‘Our vote is diluted’: Voters in north KCK adjust to GOP-dominated U.S. House district
Natalie Barge walked out of a Wyandotte County candidate forum Saturday carrying a lawn sign with U.S. Rep. Sharice Davids’ name on it.
The 84-year-old Kansas City, Kansas, resident voted for Davids in prior elections but when she goes to the polls next month Davids, the only Democratic incumbent in Kansas’ federal delegation, will not appear on her ballot.
Instead, she’ll have a choice between Republican U.S. Rep. Jake LaTurner and his Democratic challenger Patrick Schmidt.
When Kansas lawmakers redrew congressional lines this year. they split Wyandotte County along Interstate 70. The southern half of the county remained in Kansas’ 3rd Congressional District with Johnson County, while the northern half was moved to Kansas’ 2nd Congressional District, which stretches from the state’s northeast corner down to the Oklahoma border.
“I’m not happy with the change at all. I want to vote, and I want to vote for who I want to vote for,” Barge said, though she said she would support Schmidt.
“This is a new learning curve, as they call it. When you get to be as old as I am, learning curves are kind of difficult.”
For the first time since the 1980s, candidates in the 2nd district are speaking to voters in Wyandotte County, the state’s most diverse county and one that is considered a Democratic stronghold.
The county has spent the last 40 years sharing a district with suburban Johnson County. But when 2020 Census data showed the counties were now too populous to share a district in their entirety, GOP lawmakers split the county in two.
As Nov. 8 approaches, voters are frustrated by the change, worried fears they expressed throughout the redistricting process of a critical dilution of their voting power, have come true.
“Our vote is diluted for the next 10 years,” said Roy Robinson, a Wyandotte County resident, who now lives in the 2nd district. Robinson, a 76-year-old member of the local NAACP, was unsure whether a Democrat could win the 2nd district and represent northern Wyandotte County in the near future.
2012 Kansas Congressional map
Though one predicted consequence of the map was reduced turnout in Wyandotte County, Tom Alonzo, one of the plaintiffs on a failed lawsuit to block the new map, said he believed voters were still fired up to retain judges, and reelect Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly. However, he said he didn’t believe Schmidt or LaTurner were always spending adequate time in the area.
“I think there’s a lot of people who still think Sharice is our congressperson,” Alonzo said. “I’ll bet you half of the Republicans here, people who say they’re Republicans, don’t know who Jake LaTurner is.”
LaTurner is barred from holding official events in Wyandotte before the election, as it is not part of his current district. But he said, speaking to The Star at a GOP bus tour campaign stop at the Frontier Justice gun store in KCK, that he was still working to campaign in the area.
Republicans, LaTurner said, need to be willing to go to regions where people may disagree.
“My theory has always been … that you can’t take anything for granted. You have to work hard for every single vote,” LaTurner said. “You know, obviously, when it comes the registration, Wyandotte County is a heavily Democrat county. But that doesn’t matter to me.”
During the KCK stop earlier this month, LaTurner appeared alongside other Republican candidates up and down the 2022 ballot. He asked Wyandotte County residents for their votes as he leaned into conservative rhetoric about a “wide open border.”
Wyandotte County commissioners voted to bar local law enforcement from cooperating with federal immigration authorities earlier this year, prompting Republicans in the Kansas Legislature to pass a law making the practice illegal.
“I have seen how the drug cartels have never had more money than they do right now,” he told the crowd during the appearance in the state’s most diverse county.
Schmidt, the Democratic nominee, told The Star he has been spending at least one or two days a week in Wyandotte County knocking on doors and speaking to voters at churches. Barge, the 84-year-old voter, said Schmidt’s appearance at churches made her comfortable supporting him.
The Navy veteran from Topeka has sought to convince voters that the new district remains winnable for a Democrat by leaning on the voters who supported Laura Kelly in 2018 and voted against a GOP-backed constitutional amendment on abortion in August.
No single geographic area, he said, is key.
“I see opportunity in every place that we go,” Schmidt said. “I think there are different shades to these challenges but overall, whether it’s social security, medicare, whether it’s childcare, whether it’s finding good jobs, healthcare, every county has some version of these problems.”
LaTurner had a money advantage heading into October with nearly $820,000 cash on hand compared to Schmidt’s more than $313,000 cash on hand, according to campaign finance reports. Both candidates had spent roughly $600,000 on the race through September.
Replacing Lawrence
It’s possible northern Wyandotte County could play the role Lawrence played in the district for the last 10 years. In addition to adding Wyandotte County to the 2nd District, lawmakers moved Lawrence into the vast 1st Congressional District, which covers western and central Kansas.
“For a Democrat running in the 2nd, Wyandotte County is definitely going to be very important,” said Paul Davis, a Lawrence Democrat who came within a percentage point of winning the 2nd district in 2018.
“The key for a Democrat winning in the 2nd under its old composition was really being able to run up the numbers in Douglas and Shawnee counties to offset the numbers in rural areas. I think the same is true for the new 2nd district,” Davis said. The key is going to be to run up the numbers and have a strong margin coming out of Wyandotte and Shawnee counties.”
That dynamic was on display at the NAACP candidate forum Saturday. Though candidates of all parties were invited only the Democrat, Schmidt, attended.
But, Mike Kuckelman, chair of the Kansas Republican Party, said the party has always spent some time in Wyandotte County, noting the election year bus tour had stopped at the same KCK gun store in 2020 and 2022. The party message about inflation and crime is relevant regardless of where a candidate is campaigning, he said.
Though Wyandotte County leans Democratic, Steve Fitzgerald, a former Republican state senator who represented parts of Wyandotte and Leavenworth counties, said LaTurner could find reliable support in the western part of the county.
That area, he said, was connected to southern Leavenworth county.
“It’s very similar development of the area and the older communities there like Bonner Springs have their own flavor,” Fitzgerald said. “I think there’s enough commonality there that it’s not surprising.”
Meanwhile, Robinson said voters in Wyandotte County had their work cut out for them learning how to operate in the sprawling new district.
“Wyandotte County will continue to move forward, why, because it’s right and reasonable that we move forward,” he said. “We’ll have to learn the 2nd District and we’ll have to learn to get along with the 2nd District, and I would expect we’ll be okay. ”
Correction: An earlier version of this story misidentified Patrick Schmidt as an Army veteran. He served in the Navy.
