Giddy up, horsies
We’re only a few days from primary elections in Kansas and Missouri and the candidates are scrambling to grab as many votes as possible heading into Election Day.
I want to use this week’s newsletter to take a look at where things stand in some of the more competitive races we’re watching.
I spent some time in Kentucky, so you’ll have to pardon me if you find it’s a little focused on the horse race. These aren’t predictions, I’m not giving betting odds, but I want to just give a brief summary of where it looks like things stand heading into the primary.
Abortion Amendment
Kansas will be the first state to vote on abortion rights in the aftermath of the U.S. Supreme Court ruling that reversed the landmark Roe v. Wade decision and tossed decisions about access to abortion back to the states.
The only poll in the race shows that the anti-abortion campaign, urging people to vote yes on a constitutional amendment that will eliminate abortion protections from the constitution, has a slight lead over the “vote no” campaign. It was conducted by the polling group co/efficient, which often polls for Republican candidates.
In the poll, 47% of voters said they plan to vote yes, while 43% said they plan to vote no and 10% remain undecided. It has a margin of error of plus or minus 2.78 percent.
The vote carries national significance as Democrats have a midterm strategy that relies on abortion rights serving as a galvanizing issue for their voters — particularly the coalition of suburban women the party built during the presidency of Donald Trump.
Abortion rights groups have outraised the anti-abortion groups over the course of the campaign, but the Catholic Church in Kansas has played a big role in helping the anti-abortion campaign.
Missouri Senate GOP
The Missouri Republican primary for U.S. Senate seems to be a three-way contest between Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt, U.S. Rep. Vicky Hartzler and former Gov. Eric Greitens.
While Greitens led in a lot of polling through most of his campaign, Schmitt appears to be riding a late surge, boosted by a well-funded PAC supporting him and a PAC — consisting of some of his donors — that has spent nearly $8 million specifically attacking Greitens.
Hartzler, who earned the support of U.S. Sen. Josh Hawley, was knee-capped by former President Donald Trump, who put out a statement saying he specifically would not endorse her in the race, even though he hasn’t endorsed any other candidate yet. She has been polling in second place recently.
While it appears Schmitt may be able to pull away, polling is within the statistical margin of error and it could break in a different direction. Missouri is notoriously a difficult state to poll and in the 2016 gubernatorial race, Greitens trailed in a late poll before pulling out a win.
Of course, everything could be upended if Trump decides to endorse either Schmitt or Greitens in the final days of the race.
Missouri Senate Dems
On the Democratic side, philanthropist Trudy Busch Valentine appears to lead retired Marine Lucas Kunce. In a poll by Emerson College and the Hill, Busch Valentine led Kunce by about 4% with another 22% of voters undecided. Another, by SurveyUSA on behalf of Gray Television released Thursday night, had Busch Valentine ahead of Kunce 40% to 14%, which could mean people are breaking toward Busch Valentine.
There’s a couple of reasons why people may still be undecided. For one, most of the attention has gone to the Republican primary, where the candidates have a higher profile and the winner could likely be the next senator from Missouri, given how conservative the state has been voting of late. For another, both Kunce and Busch Valentine were relative unknowns before entering the race, meaning they’ve had to spend a lot of time (and money) building up their name recognition.
Now, the two campaigns have gone negative on each other. Busch Valentine’s team is targeting Kunce’s stances from his first run for office in 2006, when he ran for the Missouri House as a moderate Democrat who opposed abortion rights and same-sex marriage (his campaign says he has evolved on the issues).
Kunce’s team has gone after Busch Valentine for her participation in the Veiled Prophet Ball in St. Louis, which has white supremacist roots, (Busch Valentine has apologized for attending) and for her jumbled answers on LGBTQ issues.
Busch Valentine has picked up a lot of support from current elected officials, but even those can be a sign of the confusion among Democrats. St. Louis Mayor Tishaura O. Jones backtracked after endorsing Busch Valentine, saying “I don’t condone the words she used about the LGBT+ community, however, I think this is a learning experience for all of us.”
