “but is more moderate in composition.”

Mike Kuckelman, chairman of the Kansas Republican Party, predicted Davids will struggle to win over new voters, and may lose voters who supported her in earlier elections, given the state of the economy. Inflation is at a four-decade high, sending the costs of food and other goods rising.

“I don’t think you can just say she’s going to struggle in rural areas,” Kuckelman said. “She is going to struggle with her past voters, too. I think she’s gonna lose voters that supported her previously.”

But state Sen. Ethan Corson, a Prairie Village Democrat who was previously the executive director of the Kansas Democratic Party, said Davids more than most politicians is well equipped to handle a district with substantial new area.

The key is her willingness to listen to constituents, he said, echoing Davids’ own comments.

“I think she’s going to do, really, at its most basic what a representative should do,” Corson said. “Which is listening to concerns in these communities.”