The 2018 Kansas Elections: The Races for Governor and U.S. Congress

one of the big kansas stories of two thousand a team that will have a major impact on to tell the nineteen with the november elections and j mcintyre and today and kbr presents we'll look back at the two thousand eighteen cans of the elections with political insiders campaign strategists and journalists it's the dole institute of politics post election conference held november twenty eight two thousand eighteen this event's featured giordano ziglar campaign manager for laurie kelly dan mcnamara campaign manager for sure it's david's holly appalled campaign manager for steve watkins cj grover campaign manager for kevin yoder carrie gets campaign manager for paul davis and her what all with the kansas city star jon hamm out with the associated press caroline sweeney with casey tv five in kansas city patrick miller professor of political science at the university of kansas and jared soon a consultant with the singular as group a consulting group that works on republican campaigns and was previously

associated with chris kolb outs campaign for governor the dole institute invited representatives of crisp about and greg orman is gubernatorial campaigns to participate but both declined to do so they can't just post election conference was moderated by bill lacy director of the dole institute he asked were done the ziglar of governor elect laura kelly's campaign to start out by describing their strategy for the two thousand eighteen election i think that what we try to do as a campaign is run a race that was really authentic tara candidate to la or are in an authentic to the state of kansas and for what and so what she was hearing around the state but in general what she felt like a stately then and i believe that we did that and the way that we did that actually was from a pretty intense message discipline and space and the beginning of a methodist a pretty much the same and i think we're all very proud of that they had a small team a very hardworking team the team that had a majority are hold our entire senior staff actually was women

which was an exciting thing and i think kind of talk about it in a state that's erika lee wants to build here in kansas and making sure that there is diversity and inclusion in state government and industry is wow i we definitely and you know we had a primary that i think was competitive for all the right reasons but i think that we handled really well i guess entered how is an extremely hard worker and because of that we've raised money we needed to do to raise we went on tv in the way that we needed to we talk to voters directly in ways that i think were important and have hit home with them from for the most part i am usually had a message that i think really resonated with people and this and that so we try to stick with the entire time and there was you know him i think there is some benefit to the fact that running for governor is like running for president of the state that we got a really like drive and methods we wanted to drive and there was a lot of

there is in the federal agencies that and there's a lot more distraction of what's going on you know with the president for in washington and here i believe that we really that set the tone for what we wanted this campaign to be about time and when it diverts from that which i always to kind of give it back to what our messages because the fella their message was really resonating with voters and i just i mean honestly this campaign cycle was really interesting i think we had a really good time doing it you know it sounds maybe silly but i think that the campaign itself you know we start at the top and center kelly feels very strongly and passionately about that she was the best fit to fix the state and have take to stay away from the ramen test them and kind of returning to what she believes is possible here i meet separately from foreign really were adults alike run a strong campaign with a small staff a diverse staff and the staff that kind of can reflect what she wants the state today and every artery on the way from people you know from both parties that they really wanted to believe

in the vision of our was trying to the show to voters we just didn't just a couple just a minute or so outlining the basic message you talk about the message oh that cover like you're even the campaign carried what was that message sure it was pretty much revolted by their ways and this is why i have communications people because they're much better estimate is actually funding education system i balancing the budget without any new taxes and then just restoring hands as to what it once was an ending rather than a pick thank you very much i wanna move now to jerry the sinuous singular is jarrett was a consultant to the coal but campaign off through the primary and he is not representing the secretary of state but he can speak to count of what he thought the eco bach a primary campaign entailed but also to start with jarrett kind of what you saw as you were thinking about the general election what you saw as a secretary of

state a pathway to victory and so just to start out with i think when you're when i was working on the campaign which was until about mayeux twenty eighteen i very much was a viewing the race from the prism of you had a candidate in surgery co bought that hacked into the table where the day back several attributes that you don't normally see a bomb in a candidate like this he had a very committed and devoted days and he had national stature on the natural national recognition on it on a number of issues had the ear of the president the reason there's a number of things that she brought to the table to begin with but she was also very defined as an ideological rise as a talking head i felt like it was very very important as the campaign launched and kicked off

to really defined him as a leader or part from necessarily have been issues that the governor of the states by carries with it all a lot of things outside of just let your typical issues i mean you're talking about somebody that people turn to when there's a crisis or any type natural disaster and i felt like it was very important to position the ham has as somebody that could could lead aw among those why we patted backs so much to a lot of things that she thought was on the frontlines on during the nine eleven on pivoting to the fact that you as secretary of state that have a large number of the proposals that he pushed our were actually supported on a on a bipartisan plan the point our second thing was