More from Missouri
On the day Eric Greitens officially resigned as the governor of Missouri, he put out 1,458 word list of his accomplishments. Then he went dark. I took a look at what happened in between when Greitens resigned and when he announced his bid for U.S. Senate. What emerged was a portrait of a man who didn’t so much as surrender, but withdrew and retreated, waiting for his opportunity to once again fight the battles that led to his downfall.
Here are headlines from across the state:
Eric Greitens’ lost chapter: Inside his disappearance from public life before Senate run, Daniel Desrochers
Dem primary turns bitter as many remain undecided, Jonathan Shorman, Kacen Bayless, Daniel Desrochers
Eric Schmitt’s lawsuits made headlines. Will they make him Missouri’s next senator?, Kacen Bayless
Greitens hits McConnell and ‘RINOs’ during KC event as Senate primary race nears finish, Jonathan Shorman
Josh Hawley is writing book on masculinity. Senator’s ‘Manhood’ goes on sale next May, Daniel Desrochers
And across Kansas
In July and August of 1991, protesters swarmed clinics in Wichita as Operation Rescue’s campaign to prevent abortion across the country. The protests also prompted a movement of anti-abortion activists getting involved in electoral politics in a way they never had before, forever reshaping abortion rights and politics in Kansas.
How protests changed abortion rights and politics in Kansas forever, Judy L. Thomas and Katie Bernard
Top KS official must persuade GOP their votes are safe. Can he do it?, Jonathan Shorman and Katie Bernard
Long-awaited statue of Amelia Earhart, Kansas-born aviation hero, unveiled, Daniel Desrochers
Wyandotte County candidate for Kansas House accused of sexual battery in 2020, Katie Bernard
Are neighboring states driving abortion demand in Kansas after Supreme Court decision?, Katie Bernard
The latest from Kansas City
In Kansas City …
KC mayor lauded by national gun violence prevention organization, Cortlynn Stark and Anna Spoerre
Body camera videos show fatal police shooting of former Kansas City, Kansas, detective, Aarón Torres
Kansas City transit agency accepts CEO’s resignation a month after asking for it, Mike Hendricks
Have a news tip? Send it along to ddesrochers@kcstar.com
Odds and ends
PACT broken
On Wednesday night, a vote to pass a bill expanding benefits for veterans who were exposed to toxic burn pits while serving overseas failed in the U.S. Senate.
It was a weird vote. The bill, pushed by Kansas U.S. Sen. Jerry Moran, had already passed the Senate with more than 60 votes. It was expected to easily pass the House and then get signed by the president. Instead, there were technical issues with the bill, the House made some changes and the Senate had to vote to pass it again.
U.S. Sen. Pat Toomey, a retiring Pennsylvania Republican, made a speech after the bill failed, arguing that it failed because of the spending mechanism in place in the bill (which was there when it passed the first time). He had an amendment that would change how the money was spent and he said if that amendment were called, the bill would pass easily.
That’s not really why the bill failed. Instead, it was about a deal that was announced while the vote was going on. U.S. Sen. Joe Manchin, a moderate Democrat from West Virginia, put out a press release saying he had reached an agreement on a bill that would raise the corporate tax rate to 15%, reform prescription drug pricing, would spend $369 billion on climate change and another $64 billion extending the Affordable Care Act until 2025.
Republicans — particularly those who cut deals with the Democrats — were outraged, in part because the announcement came right after they voted on a bill that would spend billions to prop-up domestic production of semiconductors. Republicans had said they would not support the bill so long as the Democrats budget reconciliation bill was still on the table.
The victims in the political gamesmanship were veterans who have worked for years to get expanded benefits for burn pit exposure. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said he would bring the bill up for a vote again next week.
Ditch Mitch
With less than a week left in the Republican primary for U.S. Senate, Schmitt and Hartzler are throwing Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell under the bus in order to bring as many Republican voters over to their side as possible.
