By MICHAEL A. SMITH
Insight Kansas
This year brims with opportunities for Democrats.
The President’s party typically loses seats in the midterms, and President Trump’s approval ratings are an abysmal 36%. Kansas Dems are fired up because popular Johnson County pastor Rev. Adam Hamilton abandoned his longshot independent candidacy. Coming to his senses, Hamilton just launched a high-profile campaign seeking the Democratic nomination, hoping to square off against U.S. Senator Roger Marshall this fall.
The party’s best-known candidates for governor are state senators Ethan Corson and Cindy Holscher. Both are respected and experienced. They are barnstorming the state, defining notable differences without tearing each other down.
For example, Corson co-sponsored the new statewide ban on cell phone use in classrooms, while Holscher argues that such decisions are an unfunded mandate and should be left to school boards.
Meanwhile, the annual Kansas Speaks poll consistently shows that most Kansans align closer to Democrats than Republicans on many issues, from Medicaid expansion to abortion rights to marijuana legalization.
Then again, in hard-red Kansas, such high expectations could set Democrats up for a hard fall. This is what happened with Marshall’s 2020 victory over the moderate, well-funded, hopeful Democratic nominee Barbara Bollier.
Democrats win when they give people hope. It will not do to simply point out high gas and grocery prices – governors and senators have little jurisdiction over these.
Democrats have to announce and affirm a set of values and principles that offer hope in a time of political despair and abusive cruelty. Michelle Obama said, “when they go low, we go high.” Her husband ran a campaign promising hope and change, speaking proudly of his “mother from Kansas and father from Kenya.”
Notwithstanding his personal failings, Bill Clinton had stressed similar themes, noting that he had once lived in a town called Hope, while adopting Fleetwood Mac’s “Don’t Stop (Thinking About Tomorrow)” as his campaign theme song. Even Joe Biden promised to Build Back Better.
Here, Governor Laura Kelly consistently steered clear of today’s toxic politics, stressing instead that Kansas is a great place to live and that good policy will make it more so. She hasn’t won every battle, and I haven’t agreed with her every choice, but throughout her two terms, she has consistently risen above destructive politics.
Kelly’s legacy will include restoring the state’s fiscal health, ending the state sales tax on groceries, keeping abortion legal, and an ambitious- though expensive-plan to move the Kansas City Chiefs to Kansas.
For the next crop of Democratic hopefuls, the bar is high.
Disjointed campaign promises about this or that pet program will not get the job done. Also, it would be downright foolish to rant against Donald Trump in a state he won three times.
Furthermore, national Democrats are notorious for internecine squabbling, though this “circular firing squad” pattern is not as present statewide here in Kansas, where they have always had to unite to survive. Still, there is a lot to overcome, and the stakes are high.
We live in an era when narcissism, rage, despair, conspiracy theories, and scorched-earth rants have smashed the bounds of politics, spreading virally on social media and toxifying nearly every aspect of American life.
We desperately need a political party that offers true, meaningful hope. The history is there, and the opportunity is too. Will Democrats seize the day?
Michael Smith is a professor of political science at Emporia State University.