expanding his issue portfolio is obviously very well known on tour three signature issues are my foliage is very important to expand that to give him a broader footprint other issues that he was really concerned about on the third thing that i felt like was important is as you've looked at the yuki that the pendulum swings so to speak in kansas politics in terms of the governor's office changing hands from party to party i'm over the years i've all it needed to position himself as kind of the the candidate of change are more especially indeed the post brownback her and to begin to inoculate ourselves you know from attacks that he would be you'd be labeled as brownback to point out because i was it was my vantage point from a strategic or standpoint that that was actually the most salient heads against him it wasn't that he was i too conservative or

un that that being labeled as from like to point out what it would be where we would get would run into problems ahmed and then finally i just we needed to run a very intensely data driven not harm and very focused campaign when you're dealing with the candidates is highly polarized and does this is a race is going to finally won or lost on the margins it wasn't going to be one and was by aa motivating or persuading the arts large part people and what we knew to run a very intensely data driven campaign then really drill down on the specific people that we could persuade on and then those would motivate turnout the key figure in the races in washington he's now an ambassador was was brown johnny and it is a reporter with the associated press very clearly in twenty sixteen kansas voters repudiated the brownback experiment there was nothing we saw on the ground that

that set their feelings changed about that indeed probably a good sizeable majority of them thought that tax experiment was a mistake and that it was actually bad for kansas and they didn't that they didn't want to continue that didn't want to go back to them so on the challenge for cold walk was to differentiate his position on the budget and taxes in favor of tax cuts and a smaller budget from brownback and dr kelly campaign state right on message on that point and you know there's always this argument and politics that if you're explaining you're losing and so toward the end of the campaign mr kovach was explaining how even though he's talking about tax cuts he wasn't talking about the same going back

to the brownback tax experiment he would doing differently shrink government cut spending at the same time and my work and you know there was always a sense with kovach that there was a ceiling somewhere to peer support statewide and in general election was that forty two wasn't forty five was it forty seven what you know our view we could be fifty percent but there was very clearly ceiling they're amending you have this factor with greg orman is the independent candidate who turned out not to be as much of the factors people thought but it i mean from the beginning everybody i think everyone kind of understood that this was going to be a debate about sam brownback sweaters then alison interesting you know you look at the state trial prison trump won a decisive decidedly in twenty sixteen and copa archetypes or so much trump airstrikes have very much of a presence here and your widow is a reporter

for the kansas city star and trump won the state by more than twenty points or so and you look at the so and that goes to sam brownback who really did seem to matter more than your president trump coming out i'm supporting both kovach and watkins and a rally in topeka that because partly because i talk to voters and you're like the cover but the third congressional the second and voters are very either they loved the president said that was very clear on that unseen what water down to the governor's race not i'm not sure that was because of the young people still have a memory of sam brownback or because of new medical but couldn't quite escape predators the ideal outcome a talking head and people form self disco was somebody who we know you can't count that he was always you know ever the nine months in one fox news to be talking and for our cities always precise for the us and yet as jon said we we didn't expect it would be some kind of seal an obese some kind of okay you know bigger

people tapped out and was fascinated me and my colleague at the star steve arkwright wonderful reporter may disappoint all action on the economy is somewhat four klein the former attorney general can you go too far to re working you can does which is a republican state will say ok that's too far long will the new center right not quite so far what about jobs and this is mentioned briefly by gerrit what about the secretary of state's national profile is that a plus farmers out at the end of the day a negative and and i'm i'm speaking from a broadcast perspective airline sweeney as a reporter with casey tv five in kansas city we talk about having access to candidates on any level and having their face in their voice in front of voters that's what i was hearing a lot from the johnson county wine that county in miami county voters that i was interacting with them on a day to day basis was a lot of them wanted to know why and even though we did have access to secretary kovach and he did come

on cctv five news or why they didn't understand why he was going on national programs and not more on local news and i think because my medium is so visual broadcast is extremely visual having that disparity between him always on national news promoting after moves on social media which the secretary still does on my facebook and twitter that can sometimes sending an interesting message to kansas voters that local media may not be as important as national media and and so that was that was something i was hearing from from voters a lot especially when it comes to wear candidates' bases and where their voices were showing up they don't necessarily understand the differences between national and local and they want more local exposure and its indisputable to look at his profile and say

