Can Wichita Elect a Governor?�(and Other Thoughts about the Kansas Political Landscape)�

Wichita and Kansas

• Wichita is the largest single city in Kansas
• More than a fifth of the state’s total population resides in our metropolitan area.
• City population (latest estimate): 391,586
• Metropolitan statistical area population (latest estimate): 644, 610
• Kansas state-wide population (lastest estimate): 2,907,289
• The regional economic and media center for over half the state

Who are the governors from Wichita?

Mark Parkinson? Born in Wichita (1957), but relocated to Olathe and Overland Park for political career, served as 45^th Governor of Kansas (2009-2011)

Edward Arn? Opened a law office in Wichita (1936), left for military service, built his political career from Wyandotte County, served as 32^nd Governor of Kansas (1951-1955), returned to Wichita afterwards, buried here

Best option: Henry J. Allen Henry J. Allen (21^st Governor of Kansas, 1919-1923), a newspaperman from Clay County who came to Wichita as a young man and built a small publishing empire here before being elected governor, then later returning to live the rest of his life in our city. (Visit the Allen-Lambe House in College Hill!)

• If you look through the list of Kansas’s 46 governors, dozens of Kansas cities, towns, and rural counties are represented.
• Some commonalities among nearly all of them, especially over the past half-century: strong connections to the University of Kansas, and/or to the state capital in Topeka, and/or to the cross-border urban agglomeration of Kansas City.
• Politics is often a function of path-dependency–people making use of the connections, both personal and financial, that others have already established, thus deepening them.
• As always, success breed success.
• Wichitans running for governor today face challenges similar to our city’s social and economic prospects as a whole: namely, we often seem stuck in the middle, too big not to be considered a major player, but not big enough to compete with the major players who came before us.

Wichita metropolitan statistical area population (latest estimate): 644, 610�Combined Topeka-Lawrence-Kansas City-nexus statistical area population (latest estimate): 2,488,308.

Perhaps we have an inferiority complex?

On the Republican side:

Mark Hutton, born in Wichita, built construction business here, served as state representative for the 105^th district (west Wichita, 2013-2017)

Wink Hartman, born in Wichita, operates numerous businesses (including Hartman Oil Company) here, pulled out of the governor’s race…for now?

On the Democratic Side:

Carl Brewer, born in Wichita, worked in local aviation industry, served in Kansas National Guard, elected to city council (District 1, north Wichita) and as mayor of Wichita (2007-2015)

Jim Ward, came to Wichita to practice law, served on city council, Kansas senate, and as state representative for the 86^th district (central-south Wichita, 2003-present)

The Incumbent: Governor Jeff Colyer

Primary advantages: current incumbent, was lieutenant governor under Governor Sam Brownback from 2011-2018

Primary disadvantages: current incumbent, was lieutenant governor under Governor Sam Brownback from 2011-2018

The Man to Beat: Secretary of State Kris Kobach

• Primary advantage: is Kris Kobach
• Primary disadvantage: is Kris Kobach

Someone (Ed Flentje?) once said: “Kansas politicians live or die west of I-35” (or Turnpike? Or I-135?)

• “Rural votes tend to swing competitive gubernatorial primaries even though nearly half of all registered Republicans live in the five large urban counties — Douglas, Johnson, Sedgwick, Shawnee and Wyandotte. Urban votes will be splintered among the seven creditable Republicans who have announced their intentions to run for governor. This voting pattern will likely repeat this year given that each of these seven candidates resides in one of the urban counties.”
• �Flentje, “Rural Republicans will selection GOP nominee for governor,” Wichita Eagle, January 7, 2018

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Ron Estes’s primary commitments—the priorities he presented as a potential future congressperson--were to political movements that have been constructed and taken root both nationally and state-wide. There were Republicans competing for the 4th congressional district nomination which represented a conservatism which might have dissented from elements of Brownback’s record or Trump’s agenda—Tiahrt, Ashby, etc.—but they never really threatened Estes’s level of support. Ultimately, Estes is a loyal Kansas Republican, and the Republican establishment’s endorsement of him was no surprise. He really is best understood as a committed supporter of, and consequently the beneficiary of, a state-wide, and a nation-wide, conservative party infrastructure.

• Thompson does in some ways resemble those Democrats that have occasionally achieved success in Kansas outside of the 2nd congressional district over the past 25 years (military veteran, gun rights, etc.)
• But also departs in important ways from the old model of Democrats like Wichita's Dan Glickman: strongly committed to women’s and LGBT rights, progressive on taxation, poverty, trade.
• Defeated Dennis McKinney, a former state legislator in the model of the sort of Democrat that was once, a generation ago, occasionally successful in non-northeastern Kansas politics: namely, a Democrat who is culturally conservative, strongly populist , with farming roots
• A progressive Wichita civil rights lawyer, running in a district which includes (thanks to redistricting) a significant chunk of rural south-central and southwestern Kansas? Why?

This is why.

And this.

And this.

And this.

A wave that has been building for a while.

Here too. (Urban population of Kansas, latest estimate: 1,972,856; rural population of Kansas, latest estimate: 934,433)�

Two concluding questions/thoughts:

• How locked in, for both national and state-wide ideological and infrastructural reasons, is the Kansas Republican Party to following the lead of rural (vs. suburban or exurban?) voters in shaping the direction of the party, if not necessarily supplying the votes? (Does Trump’s victory make a difference?)
• How serious is the movement in the Kansas Democratic Party to follow national trends, and seek to maximize the urban potential of cities like Wichita, not to mention the traditional Topeka-Lawrence-Kansas City nexus? (Kelly’s entrance? Ward’s and Brewer’s candidacy? Svaty as spoiler?