Schmidt launches run for Congress promising to ‘fight back’
Former Kansas Attorney General Derek Schmidt is running for Congress, echoing former President Donald Trump’s slogan “make America great again” as he attempts a political comeback following his narrow loss in the 2022 governor’s race.
Schmidt’s campaign for Kansas’ 2nd Congressional District, announced Friday, comes a week after Rep. Jake LaTurner said he wouldn’t seek reelection. The district spans much of eastern Kansas, including Topeka, Leavenworth and northern Wyandotte County.
Schmidt promised to work to secure the border, fight overreach by a federal government that “doesn’t understand or respect our way of life” and stop the federal government from making daily life more expensive and difficult.
“President Biden and the radicals he enables have unleashed a dangerous agenda on our country. Those of us who represent Kansas conservative values need to stand up and fight back,” Schmidt said in a statement.
Schmidt is the third person to publicly declare a candidacy.
Former LaTurner staffer Jeff Kahrs launched his campaign on Thursday. Kahrs was previously a regional director in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services during the Trump administration and a deputy secretary and chief of staff in the Kansas Department for Children and Families under the Brownback Administration.
Shawn Tiffany, a former Kansas Livestock Association president from Herington, has also indicated he will campaign. He wrote on social media that “I am looking forward to earning the right to serve the people of Kansas’s 2nd district!”
Schmidt, who in 2022 lost to Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly by roughly 2 points, enters the race with advantages that could deter some would-be candidates. As a recent Republican nominee for governor, he has already built up a degree of name recognition within the district – and the whole state – that most opponents likely can’t match.
Given LaTurner’s relatively late announcement, the compressed primary campaign means candidates without a preexisting broad base of support will potentially struggle to build name ID and raise money. Schmidt enters the race after a long tenure in statewide office and a recent statewide campaign, both of which helped build a political identity across the district.
Schmidt, 56, works as a partner at the law firm Husch Blackwell. He owns property in both Lawrence and Independence in southeast Kansas, where he is registered to vote.
Schmidt held the office of state attorney general for more than a decade, from 2011 until January 2023. His initiation into Kansas politics came from serving as an assistant to U.S. Sen. Nancy Kassebaum, before entering the state Senate in 2001, where he rose to the rank of majority leader. He holds a law degree from Georgetown University Law Center.
As state attorney general, Schmidt had a reputation as a genial conservative. He emphasized the office’s traditional public safety and law enforcement roles but also filed politically-charged lawsuits against the Obama and Biden administrations. Schmidt in 2020 supported a lawsuit that sought to overturn former President Donald Trump’s electoral losses in key swing states by recycling baseless claims of illegal voting.
On Friday, Schmidt invoked Trump, now the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, who is standing trial in New York on allegations of business fraud related to hush money payments.
“My steady guidepost will be what is best for the people of the Second District and for America,” Schmidt said. “These past four years have made clear that America was stronger when President Trump served in the White House, and I look forward to working with him and others next year – yes, to truly make America great again.”
Kahrs’ campaign attacked Schmidt after Friday’s announcement. In a statement, Kahrs campaign manager Rob Fillion said he wouldn’t compromise conservative values and was the “only candidate in this race who has a proven record of working with President Trump to put America first.”
“Derek Schmidt is nothing more than a timid career politician who has failed conservatives at every turn during his time in the state legislature and as Attorney General of Kansas. Our nation can’t afford another rubber stamp for the D.C. Establishment,” Fillion said.
During the governor’s race, Schmidt’s campaign attempted to appeal to both his right flank and more moderate voters in some ways that ultimately fell flat. He proposed cutting taxes on Social Security income, a broadly popular position, while also playing up culture war issues, in one instance attempting to link Kelly to drag shows.
Kelly’s chief of staff, Will
Lawrence, in a text message said Schmidt would be the weakest candidate in the field “with the backbone of a wet blanket.”
In the congressional race, Schmidt will only need to win over a district comprising one-fourth of the state’s residents. The district also doesn’t include Johnson County, a new Democratic stronghold where Schmidt struggled in 2022.
And some of the issues are different. Debates over foreign aid to Ukraine and Israel, along with views on Trump, will play a role in a way they didn’t in the governor’s race.
“There’s such a divide right now. It’s going to take a person who’s willing to listen to other side, maybe work with the other side,” said state Rep. Chuck Smith, a Pittsburg Republican, describing the kind of candidate he wants.
Saying “Kansans know me,” Schmidt stressed his support for veterans and military members, farmers and ranchers, small businesses, Kansas colleges and universities, “for life” and the Second Amendment. His announcement didn’t specifically address his position on abortion.
“They know I am proud to be a Kansan. Always have been,” he said.
LaTurner’s announcement last week, citing a desire to pursue other opportunities and spend time with family, caught Kansas Republicans offguard. Schmidt’s name quickly began circulating as a potential candidate.
Other possible candidates include state Sens. Caryn Tyson and Dennis Pyle, who mounted an independent campaign for governor in 2022. Some political observers say Pyle, who ran to the right of Schmidt, helped cost him the election by attracting conservative voters who may have otherwise supported the Republican nominee. Still, Kelly’s margin of victory was larger than the total number of votes Pyle received.
“I’m running for the Senate seat until I’m not,” Pyle told The Star on Thursday.
Leavenworth County Attorney Todd Thompson is also weighing a campaign. Kansas House Majority Leader Chris Croft, an Overland Park Republican, considered a run but on Thursday announced he had opted against a campaign.
No Democrats are currently in the race, after Eli Woody suspended his campaign earlier this year to run for a state legislative seat instead. The district, which was redrawn in 2022 to exclude Lawrence, is considered a relatively safe Republican seat. Former President Donald Trump won 57% of the vote in 2020.
“I think 2nd District Republicans are going to strongly support the folks who get in the race and whoever eventually becomes the nominee,” said Mike Kuckelman, a former chairman of the Kansas Republican Party.