KS-SEN 2020 Megathread: Marshall overperforms and wins

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Kobach to announce for Senate next month, report says.

(via Sunflower State Journal)

KS-SEN is Lean D if Kobach wins the nomination.

Nope, Likely to Safe R. The only reason Kobach lost the gubernatorial election is because it was a state race, not a national race.

In 2010, Republicans failed to win a single gubernatorial race in >60% Obama in 2008 states, while they won 2 senate races in such states and came a primary election misfire away from winning 2 more, for a total of 4. The data points are more mixed than you realize.

It should be noted that Republicans were the incumbents in a lot of these deep blue elastic states and thus couldn't run against the economy in 2010 like they did nationally. This made it harder in say CT and CA. The one state where the could run against the incumbent Dem Governor, they also had a primary misfire, Illinois. Also in CA, not only was Arnold deeply unpopular but Meg Whitman proved to be a disaster.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Hilarious this means that Republicans will continue to get all of their KS Senators from KS-01. Both Jerry Moran and Pat Roberts represented KS-01.

Coincidentally, back in the 2010 cycle, I made a comment that Republicans were better off because at the time the stark divides between moderate and conservative KS factions were centered in the Eastern Part of the state, and thus such a western Representative would be "above the fray".

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Hilarious this means that Republicans will continue to get all of their KS Senators from KS-01. Both Jerry Moran and Pat Roberts represented KS-01.

Coincidentally, back in the 2010 cycle, I made a comment that Republicans were better off because at the time the stark divides between moderate and conservative KS factions were centered in the Eastern Part of the state, and thus such a western Representative would be "above the fray".

Well depending on how they draw it, the Western District could come all the way East.  You'd think that the metro areas might get tired of the Western areas getting all the Senators.

They didn't have the votes to do that in 2011 when Brownback was governor.  No way they would be able to do it now over Kelly's veto.  Republicans are currently only 2 seats over the veto override threshold in the lower chamber, so it's entirely possible they lose the veto-proof majority in 2020 anyway.  And the Kansas Supreme Court leans strongly left if redistricting gets there.

And Kansas legislature couldn't even draw the maps last time because they were too busy fighting each other, as I recall.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

The KS GOP moderate branch needs to be cleansed with fire, and that's the end of it. Tim Huelskamp 2020.

Wow how dare a moderate state have a moderate ruling party!

Moderate? Kansas voted for Trump by 20 points.

A Kansas moderate is still a conservative in the national scale of things. They just live in a suburb and prefer not to have their schools funding gutted.

In a sense they are more conservative in the tradionalist sense (societal stability etc), then the "conservative" wing, which only cares about dismantling government and are thus more Randian and economically libertarian, than conservative.

That explains the disconnect between support for Trump and support for moderates locally.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

So Kobach raised $242K, Marshall $376K, and Bollier over $2.2 million. Hard to say that Marshall would be a shoe-in with those #s.

Republicans are shooting themselves in the foot praying for Pompeo or someone else to bail them out here and that is why a lot of money is waiting on the sidelines.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

I told you all Kansas wouldn't be close lol. It's basically impossible in today's climate for the other party to win in a state where they're losing voter registration by 20 points this was Tennessee 2018 all over again.

Western KS is KS equivalent of East TN.

Mann won KS-01 with 71%. Estes got almost 65% in KS-04. Flip Johnson and Riley, get swamped by the rest of the state.