Schmidt is off to an early lead in Kansas 2nd District
Just a month ago, Rep. Jake LaTurner stunned Kansas Republicans by announcing his retirement from Congress. There’s already a frontrunner to replace him: former Kansas Attorney General Derek Schmidt.
Schmidt, fresh off a failed bid to defeat Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly in 2022, jumped into the race about a week after LaTurner’s announcement. He entered a race where most voters already know his name and with a stable of donors he’s been able to tap into over three terms as attorney general and in his attempt to unseat Kelly.
That network has given him an early advantage over two Republican candidates who have never held elected office – former Kansas Livestock Association president Shawn Tiffany and former LaTurner staffer Jeff Kahrs.
“At this point, it’s
Schmidt’s,” said Bob Beatty, a political science professor at Washburn University who has followed Kansas elections for decades. “The primary is his to lose. That doesn’t mean that one of the other two can’t spark a flame, but it’ll be a challenge for Kahrs and Tiffany.”
Schmidt led with 44% of the vote in an early poll of 1,517 likely Republican primary voters by the political polling firm Coefficient released last week. Kahrs and Tiffany had 4% and 3% of the vote, respectively.
The Republican primary will likely decide the next congressman from the
2nd District. While the district covers Topeka, which includes a Democratic core, and northern Wyandotte County, voters in the area supported former President Donald Trump by 15 percentage points in 2020.
“Kansans know we need a proven conservative leader who can help tackle the crisis at our border, skyrocketing inflation and the intrusion of big government into our lives,” Schmidt said in a statement. “I was proud to lead that fight as Attorney General, and I will be honored to stand tall and continue it in Congress.”
While Schmidt may have the early advantage to head to Congress, there are still three months for Kahrs and Tiffany to try to win over voters in the district. The Coefficient poll found that 49% of voters still hadn’t made up their minds about a candidate.
With Schmidt’s name recognition and fundraising, Tiffany and Kahrs have to try and find an opening. It could be running to Schmidt’s right.
Primaries historically draw fewer voters and those that do show up tend to be on the ideological extremes. In a Republican primary, that means a conservative electorate.
In the 2022 gubernatorial campaign, Schmidt leaned into cultural issues like transgender rights and whether the state had helped fund an event that featured drag queens. Kelly spent months trying to portray Schmidt as too conservative to be governor.
But, in an era where voters often gravitate toward outsiders who try to disrupt the status quo in Washington, he’s still the more establishment choice for the district.
“As Attorney General for so many years, he does have that establishment background,” Beatty said. “He’s not a newcomer. He’s not an upstart.”
While Kahrs has never held elected office, he’s worked in government for much of his adult life.
He served in the administrations of former President Donald Trump and former Gov. Sam Brownback. He also worked as a Congressional staffer for former Rep. Todd Tiahart and as a senior adviser for LaTurner.
Brownback endorsed
Kahrs on Wednesday morning, lending his well-known, but polarizing, name into the primary. In a press release announcing the endorsement, Kahrs’ campaign said he was the “only conservative in the primary,” a sign that he plans to run a campaign to the right.
“Ambassador Brownback is a man of faith and conviction,” Kahrs said in a statement. “He is a stalwart conservative, and he knows we must send to Congress, especially in the seat he once held, someone who has the courage to fight for our Christian values. I am proud to be supported by leading Republicans across the district, state, and nation.”
Tiffany, who co-owns four feedlots in the state, could also try and run to Schmidt’s right. His campaign did not respond to a request for comment, but his website highlights several issues popular with hard-line conservatives – a focus on China as a foreign adversary, the border and stopping “Woke left ideology.”
He’s also using Axiom Strategies, the firm founded by Jeff Roe, for political consulting, according to the Sunflower State Journal. Axiom has worked with conservatives like Sen. Ted Cruz, a Texas Republican, and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis.
Working with Axiom could potentially block Tiffany from getting an endorsement from former President Donald Trump, who has warned Republicans not to use the firm that ran the campaign of one of his top primary opponents, according to Politico.
Trump’s endorsement has often been coveted by Republican candidates running in conservative districts.
Still, if the campaign starts to lean too far to the hard right, it could cause issues in the general election. In the 2022 gubernatorial race, Kelly won four out of the five largest counties in the district.
Matt Kleinmann, an architect and former University of Kansas basketball player, announced his campaign for the Democratic nomination earlier this week. He is the only Democrat running so far, after a previous candidate dropped out to run for a seat in the Legislature.
Kleinmann’s campaign did not respond to a request for comment.
Daniel Desrochers: drdesrochers