that those appearances fuel helped fuel his rise arm but i think that it also somewhat created a plateau jared soon is with the singular as group a consulting firm that works on republican campaigns and was previously associated with chris kyle backs campaign for governor when you're in a campaign like that you want to drive a specific message happened every every one of those appearances the campaign kind of war on i think it became less distinguishable what his message was specifically related to the governor's race and instead it kind of went off into these other where essentially the news of the day wives and there's an element of that i think is good because you are participating in the debate in your life at the end of the day as a sort of been pointed out his name i didn't need to be increased arm where oh where that the focus needed to be it was in a specific a specific issues but he also seemed to kind of do things more than occasional way that you know

bill that kind of i think the phrase he used was consistent conservative but he built that kind of conservative warrior image mean the jeep with leo replica machine gun on the back of it that was in every parade an effort to trample all had interviewed genzyme a glove box again john hanna with the associated press you know you have this line in in debates during the primary i don't back down i double down you know when people complained about that parade forty talk about the snowflake meltdown he was kind of the crisco block that everybody knew in love and i was struck by the idea that you were you were talking about people haven't been able to see him as somebody who can comfort you in a time of natural disaster and it i don't know that he ever and he's a family man he's got five daughters in an n all of that but i

don't nobody ever came across is cut ta tum something that i found interesting about secretary kovach was me yeah it started off a race with just for secretary of state obscene name recognition i mean you and i were sitting hero wins the afternoon talking about politics we're really strange people patrick miller is an assistant professor of political science at the university of kansas you know we know noise elected officials are most people got so he was a decently well known quantity some child in kansas know he was amenable to clear the polling by his neck is a really high end and the public polling anywhere between forty five and fifty five so i think if you look at the public polling as the campaign progresses and as that voters who i thought would do pauline actually republican as you know is that decrease his negatives didn't change so this really even learned about him during the campaign that he was not only able to change how he was perceived and wondering that yet because of what the site is very hard to quantify

yet especially like studying an n of one like a president or a candidate like like like a marker trial but i do wonder to what extent the presence of trump and how people have reacted to him may have made kovach unpalatable to a degree i think it's fair to say that they're both politicians to their good at putting on a show any democrat senator cory booker and burning people like that they're going to put you on a show and come up with one of those people and i do wonder once you've finally got someone like trump an office for him the show is very important if that somehow helps if further limit kovach when if hillary clinton had won or john k set for some kind of mainstream republicans would be voters have been more willing to experiment with robots tommy i don't know that we look at the polling in kansas bases across the country that they're there are trying to people who voted for

trump we don't actually approve of the job he's doing trump got what sixty percent in kansas but canons are split fifty fifty and in terms of job of rewarding yeah kansas is more moderate than it is republican in polling but people like that republican brand so it except i bet i do think we shouldn't totally discounted the role that trump be a play because it it might have been a direct one immediate places like the johnson county suburbs it was a mean look at how that's changing but it also could've been a more indirect one in changing how people might have just perceived or received a political campaign by nationalizing himself kovach inexorably tied himself to the president who was a problem in the third district and just count in particular cj a rover was campaign manager or congressman kevin yoder i think that the entire vote margin that the secretary last fight you can account for jobs can you move johnson county was basically even race but if you go to but that it was something like forty six thousand and forty three thousand i think was in johnson county so i think tying

himself to trump may not remember as the state budget did fatal damage to him and in the race because of the way johnson county voters perceive the president had pursued and in somewhat seedy that night we i asked the secretary which counties are in washington and caroline sweeney with casey tv five in kansas city and he said he was watching sedgwick county for himself and johnson county for governor elect kelly and i think that's very telling a just way air that campaign may have been looking at their last minute priorities in johnson county i think we all know has been to continue to play a big role but i found that it's a very interesting meeting to his credit history very consistent then there's no richard have been very shy and all these tv the last few weeks is about trout yeah yeah so that was the question is why was there not that it was a strategic error that the women would be better than what we did do which would

