Kansas governor race: Kelly and Schmidt set to collide in November after easy primaries

Kansas Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly and Republican state Attorney General Derek Schmidt are heading into a knockout fight this fall as Kelly attempts to become the first Kansas governor since 1968 to win reelection while their party controls the White House.

The governor’s race is expected to ramp up dramatically now that Kelly and Schmidt have officially won their parties’ respective nominations.

The Associated Press called the Republican race for Schmidt and the Democratic race for Kelly at 8 p.m.

Neither candidate faced a significant primary opponent. Former Gov. Jeff Colyer, a Republican who was running against Schmidt, dropped out nearly a year ago after a cancer diagnosis. The end of Colyer’s campaign cleared the way for Schmidt, who quickly secured the support of the Kansas Republican Party establishment.

Kelly and Schmidt have, in effect, already been running a general election-style race since September 2021. Their campaigns – and outside groups on both sides – have collectively sunk millions into building up their operations and attacking the other side.

But the fight over an amendment to strip abortion rights from the Kansas Constitution, as well as contested Republican primaries for attorney general and secretary of state, had until now captured public attention even as Kelly and Schmidt continued to skirmish.

The focus will soon shift to the governor’s race. A massive battle lies ahead that will turn in large measure on whether voters believe they, and Kansas as a whole, are better off now than when Kelly was first elected four years ago – and who voters believe offers the most promising path for Kansas in the years ahead.

“I think it’s just going to be a tale of the tape,” state Rep. Ken Rahjes, an Agra Republican, said. “Are you better off?”

Both campaigns keep focus on Kelly’s record

In 2018 Kelly ran as the answer to Kansas’ budgetary woes following tax cuts championed by Republican Gov. Sam Brownback. She promised to improve the state’s child welfare system, improve public school funding and expand Medicaid.

The governor has made changes to the foster care system, including reaching a settlement agreement in a lawsuit that requires that children must not sleep in offices and receive a mental health screening. She also signed legislation that brought education funding into compliance with the state constitution, but she hasn’t been able to get Medicaid expansion through the GOP-controlled Legislature.

Both Republicans and Democrats have centered the race about Kelly’s record. Schmidt has seized on shortcomings by Kelly’s administration, such as persistent problems processing unemployment benefits at the Kansas Department of Labor.

Kelly, on the other hand, is touting a litany of economic development projects, capped by Panasaonic’s announcement that it intends to build a $4 billion battery factory in Johnson County. Unemployment is at a record low, Kelly notes, and the state budget surplus has never been larger.

“I am sensing the same sort of support that I had in 2018 from a host of folks from across party lines,” Kelly told reporters recently. “I’m also an incumbent governor at this point so I have to spend a whole lot more time actually just doing my job.”

In an election night message Kelly touted her economic record.

“The same politicians who drove our state into the ground want the keys back,” she said. “And they’ll take us back to the days where extreme political ideologies won over basic common sense.”

Schmidt, a former state senator from Independence who has been the state attorney for more than a decade, is arguing Kelly is out of touch with Kansans, pointing to early pandemic lockdowns and mask mandates. During his time as attorney general, he has sued the Biden administration over federal vaccine mandates and battled Kelly over expanded food assistance.

Schmidt has used the Kansas Attorney General’s Office to bolster his conservative credentials after a more moderate tenure as a state senator, signing on to lawsuits challenging Biden and Obama administration policies. He also supported a baseless lawsuit challenging the 2020 election results.

“Derek Schmidt is the most well-positioned challenger to an incumbent governor in Kansas history,” Schmidt’s campaign manager C.J. Grover said in a statement. “Voters have responded to Derek’ positive message of a bright future with commonsense leadership and are ready to turn the page on Laura Kelly’s disappointing administration. Kansans know Derek, they’ve spent time with him, they’ve shared their priorities with him and they know he shares their values because he listens - unlike Governor Kelly.”

His campaign is working to link Kelly to Democratic President Joe Biden, whose low poll numbers come at a time of rising inflation not seen in the United States in 40 years. Schmidt has proposed eliminating income taxes on retirement benefits as a way to attract more people to the state.

“During the next 98 days of this campaign, we will continue to work tirelessly to earn the support of every Kansan in every community in every county in our state. Our citizens want and deserve effective, commonsense leadership guided by Kansas conservative values,” Schmidt said Tuesday.

Historical trend goes against governors when party holds White House

Former Gov. John Carlin, the last Kansas Democrat elected governor during a Democratic presidency, said it will be challenging for Kelly and Democrats to communicate her achievements. Carlin was elected to his first term in 1978 when President Jimmy Carter was in office.

“But I think the projection in the future is ‘You vote for Kelly and you will get more of this good leadership and direction for infrastructure and for economic development,” Carlin said.

Throughout modern Kansas history, Republicans and Democrats have regularly traded control of the governor’s office. But another rule that has also held firm over the past 50 years is that incumbent governors don’t win reelection when their party also holds the presidency.

