Johnson County loses some influence as Wichita lawmaker becomes Kansas House Speaker
The top spot in the Kansas House will now be held by Wichita’s Dan Hawkins, shifting the balance of power in the Legislature further away from Johnson County and toward south central Kansas.
Hawkins, who has served as House majority leader for the past four years, ran unopposed Monday for Kansas House Speaker — an influential leadership role that sets the agenda and tone for the chamber for the next two years.
He will replace Olathe’s Ron Ryckman, who for six years has been a major source of representation for Johnson County in GOP leadership even as more of the suburban seats go to Democrats.
Hawkins, a conservative Republican, is vehemently opposed to Medicaid expansion and is known for a blunt demeanor. He played a pivotal role in negotiations over the past two years on bills legalizing sports betting and medical marijuana. Speaking to reporters Monday Hawkins said he had “no interest, whatsoever” in changing provisions of the sports betting law next year.
In 2017 Hawkins was among 88 House members who voted to override then Gov. Sam Brownback’s veto on a bill overriding his tax cut experiment.
Speaking to reporters Monday, Hawkins said he anticipated the House would continue to pursue conservative policies and said many members were especially focused on tax issues.
“Truly the philosophy of our leadership is going to be we believe in the people, we believe in the people of Kansas to make the best decisions of how to spend their money, not the state,” Hawkins said.
“The legislation you’re going to see is probably more conservative.”
For the past six years Ryckman has led the chamber, breaking with the tradition that speakers only serve two 2-year terms. Ryckman did not run for reelection in November.
Sen. Ethan Corson, a Fairway Democrat, said he saw Ryckman’s occasional clashes with GOP leadership in the Senate as evidence of his position in increasingly Democratic Johnson County.
“Speaker Ryckman, being from Johnson County, had a pretty good poll on how a lot of those divisive social issues played poorly in Johnson County,” Corson said. “I think he was a little more of a buffer because he was smartly more in tune to what was going on in Johnson County.”
Hawkins joins a coalition of GOP leaders in the Kansas Senate that largely hail from south central Kansas. Senate President Ty Masterson is from Andover, while Senate Majority Leader Larry Alley is from Winfield and represents part of Wichita.
Though clashes between the House and the Senate are inevitable in the 2023 session, Alley, the Senate majority leader, said they may be less common with Hawkins as speaker because of the geographic alignment.
“Dan has pretty much been aligned with the Senate most of the time,” Alley said.
Hawkins said he didn’t believe the geographical similarities would influence policy.
“I think what it does mean is you’re going to see a pretty good communication flow between the House leadership and the Senate leadership,” he said.
Johnson County will still be represented in Republican House leadership. Rep. Chris Croft, an Overland Park Republican, will replace Hawkins as majority leader.
Croft led the House’ redistricting efforts last year, including successfully passing a congressional map that split Wyandotte County between two districts along Interstate 70.
“We always have a responsibility to advocate for our people but at the same time I have a responsibility to advocate for my caucus,” Croft said.
On Monday lawmakers also chose Derby Republican Rep. Blake Carpenter as Speaker Pro Tem in the House and Rep. Vic Miller of Topeka to lead the Democratic caucus as minority leader.
Miller said the primary goal of the Democratic caucus would be working with Kelly
“We have a responsibility to our Democratic governor to do what we can to make her agenda successful,” he said.
But Democrats will be up against an 85 member Republican supermajority. While the caucus became more conservative in the November elections Republicans can only spare one vote to override a veto from Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly.
“I think there’s probably some places where we can work very well (with Kelly). There’s going to be places where we’re going to vehemently disagree,” Hawkins said. “It’s up to us to communicate and to bring everybody into the discussion and to do the best we can and pass bills and be able to override those bills when the governor doesn’t agree with us.”
Hawkins served on the House and Senate health committees at the same time when Kelly was in the Senate. The Democrat said last week they had a good relationship.
“We developed a really good working relationship and a great respect for one another. So I think we will take it into the next four years,” Kelly said.
The Star’s Jonathan Shorman contributed to this story
This story was originally published December 5, 2022 at 3:48 PM.