allow basically to win big in the torah which is this republican voters that leopold with campaign manager for sleep what pens or was it maybe he wasn't in one a risk his brand for possible something else some sort of appointments or something like that but things didn't work out and shut out again in the question this was a strategic air our conscious choice but i'm curious about that exactly how would he never did because he was talking about tax cuts he was talking about smaller government is talking about being tough on immigration he was talking about second amendment stuff how how would you if you were if you were running his campaign how would you why would a tough swing voters like and like a side and the strategic i mean they literally the universe that we're talking to senate district that what his campaign was talking to a second district was about forty forty five thousand households as almost exclusively are in there swinging

gop their independence there is no overlap coker was base republican voters we try to do like door knocking with them there's no it's like those people are talking about probably like it now but that's that's like that that's what the criticism of that was a challenge and that he felt the need to respond to and to show is he said i don't let down a double whammy that point probably like a trickle down and yet again hunter woodall with the kansas city star that you know that there was a thing i don't i'm not sure i don't know and they came in this room could says do you think there isn't a new moderate crist kovach i think and i'm not sure you can an increased about serena for medicaid expansion he's never go for stricter gun laws you know it he you know the ten battleground what do a school's please never ran the young moderate on than school finance arm not quite sure if it was ever there

to the point about him having just as the president i mean let's be clear cool waters trump before trump strip and the water much had this plan he didn't hear one he tied itself trump really but he had this plan and kansas you know most at nasa has selected and get into the whole pedal point patrick made about this circus spectacle essence of this i mean you look at from the day announcing a wet leaves june twenty seventeen july actor promised tax cuts are largely been rolled back he comes out you know and says this is terrible i hated they did this ties himself too brownback tax cuts and then you know as time goes on you have trump jr come out you have the ongoing court case of a criticism chabon you know and then all that says names always in the news you have tended to come out for himself jr come out for me eventually trump come out for him and record machine gun he and he got very good at say the names of the news and say okay look i'm a look i'm a little i'm going i know for us as reporters on writing a jon i did the central and as well nicholas energy not you know you're not there or actress every time he pulls up

to the record you know machine gun gee you know thats not news every tiny desert news the first time an ok and again that's where the work and nobody don't keep reporting on every tiny percentage he made it really really you know some are turning away from doing okay here is what my policies was using the welcome and bespectacled isn't you know it's funny you needed a machine gun that are on a saturday and we get to break that story and a heads up the jam oh my goodness like this is really happening now and to get that story out there and it takes a campaign finance later at a statement regarding the whole snowflake that so simply to repair knowing exactly what they were doing but chris also something really interesting he very much a challenge but i think yukon republican stalwarts in the party a busy year nancy kassebaum came out and endorse you and work on his campaign enviable careers don't matter and he very much got upset with them doing that and he really i think struggle visit here was dished it was really harsh on kassebaum i think for average republican voter there's she's very worst act of unity really want the person you voted for governor

disrespecting that as you know is very real war so much historically famous womanhood britain are safer so hunter but remember on election night you know we're standing there at like for like for thirty and he said that comment and you and i both pushed back and said are you sure that's what you want to say about these two make respected people in the state in a walk that back just all that imagery was interested she had we have to crack and years ago the same people that oppose ground that are opposing these republicans who endorse democrats and that is not the case building a bill graves and not none doors paul davis over brownback and for taming kassebaum and i'm doris davis around active in fourteen now graves hadn't had got involved in the sixteen campaign toward the omnibus if kansas coalition but at any very good your religious trouble getting in chicago has drawn notes you know was it a passion kris has passed mom this much i think he realized i read or heard him even the other end that's hunter would all of the kansas city star part of a kansas post

election conference at the dole institute of politics today on k pr presents we're hearing about the two thousand eighteen kansas elections from reporters campaign managers and university of kansas political science professor patrick miller one person i had it i think you're right you're not been a moderate crist kovach on issues but it has what in a campaign ads it did seem to me at all that disagree that at the end he maybe pivoted back more towards talking about issues politically education that might have been important for swing voters and i think we can't be certain often wore kelly very much talking about kansas is using very focused on that day greg orman over here in our booth or part due to what you know kovach being provocative which we think about them you know the jeep in helping nancy kassebaum the ideas like that but it seemed like at the end you know in the last mile he was talking more his campaign was talking more about