The last incumbent governor to accomplish this was Democrat Robert Docking, who won his first reelection in 1968 when President Lyndon Johnson was in office.

Carlin said the Kelly-Schmidt race is close. He emphasized the importance for Democrats to find the right way to promote her accomplishments, especially on economic development.

While Carlin acknowledged that some may tire of hearing about Brownback, he argued Kelly has a strong case to bring up the former governor on that topic. Brownback appointed a commerce secretary, Antonio Soave, who resigned amid allegations of fraud and financial misdeeds.

“With all this success, why would we want to go back to where the state didn’t do anything about economic development?” Carlin said of Kelly’s record, including the Panasonic deal.

Former Gov. Jeff Colyer, a Johnson County Republican who led the state for one year after Brownback resigned to take a diplomatic role in the Trump administration, said Kelly was already underperforming.

Colyer said money sunk into the race should have given Kelly a commanding lead heading into the general election but she didn’t appear to have that. And he said Panasonic won’t be quite the boon Kelly is hoping for. It’s a large announcement but the details of the deal, millions in incentives and no job guarantees, could weigh it down.

Colyer said Schmidt should have an easy case for why voters should abandon Kelly.

“There’s plenty there from how she’s handled COVID to our economy should be bursting at the seams and we’re not. We still haven’t made up for the number of people employed in the state of Kansas whereas all of our neighbors have,” Colyer said.

But he noted that Schmidt still has work to do explaining what he plans to do in office.

“I think he probably needs to have a sharp edge of why he deserves the job and what he can do,” Colyer said.

Schmidt has proposed eliminating income taxes on retirement benefits as a way to keep and lure people to the state. He advocated for legislative efforts to cut the state’s food sales tax and eliminate pension debt earlier this year.

Kelly this spring signed bills paying down pension debt and gradually ending the food sales tax over several years after she had called for an immediate total elimination.

Republicans say Kelly is overselling her own economic record at a moment of high inflation and that the Panasonic deal was the result of bipartisan cooperation, including a massive $829 million incentive package approved by the Republican-controlled Legislature.

Some Republicans and Democrats opposed the package, however.

“It really is going to be up to folks to determine, ‘Do we trust this kind of money as far as giveaway?’” said state Sen. Molly Baumgardner, a Louisburg Republican who voted against authorizing the incentives.

“Can we trust that as much as we trusted what was happening in the Department of Labor and other agencies that were led by this administration?”

In Kelly’s first campaign for governor, she faced Republican Kris Kobach, who at the time was the Kansas secretary of state. Kobach, who frequently courted controversy in office, was a more divisive candidate than Schmidt.

The extreme contrast between Kelly and Kobach helped the Democrat in 2018 by framing the race in stark terms

“People in general didn’t view him too favorably,” state Sen. Cindy Holscher, an Overland Park Democrat, said of Kobach. “Derek Schmidt is a little bit undefined to a lot of people.”

Kelly and her allies have been trying to define Schmidt by suggesting he is a successor figure to Brownback, who remains an unpopular figure in Kansas. The Kansas Values Institute has run a series of ads linking the two politicians.

“If that’s the best they have … there’s been two other governors since he went on to other things,” Rahjes said.

“Those of who that are hardcore into politics, that live and breathe all these different things, I think that probably has a bigger impact than the average voter.”

Pyle’s independent run could cause headaches for Schmidt

State Sen. Dennis Pyle is also running an independent campaign for governor, but it’s unclear what effect it will have on the race. Pyle on Monday said he had submitted nearly 8,900 signatures to qualify for the November ballot, more than the 5,000 required. The Kansas Secretary of State’s Office will now verify the signatures.

Pyle has been a Republican in the Kansas Senate, but changed his registration this summer to mount an independent, hard-right campaign. When he began campaigning in June, he said he was running “due to the continual gross negligence in protecting and assisting citizens.”

If Pyle mounts an aggressive campaign, he’s most likely to draw Republican voters and unaffiliated voters dissatisfied with Schmidt. In 2018, Greg Orman’s independent campaign was credited with aiding Kelly.

Orman was a much more centrist candidate than Pyle and he is believed to have attracted some independent and Republican voters who viewed Kobach as too extreme, despite fears he would also pull voters from Kelly. Because of his right-wing record, Pyle is unlikely to draw voters away from Kelly, however.

Little public polling has been released on the governor’s race. Surveys by Morning Consult this spring placed Kelly’s approval rating at 55% and disapproval at 34%, but didn’t ask about a matchup between Kelly and Schmidt.

Campaign finance reports released last week revealed that Kelly has more than doubled Schmidt’s fundraising during 2022, raising $1.5 million to Schmidt’s $707,279 between Jan. 1 and July 21.

Kelly has also spent more than Schmidt this year —$2.1 million compared to $509,000. But Schmidt has more cash on hand to spend this fall, $1.5 million compared to Kelly’s $1.3 million.