Category: Election 2018

by Stephan Bisaha, Madeline Fox and Scott Canon, Kansas News Service

His last real prospects of winning the Republican nomination for the office he holds slipping away one county canvass after the next, Kansas Gov. Jeff Colyer conceded the primary race to Secretary of State Kris Kobach on Tuesday night.

That assured his governorship will be among the most short-lived in Kansas history, and that Republicans will send perhaps the state’s most polarizing politician into the fall elections.

In the end, Kobach appeared on course to win the nomination with just 41 percent of the vote and a tiny fraction of a percent more votes than Colyer.

But by late Tuesday, a week after the primary, Kobach’s slim margin still dashed the last hopes of the Colyer campaign.

Now Kobach faces Democrat Laura Kelly, a party leader in the state Senate, and independent candidate Greg Orman in the general election.

Colyer said in a Capitol news conference Tuesday night that the prospects of reversing the outcome of the primary without breeding added discord among Republicans seemed too remote to pursue.

“The numbers are just not there unless we would go to extraordinary measures,” the governor said as emotion crept into his voice. “(Lt. Gov. Tracey Mann) and I will not challenge this in court nor will we be asking for a recount.

“Right here and now,” he said, “we will endorse the winner, Kris Kobach.”

The last attainable goal, he said, rested in pulling Republicans together to maintain hold of the governor’s office.

The announcement capped off a tough intra-party fight among two of its most hard-line conservatives. They differed mostly in style.

Colyer was the loyal and soft-spoken lieutenant governor to then-Gov. Sam Brownback until early this year. Colyer stepped up to the governor’s post when the by-then unpopular Brownback left for an ambassador’s post in the Trump administration. Once Colyer became governor, he agreed with lawmakers to an education funding hike that Kobach blasted as unnecessary and too expensive.

Kobach, in contrast, has marked his career with an eagerness to contest his opponents in ways, and on topics, that have given him a national profile.

He took the secretary of state’s office from an often-overlooked post as recordkeeper to a national platform on his pet issues — illegal immigration and voter fraud.

Kobach has just as often seen his claims on those issues fall apart in public. This spring, for example, his claims of rampant voter cheating crumbled in a federal court case. A judge ruled against his demands of proof-of-citizenship for voter registration and held him in contempt for wrongly enforcing rules rejected by the court.

With Colyer stepping aside, Kobach charges into a general election campaign unsure whether his high profile will energize more conservatives on his behalf or liberals to defeat him. Some polls have suggested Colyer might have fared better than Kobach in the general election.

Colyer would have needed two out of every three remaining provisional ballots awaiting review from county election officials across the state — and take an even more extraordinary margin if the usual number of those votes was rejected.

As his prospects dwindled, Colyer continued challenging how election officials are tallying votes. As late as Tuesday afternoon, for instance, his attorney blasted election canvassers in Johnson County for not including 153 advanced voting ballots where a poll worker believed signatures on envelopes did not match those the county had on file.

Ronnie Metsker, appointed the Johnson County election commissioner by Kobach last year had said Monday that those ballots mostly involved a voter’s parent or spouse mistakenly signing an envelope.

In his letter on Colyer’s behalf on Tuesday, Edward Greim called on Metsker and the Johnson County Board of Canvassers to include 153 ballots that were ruled out because of the signatures.

“Registered voters attempting to vote should not be punished for errors (often of some other person) that do not implicate the intent of the voter or validity of the vote,” he said in the letter.

While Colyer lobbed that criticism, he was falling further behind in the vote totals. Kobach called the letter a “Hail Mary.” After the concession, Kobach called Colyer “incredibly gracious.”

By day’s end Monday, after the Johnson County votes were counted, he trailed Kobach by more than 300 votes.

State Senate President Susan Wagle, a hard-line conservative like both Colyer and Kobach, tweeted on Tuesday that a protracted fight over the vote counting could undermine the eventual Republican nominee’s chances in the general election.

To prepare for the November election, Wagle suggested walking away from disputes over the Aug. 7 primary.

“Democrats,” she tweeted, “are hoping for a drawn-out litigation process.”

Kansas has no automatic recount provision for primary contests. A loser who calls for a recount risks picking up the cost if it doesn’t reverse the outcome.

Colyer’s criticism of the tallies happening in the week following the primary — “we have to get the first vote right,” he said last week — hadn’t gone to issues that a recount would change.

He had called on Kobach to hand off the secretary of state’s oversight of the election results to Attorney General Derek Schmidt. Instead, Kobach put his deputy Erick Rucker in charge.

Kobach, meantime, held his own press conference two hours before Colyer conceded.

“It’s time for Republicans to start unifying and gearing up,” he said in Johnson County.

He claimed to pose a clearer anti-tax choice to voters than Colyer, and a stark contrast to the way he viewed Kelly and Orman.