education again defensive about attacks on that but also try and approach maybe soften the edges of that someone in a way that didn't make him seen as conservative even though he still had very conservative policies any that immediate that precious correct all believe in herman gall a bit of data that we had a brown back in the campaign as you look at the fox a people university and it was seventy eight percent of voters had a negative perception of the brownback tax experiment so they're maybe about perception as corrected co workers came back and talking more about them as issues that may be made people think a brownback that was a useful strategy again jared sin with this singular as group a consulting firm that works on republican campaign i think in in their minds the the education play was uncovered a but i think i would i would question two degree if you're an education voter out there first of all i don't think you're probably undecided on the governor's race and so i don't think you are or i question

was how much that actually was able to potentially move undecided voters and whether or not there is a lead there were other wedge issues out there that might appeal to swing voters whether it be good jobs in an economy which really never became my subject in the debate in the race that much arm you know he talked about term limits culture of corruption tied cleaning up government power which i think could have had some could have great legs would go in with a wider swath of voters like her believability factor cj grover with kevin year's campaign voters don't believe that republicans in general this point and kansas have trust or trustworthy and education she knows the kansas focus segment but you look at the missouri senate race comcast are in love that's on immigration and saying that she's a stronger border security candidate and i just think in today's day in a gentle that's very top are believable for a democrat to be trusted as the border security candidate over a republican especially when i'm

just telling you so but clearly embrace the president and the border message so that did sort of mirrors that in a way i think he saw the unsuccessful candidates making arguments that just weren't believable to vote kayla move along to the general election a little bit more now and down i first one i'm just like an observation about ms gorman whose ii and then again the race he ran a very strong race for senate until it was nationalized back and forty how wound up with six and a half percent but i know patrick you ever written skeptically about independent candidacies maybe not mormons in the jewish charity of your thoughts on them you know the whole corpsman have gotten a tweet from a norman person saying something on the order of you're buying

into this false narrative or warm and being a spoiler because it really pushed back on that and we were struck by how little the cast of the race changed it including with her any such a year ago greg norman and one of the women on a drummer named issues involves national and an organization like the roaches are bad to happen to the kansas city star of that as it is a political scientist who tracks and a veteran looks at data over decades about independent candidates and partisanship you just absolutely wrong totally false remain and it was this collar middle americans are less partisan turning independence no they're not and so ira response back in that goes it just was not actually correct it was distorting a lot of that over the legality and as i wrote back this response about will hear what's actually going on then of course that fear jihad on whatever you know and how silly unlikable

but the drama of that aside i was really skeptical because yeah i think if you dig down below the surface of the percentage of americans who claim independent and don't really act like it you look at success rates of independents they're not getting more successful in fact we're going to end the selection with your independence in state legislatures and we haven't even going into the election that we are not moving towards a viable third party voters are not less partisan are more partisan than ever and you know an actor nothing about astronomy in particular and trees a very nice person i've ever met and you know i'm glad i ran but i think that a candidate like that whether in business or a mormon or a candidate anywhere else faces immense structural challenges that no matter how rich or successful or a killing of a person that you might be you're not suddenly able to overcome that no that money combined infrastructure but a bottle six and a half percent and in that sense the storm is like and practically every other

independent candidate in this country who has run for statewide office is a competent normal human being with a nice bank account and that's about where the end up so to me that was the source of my my criticism i think people interpreted that as some kind of personal thing it wasn't because they don't know but you know i think it was very clear that the selection that we're not moving towards our party system fundamentally changing and we saw that here in kansas and it's all around us what it reminded me it is you see this happening and in states that have runoff elections where you have a multi way primary or general and you you will see essentially the top two or three candidates star rising to the top and then very very frequently and as you get close to the end that that other person or the fourth person just they just are the bottom falls out their numbers and so forth because people

just debut as potentially wasting about again jared sing with this thing you are screwed and i think that you saw that a lot with the norm in tennessee the other thing is is that i would say that when you look at trump's disapprove or prove numbers on his strongly disapprove numbers are the strongly disapprove is where virtually a hundred percent of the disapproval comes from and so people that were left of center or i'm against the president but they weren't looking for they were looking for an independent option they wanted they wanted they wanted a democrat to vote for and so i think in a different electoral fire member might have been slightly different how come our worries you have at least done better but i i just don't think that there's any appetite on the part of the left of center voters for anything less than that been awful for a full democrat and then the other thing

