When they said to self-isolate, the Kansas GOP must have heard “self-immolate.”
Those of you who merely want a secure and prosperous nation — with a limited and accountable government, and judges and justices who adhere to the Constitution rather than the prevailing political winds — take note: Kansas Republicans seem hellbent on losing retiring Pat Roberts’ U.S. Senate seat, which they’ve held for nearly a century. And that could very well tip control of the chamber, and much if not all of Washington, D.C., to Democrats.
You can get pumped up about voting for Donald Trump again, but if he loses the Senate along with the House, there’s not much point. Most of his agenda, notably to include conservative jurists who respect your right to be largely left alone, will hit a brick wall. That’s how important the Senate is.
Moreover, if Kansas Republicans lose this seat, the political and social earthquake will be felt from coast to coast. Democrats, especially if it means they win the Senate, will hold the Kansas Senate race up as a national referendum on their agenda.
It would, in reality, be a statement on Kansas Republicans’ solidarity, or the lack thereof.
While Kansas Democrats rally behind one candidate to replace Roberts, state Sen. Barbara Bollier, and cover her up to the eyeballs in campaign cash, here’s the blueprint Republicans are following:
Everybody runs for the rare and potent open seat, regardless of one’s chances, giving the best-known and least-electable candidate — failed 2018 gubernatorial contender Kris Kobach — the inside track to the GOP nomination.
Then have a big old public fight when it’s suggested that the horde be culled for the sake of the herd.
Pruning the apparent eight-person Republican field of its medium-sized branches is what state GOP Chairman Mike Kuckelman had in mind when he wrote second-tier candidates Susan Wagle and Dave Lindstrom Thursday, asking them to exit the race. That would leave the two top-tier candidates, 1st District Congressman Roger Marshall and former Kansas Secretary of State Kobach, to battle it out.
Clearly the idea, and it’s a good one, is to isolate and beat Kobach, the widely reviled and mostly ineffectual populist firebreather who would bring the match to the party’s self-immolation — as he did in losing the race for governor.
Problem is, Kuckelman’s letter and phone calls appear to have had the opposite effect, instead convincing state Senate President Wagle and former Johnson County Commissioner Lindstrom to dig in their heels and stay in the race.
In fact, Wagle claims Kuckelman is targeting her specifically, and only using the companion letter to Lindstrom as cover. While Kuckelman’s letters to both Lindstrom and Wagle asked them to leave the race, Wagle says only she was asked to do so by phone. Lindstrom campaign supporter Dave Owen confirms that.
“He adamantly asked me to walk away and get out of the race,” Wagle said of Kuckelman’s call.
In contrast, Owen says, Kuckelman’s written request to get out “blindsided” Lindstrom.
So, one candidate feels targeted, the other blindsided.
Kuckelman dismisses Wagle’s claim of targeting out of hand, saying that, without a clear path to victory for either one, “I want them both to leave the race.” With the June 1 filing deadline looming, Kuckelman says, “at some point, this (crowded race) has to stop.”
It’s not likely to. Kuckelman fully realizes that. But if that means Republicans end up losing the Senate seat in November, he says, then Lindstrom and Wagle “will have responsibility for that.”
More to the point: With Wagle and Lindstrom each polling at about 5%, without them in the race, there would be enough votes to swing the nomination between Marshall and Kobach.
Not only did Kuckelman’s gambit only embolden Wagle and Lindstrom, it tag-teamed Marshall and Kobach into the party’s verbal cage match. Kobach wrote a letter to Marshall challenging him to repudiate Kuckelman and, in essence, refuse the party’s help in narrowing the field.
Not to be outdone, Marshall, a doctor, responded with a handwritten note accompanied by a photo of him in scrubs. Saying he was too busy treating COVID-19 patients to type a letter, Marshall pointedly reminded Kobach of “the consequences of a Democrat administration at the state level when we nominated a person who can’t win.” Marshall also reminded Kobach it was under Kobach’s chairmanship that the state GOP was fined for campaign finance law violations.
This round to Marshall.
But in fact, the party as a whole has bloodied itself, to the delight of Democrats.
Given the polling numbers and fundraising figures, it would take a miracle for Wagle or Lindstrom to catch up to Marshall and Kobach, and the coronavirus has outlawed miracles.
Kuckelman’s advice to take one for the team couldn’t be more apt. This should be the Republicans’ race to lose, and with a muddled field that hands the nomination to Kobach, the party may, indeed, lose it.
If this all seems like inside politics, it is. But there’s rarely been a more important time for rank-and-file voters to stick their heads inside and see what’s going on.
It’s not pretty.
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ABOUT THE WRITER
Michael Ryan is an editorial writer and columnist for the Kansas City Star.
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