“It is so essential that when we march together, we have seen historically, we win together,” Kobach said. “It’s also important to recognize that the other campaigns are already moving.”

Orman, for instance, has begun airing TV ads.

“The longer Republicans stay in neutral, the farther behind in the race we will be,” Kobach said.

“I stand ready to engage in the general election, indeed we’re champing at the bit to get going in the general election.”

Kelly was waiting for him, issuing an attack on Kobach in a statement released less than 20 minutes after Colyer conceded the primary.

“With Kris Kobach as governor,” she said in a news release, “Kansans get all of the failed policies of Sam Brownback plus Kobach’s unique brand of hyper-partisanship and self-promotion.”

Jim McLean of the Kansas News Service contributed to this report.
Stephan Bisaha reports on education for KMUW in Wichita and the Kansas News Service, a collaboration of KMUW, Kansas Public Radio, KCUR and High Plains Public Radio covering health, education and politics. Follow him on @SteveBisaha.
Madeline Fox is a reporter for the Kansas News Service. You can reach her on Twitter @maddycfox.
Scott Canon is digital editor of the Kansas News Service. You can reach him on Twitter @ScottCanon.
Kansas News Service stories and photos may be republished at no cost with proper attribution and a link back to the original post.

See more at http://www.kcur.org/post/colyer-concedes-backs-kobach-keep-kansas-governorship-republican

by Madeline Fox, Andrea Tudhop and Stephan Bisaha, Kansas News Service

The counting, sorting and contesting of ballots in the Republican primary for Kansas governor continued on Monday. It could be just the beginning.

Incumbent Gov. Jeff Colyer last week began criticizing his rival for the nomination, Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach, for how he was overseeing the election and how he had schooled local election officials on provisional votes.

Kobach gave in to Colyer’s demand last week to step aside from that part of his secretary of state duties. Colyer, meanwhile, continued to lay the groundwork for challenging the results of the nailbiter in court.

Kobach’s slim lead remained, and remained around 200 votes, on Monday. But thousands of ballots were still uncounted Monday, including 1,176 in Johnson County due to be tallied late Tuesday afternoon. Counties aren’t required to submit their final totals until Aug. 20.

Monday morning, as canvassers across the state began to rule on which provisional ballots deserved counting, the governor’s legal counsel issued an opinion arguing for counting more of them. Provisional ballots are those set aside in a polling place when a dispute arises about whether someone was eligible to vote.

For instance, voters who start Election Day in Kansas as independent or unaffiliated can cast ballots in a primary. But state election law only allows them to do so if they first fill out paperwork at a polling place declaring themselves a member of a party.

Sometimes, the governor’s lawyer noted in his opinion, poll workers don’t sort through that party declaration process. So the voter casts a provisional primary ballot without joining a party.

Brent Lau, the chief counsel to the governor’s office, said canvassers examining which provisional ballots to include must “look to the intent of the voter to correct this technical error by the poll worker and count the primary vote.”

That put a slightly different spin on interpreting the law than word Kobach’s office had sent to local officials. His office has stressed that a voter who wasn’t registered with a party by the time they cast a ballot should not participate in the primary.

In Johnson County, canvassers on Monday chose to exclude some of those ballots. It also added to the to-be-counted pile 57 votes of previously independent voters who did register with a party on the day of the primary.

Johnson County Election Commission Ronnie Metsker said Monday all of those ballots would be accepted.

“I don’t think there’s an issue. This is a non-story,” Metsker said. “The voters wanted to vote, and they were allowed to vote and their votes counted.”

Trailing by a razor-thin margin, Colyer’s chances could conceivably benefit if a larger number of votes is added to the total.

While Kobach recused himself from the certification of the election, he left the job to his chief deputy, Eric Rucker. Colyer had called for a hand-off of that work to Attorney General Derek Schmidt. The state’s director of elections, Bryan Caskey, has said state law doesn’t have a provision for a secretary of state’s recusal.

Schmidt is anticipating possible legal challenges to the vote count. He wrote county election officials telling them to keep “any paper files, notes, or electronic data related in any way” to the election. Under Kansas law, counties are already required to save ballots for statewide races for nearly two years after the election.

The deadline for requesting a recount comes before all 105 counties are required to certify their results. So Colyer or Kobach could end up demanding, and paying for, a recount that might actually wipe away their apparent win.

County election officials started counting their provisional ballots — about 9,000 scattered across the state — Monday. That included nearly three in four counties in the state, including population centers Johnson and Sedgwick counties. Both had about 1,800 provisional ballots, far more than any other county in the state. Six counties will wait until next Monday to start their canvass.

Closely watched canvassing scenes began to play out across the state Monday morning.

In McPherson County, for example, representatives for the Kobach and Colyer campaigns watched as County Clerk Hollie Melroy read an updated tally with provisional ballots included.

Out 101 provisional ballots in that central Kansas county, 52 were approved. Those that were denied were bundled and wrapped in a pink sheet in preparation for storage. Most were denied was because the voters had not registered in time for the election.

