Kansas Redistricting: Lawmakers Still Unsettled Over Maps

Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback

The war between moderate and conservative Republicans in Kansas is threatening to send the state's redistricting process into a tailspin.

With a Thursday deadline looming to submit the first part of new legislative and congressional maps, state lawmakers appear no closer to agreement. The state already is the last one in the nation to adopt new district lines. Lawmakers were sent back to the drawing board Monday after the Republican-controlled House of Representatives took the unprecedented step last week of rejecting new Senate districts drawn by the Republican-controlled Senate.

"We did something that we have never done," Rep. Bob Grant (D-Frontenac), a member of the redistricting committee, said of the House vote against the Senate districts. "I have never seen the House vote down a Senate map."

The redistricting process comes as moderate and conservative Republicans wage a political war that has engulfed Kansas state government since last year. On one side, moderate Republicans, who control the Senate leadership, have joined Democrats to dictate most Senate actions. On the other, conservative Republicans dominate the House and include Gov. Sam Brownback (R). A faction of conservative Republicans is in the process of challenging moderate Republican senators in the August primary.

The Senate redistricting proposal included districts Grant and House Minority Leader Paul Davis (D-Lawrence) said were seen as favorable to the moderate Republicans in this year's primary. The House will now attempt to draw the Senate lines, a first for the state, they said.

The current redistricting debate is the latest front in the war, said Grant.

"This is not a Democratic/Republican issue, it is a moderate/ultraconservative issue," Grant told HuffPost. "(The conservatives) are trying with the help of Governor Brownback to eliminate the competition in the GOP. They want to do away with the moderate Republican senators. This is a powerplay to get more ultraconservatives into the Legislature, so there is no way of controlling what the ultraconservative governor does."

Brownback's spokeswoman, Sherrine Jones-Sontag, declined to discuss Brownback's involvement in creating district lines or the GOP war. She did say that Brownback wants the Legislature to come up with new maps before the matter gets sent to the courts, which is possible if lawmakers cannot reach an agreement.

Brownback -- who took office in 2011 -- has found parts of his agenda stymied by the moderate Senate, including proposals for judicial selection reform, an overhaul of the state tax code and the abolishing of the state's arts agency.

Moderate and conservative Republicans have also done battle over rewriting state education aid formulas and a bill that could provide stronger state regulation of strip clubs. The two warring factions came together last week on a bill that would strengthen the state's "conscientious clause" for doctors and pharmacists regarding abortion. One moderate House Republican suggested the agreement had to do more with election year politics than anything else.

Kay Curtis, spokesman for Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach (R), said the clock is ticking. If the maps are not completed by Thursday, the deadline to file petitions to get on the August primary ballot will be pushed back 10 days to June 11, she said. Kobach has not addressed the possibility of delaying the August primary.

Among the other issues bogging down redistricting is a proposal to place urban areas of Topeka and Kansas City into the state's 1st Congressional District, which encompasses the entire western -- and very rural -- part of the state. Democrats have accused Republicans of drawing the lines in an attempt to end Democratic voting blocks in parts of the state.

Part of the issue with the congressional lines, according to lawmakers is the state does not have strict laws governing how the draw the lines, preferring non-binding guidelines instead. This includes keeping "communities of interest" together.

"We put the guidelines in place and then no follow them," Grant said. "They are doing whatever the hell they want."

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Comments

[Ken Roberts]

09:19 AM on 05/08/2012

Most red states have had or still have serious problems with trying to skew the redistricting lines to benefit the RW Republicans & weaken the moderates & Democrats. Brewer illegally fired the Chairperson of their redistricting committee because she didn't like the results. Alaska's redistricting is still up in the air to the point that they probably can not use the new lines in the upcoming election. Any possible way to skew/subvert or use illegal practices during elections to disenfranchise the voter/votes (again Alaska as an example) they don't like is and has been their goals for many, many years. It's done blatantly now. We MUST vote in such numbers that Obama & the Democrats win by landslides otherwise the elections will be GIVEN to the GOPTP - again. That is something that just can't be allowed to happen.

Obama/Democrats 2012

[StinkyMoBub]

09:02 AM on 05/08/2012

Think of it as a room full of Nugents - without hats...

[Mdp1517]

08:55 AM on 05/08/2012

Read: "What's the Matter with Kansas? How Conservatives Won the Heart of America (2004)" is a book by American journalist and historian Thomas Frank. Might help to explain why kansans keep voting these "nightmare" politicians into office.