On Wednesday night, Schmitt told reporters that he wouldn’t support McConnell as majority leader and that he hoped U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas (who has endorsed him in the race) or U.S. Sen. Mike Lee of Utah ran for leader instead. Schmitt and Cruz are both clients of Axiom Strategies, a Kansas City-based consulting firm.
Cruz is somewhat unpopular among Republicans in D.C. (former Republican House Speaker John Boehner once called Cruz “Lucifer in the flesh”) and there has been little talk of him or Lee challenging McConnell as GOP leader.
Then, the next day, Hartzler put out a statement saying she wouldn’t support McConnell, saying he doesn’t fight Democrats enough.
“I’ve been watching Mitch McConnell and he just continues to acquiesce to Senate democrats,” Hartzler said. “We need courageous conservative leadership. It’s time to fight back.”
Both of these pledges come long after Greitens, who has called McConnell a “disgusting coward,” said he wouldn’t vote for him as leader.
McConnell has always been unpopular — in some ways, his willingness to take unpopular stands allowed him to rise within the Republican caucus to GOP leader, particularly his willingness to oppose campaign finance reform.
But pledges to unseat him only work if there’s someone willing to run against him. When former President Donald Trump, who has nicknamed McConnell “Old Crow,” called on the Senate to get rid of McConnell as majority leader last year, the call went unheeded.
Ice, Ice, Baby
All right, stop. Collaborate and Listen. Vanilla Ice is in Missouri this week at the Ozark Empire Fair and St. Louis attorney Mark McCloskey, who is trailing far behind the pack in the Republican primary for U.S. Senate, wants to take advantage of the Icicles out there (ok, I don’t know that Vanilla Ice’s fans are called Icicles, but if they’re not, they should be).
McCloskey’s campaign put out a post saying they were going to be at the Ozark Empire Fair on Sunday. It includes a picture of McCloskey and a picture of Vanilla Ice, giving the appearance that Vanilla Ice would be performing on behalf of McCloskey.
That’s not the case. Vanilla Ice is performing on the 29th. McCloskey is inviting his supporters to attend on the 31st, two days after people will be able to hear all of Vanilla Ice’s hits like, well, you know the one song.*
McCloskey told Star reporter Bill Lukitsch that he had no intention of suggesting there was a relationship between the campaign and the rapper.
Vanilla Ice’s managers said he did not give permission for his photo to be used in the flier.
“Vanilla Ice is not taking sides on political issues and is working to support his family,” his management said. “Please make this known.”
*obviously his “Ninja Rap” from the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie.
Take me out of the ball game
The Congressional Baseball Game was played at Nationals Park on Thursday night. The game features members of Congress donning baseball uniforms and doing their best attempt at something resembling the game of baseball and the Republicans won 10-0.
It’s been an annual swampy tradition since 1909. There are even signs in my neighborhood telling people to stop the game unless Congress takes action to address climate change. Congress did, actually, start moving toward action on climate change this week, but I think it’s a coincidence and not baseball related.
No members of the Missouri or Kansas delegations participated in the game this year, but on Thursday morning the U.S. House History Twitter page put out a video of a newsreel of the 1956 game. It features U.S. Rep. Thomas Curtis, a Republican who represented St. Louis from 1951 to 1969, playing catcher. He gets steamrolled at the plate by a Democrat trying to score. The clip ends in Curtis waving as he’s taken off the field in a stretcher.
Curtis was a major proponent of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
Correction
Last week, I incorrectly reported Trudy Busch Valentine’s relationship with August Busch III, the prominent Republican donor supporting Eric Schmitt. He is her step-brother.
Happy Friday
Read this article about a Juan Soto baseball card. Last week, Jon Shorman tried to tell me old fashioneds are better with rye than bourbon. Shorman is wrong, according to 68% of voters in a Twitter poll. So have an old fashioned with bourbon. And here’s a song by Madonna.
Enjoy your weekend.
Looking for more?
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For more politics news, follow @Kacen, @KatieJ_Bernard, @drdesrochers and @jonshorman.
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This story was originally published July 28, 2022 at 6:23 PM.