The final count in McPherson gave Colyer 1,781 votes and Kobach 1,659. After making notes, the representatives for the campaigns shuffled out of the room as Melroy continued to read the updated results for the other elections.

In more populous Sedgwick County, canvassers OK’d 1,300 ballots and tossed out about 900. But 14 ballots drew the most scrutiny, those cast by unaffiliated voters who hadn’t filled out paperwork correctly. Canvassers ultimately voted to count those ballots.

Caskey says the process is similar across all 105 counties. County election officials sit down at a meeting that’s open to the public and go through each ballot — often pre-sorted by what issue landed them in the provisional pile — and make a call on whether each vote should count based on Kansas law.

The Colyer campaign announced Friday that it would have a representative at all 105 county canvasses to monitor the process. Colyer spokesman Kendall Marr said it lined up someone to observe each count.

Some provisional ballots end up only being partially counted. In Johnson County, for example, voters who cast ballots at the wrong polling place only counted in statewide races — those parts of the ballot that don’t change from one location to the next.

Other ballots were tossed aside. For instance again in Johnson County, 900 ballots won’t be counted because people registered in one party insisted in voting in another party’s primary. While an independent voter can sign up with a party on primary day, a Democrat can’t switch to Republican, or vice versa. Others were excluded because voters lacked photo identification or their signatures didn’t match records on file.

“The stakes are high,” Metsker said. “I don’t recall in my lifetime a primary race where the stakes seemed to be this high. A lot lies within our office to get this right.”

Nadya Faulx of KMUW contributed to this report.
Madeline Fox is a reporter for the Kansas News Service, a collaboration of KCUR, Kansas Public Radio, KMUW and High Plains Public Radio covering health, education and politics. You can reach her on Twitter @maddycfox.
Stephan Bisaha reports on education for KMUW in Wichita and the Kansas News Service. Follow him on @SteveBisaha.
Andrea Tudhope reports for KCUR in Kansas City.
Kansas News Service stories and photos may be republished at no cost with proper attribution and a link back to the original post.
See more at http://www.kcur.org/post/kansas-republican-governor-primary-turns-provisional-ballots-one-county-time.

As provisional votes are counted today in Johnson County and Sedgwick County, Gov. Jeff Colyer’s chief legal counsel has issued an opinion on unaffiliated voters casting ballots.

This week, all counties in Kansas will be considering whether to count provisional ballots. Wyandotte County’s Board of Canvassers will meet at 9 a.m. Thursday, Aug. 16, at the Election Office, 850 State Ave., Kansas City, Kansas.

Gov. Jeff Colyer and challenger Kris Kobach both had about 41 percent of the vote statewide in a very close contest for the GOP nomination for governor.

The governor’s chief legal counsel sent his opinion to all county election officials in the state.

The opinion stated that, “Kansas law provides that an unaffiliated voter must be permitted to affiliate with a party on primary election day and vote in a party’s primary. K.S.A. 25-3301(c). However, sometimes when an unaffiliated voter seeks to affiliate and vote in a party primary, a poll worker (often a volunteer) simply instructs the unaffiliated voter to fill out a provisional party ballot rather than a party affiliation statement. Kansas law requires canvassers to look to the intent of the voter to correct this technical error by the poll worker and count the primary vote.”

Poll worker errors should be disregarded by the county canvassing board and the votes should be counted, according to the statement from the governor’s attorney, Brant M. Laue.

“Specifically, Kansas law expressly provides that such poll worker errors should be disregarded by the county canvassing board: “No ballot, or any portion thereof, shall be invalidated by any technical error unless it is impossible to determine the voter’s intention. Determination of the voter’s intention shall rest in the discretion of the board canvassing in the case of a canvass.” K.S.A. 25-3002(b)(1). This guiding principle has special importance in elections for governor: “[Even though] provisions of law may not have been fully complied with in noticing and conducting the election . . . the real will of the people may not be defeated by any technical irregularity of any officer.” K.S.A. 25-702(b),” the governor’s attorney stated.

There is a possibility this election could end up in court, and on Friday, Kansas Attorney General Derek Schmidt advised election officials in all counties to preserve all records related in any way to the primary election.

On Friday, Kansas Attorney General Derek Schmidt ask election officials to preserve all records.

“Despite the unusual circumstances of this close gubernatorial election, I know all county election officials are focused intently on performing their duties in a manner that ensures confidence in the eventual outcome of the election,” Schmidt said. “To assist with that, I am issuing this reminder of their duty to maintain all potentially relevant records. This is a common step when litigation is anticipated. I suspect local officials already would have done this as a matter of course, but as the state’s chief legal officer, and because of the obvious statewide importance of any potential litigation related to this election, I felt it prudent to provide this clear guidance in a manner that is uniform statewide so there can be no confusion or misunderstanding.”