[Paulie21]

08:09 AM on 05/08/2012

f*(.k kansas and koch.

[jefferson0467]

07:27 AM on 05/08/2012

It's time that re-districting is taken out of the hands of legislatures and due by non-partisan independent panels. Texas, where I live, is a joke and it looks like Kansas is right up there as well.

[grf67]

06:44 AM on 05/08/2012

It is time to flush all of the repubs out of our political system.

[chris hatala]

05:02 AM on 05/08/2012

The facist state of Kansas.

[oldStory]

02:20 AM on 05/08/2012

The republican party in my state is the mafia on steroids with a budget. Millions spent to get ultra neo-con men onto the local school boards and in a legislature that pays a measly 30 grand a year. Jindal pushing the cheat sheet for ALEC; privatising of prisons, school vouchers, creationism in the class and witch-hunting in the halls of the statehouse. Bobby has more than 10 million in campaign and funds and a huge charity to dole out. Went to the tea-party rally last year. Wall to wall bigots with an agenda of full-throated rage and corporate money to hire the buses and bottled water.

[MisterLogical]

12:33 AM on 05/08/2012

Tea party politics at work. These people are extremely dangerous.

[realmystical]

12:20 AM on 05/08/2012

With the conservatives trying to take over states like Kansas, the heartland just doesn't have much of a heart anymore. Everyone who wants to stop the neocons needs to VOTE in November to show the world we're not batsheet crazeee.

[hammerhead6154]

11:58 PM on 05/07/2012

Republicans can't even get along with each other much less anyone else!

[Veri]

12:48 AM on 05/08/2012

Hate. Taught by their Good Book. Or, at least, interpreted by ultra-conservative minds that way.

[vinnieboiblue]

11:58 PM on 05/07/2012

Don't you just love Gov. Sam Brownback's leadership style? Lead by creating Animosity and Havoc!

[steveruger]

06:37 AM on 05/08/2012

And that makes him different from the rest of his party exactly how?

[Ralph Lyndes Daughter]

11:26 PM on 05/07/2012

The tea party has no idea how hard their fall will be when the Repub moderates and Dems get together to keep a two party system going. We all have a front row seat to this crash.
President Obama will bring back the "sane" and "just" positions in November, and all the Rebs will wish they hadn't attempted to cheat their way back to power. Even if they do try to rig the vote, the people will show up in droves when you pissem off cause you tried to cheat to win.

[ProfessorMacphisto]

11:00 PM on 05/07/2012

Conservatives are dim witted and worse boring. Just right for a place like Kansas.

[Mdp1517]

09:02 AM on 05/08/2012

Not a fair analysis, O' Learned One. There are many smart, well-educated, and independent thinking people, like moi, in Kansas, especially in Johnson County. But I cannot speak for the Kansans who fall for "rhetoric" and not think for themselves and keep voting in "nightmare politicians" in year after year. After Kobach was elected as the "secretary of state", I've lost all HOPE!!

[Handyman2]

10:48 PM on 05/07/2012

Dwight Eisenhower, a great President from Kansas, wouldn't get elected dog catcher in Kansas today. Can you imagine pushing a public works project of historical proportions (Interstate Highway system) while opposing efforts to reduce taxes (highest rate at 91%).

[shifafa]

02:06 AM on 05/08/2012

I still like Ike. About 20 years ago the"answer man" from the local newspaper asked me if she (yep) could interview me. I said, "yes, if you quote me exactly." Her question was, "who do you think is or was the best President." I answered "in history or that I remember?" But as they were the same, I answered "Eisenhower." "Why?" I ansered, "He was a Leader of Men, a republican who carried the 'New Deal' to new heights. He warned us against the Fascist (and That is exactly what it is) threat and he played a bit of golf. THAT is what a great President shoud do!
Now we have another potentially great President. I didn't vote for him myself. Since I vote in California, my vote only counts as a number in the hope that someday a true 3d party progressive will actually get a shot and a seat at the debates. The two party system is dead. Two sides of a corporoFascist dollar still aren't worth a buck! To anyone who thinks I'm being mean, dishonest or inflating the danger we face, Read, decide and share
this: http://www.rense.com/general37/char.htm
F&F

[Lwayno]

05:50 AM on 05/08/2012

Ike warned us of the Military-Industry complex! but we did not listen! and we have been at war ever since! WHAT'S GOOD FOR HALLIBURTON IS GOOD FOR AMERICA! AND GENERAL BULLMOOSE!RIGHT???