is i think that just from the message to calm inside of the arm and campaign they were very tactful in terms of selling the independent message but i don't think they ever close the loop of you know what does it mean for you are my house is actually going to impact your pocket but how's it going to impact your life and that you know the whole period of independence in how political discourses great boy i don't i don't feel like they really made it palatable as too the motivating factor for me and a wise guy was what what struck me was how little traction orman god and i remember coming from a democratic national committee member who said what really tuned in this is in october is that what really unites democrats right now is how and i'll clean about how angry we are a great warm again john hanna with the associated press you know i

was looking at some numbers last night and it was all over the hormones affect was all over the map you could see a few counties in two counties in western kansas were actually helped co box numbers down as kelly was roughly the same day were some counties rural counties were gracing display in terms of how much they lost in and some other so i just it struck me that he just never really became the big room are talking about candidates to overestimate if he'd really really was overestimating you look at the execution of that race a snowstorm in my first book in the foxhole be and seven only seventeen percent of kansans have a negative view of both political parties not a highly inflated number that he was pushing laura kelly won those voters over seventy percent he did when she won independence if you look at how it marketed himself he tried to project an image

and politicians is all the time when the image is not necessarily the substance i think that was a fair critique in his case because he projected this image of iran this moderate centrist but whenever you tried to differentiate himself from laura kelly he was hitting her from the left where was on medicaid expansion before kovach similar regulations were gone yeah i think her to be the peak and i was there to wonder he was the biggest liberal in the race were was him or r kelly so i had to create a prototypical independent candidate who could come in and actually make it work it might be someone with the business profile or the professional background the storm and but not what his partisan history in particular is a big democratic donor and sporty not with his issue positions that's patrick miller who teaches political science at the university of kansas dr miller was part of the dole institute of politics post election conference held november twenty eight two thousand eighteen i'm kay mcintyre will turn our attention to the kansas race is for us

congress in the second and third districts right after this you're listening to a pr presents on kansas public radio from the university of kansas and we are ninety one five lawrence and eighty nine seven emporia support for katie our prisons on kansas public radio comes from theater lawrence presenting holmes and watson a mystery about dr watson's investigation into the reported death of sherlock holmes and the three asylum patients claiming to be the fabled detectives lange weekend's january eighteenth through the twenty seven if you're having a hard time selling that old car or truck or just don't want the bother of selling it a kbr vehicle donation program can help find out more at kansas public radio dot org it's so easy when the tow truck comes to your home and picks up the vehicle and yell help support quality programming and katie are today anti

pierre presents we're looking back at the two thousand eighteen kansas elections with political insiders campaign strategists and journalists it's the dole institute of politics post election conference held november twenty eight two thousand eighteen for the first part of this hour we focused on the kansas gubernatorial race for the rest of the hour a look at the races for congress in the kansas second and third district this event was moderated by dole institute director bill lacy who asked campaign manager pat leopold how steve watkins won about mending fences after a bruising republican primary without a doubt that was basically job and when i when i arrived it was i mean reaching out to the party establishment and in reality was during the eye during the primaries he was one of seven or eight people running you know b he was the only true outsider there were state senators state raptors everyone was much more well known by the party establishment

than him so that so we talk about the county party leaders the county you know i suggest that officers they all knew all the other people but amongst those aha moments those the people that they know so on but steve was able to land on an outsider message ahmed said this too doesn't it an outsider message had great appeal he was only one that can carry that banner on a mini rant that any anyone he was able to win so i'm a tight primary election thanks to that but then yeah we needed to so the first job was to reach back out to those you know the party leaders in this really need to get to know is that they sound like fifty haven't signed a letter that davis used very effectively during the general election on talk about how they don't support him out how it does support steve what exactly what exactly what the letter set by the they had a lot of questions about him is largely against visited now on day summit was some misinformation that the then fly out there so we just set a

roundtable citizen rocket science is not overly complicated stop it just set up around tables private and lights or inviting all these gop elected officials throughout the district in southeast kansas northeast kansas now i'm through the balance of the guy wouldn't want him speaking a wooden throughout and it's basically he gave this little chili talk about who he was talked about his bio plan to talk about us values as believes in an assault on the floor and they ask questions and ask questions they did and they had a lot of them when they retire shockingly tough times but he answered them and i think we grew a lot of got a lot respect from people from that sold within a week two weeks after the primary i am virtually all those people who had signed that letter already on board so that was it was that was not a process i should not that i was unfamiliar with iran when franken's campaign and two thousand eight and when she knocked off john ryan who is trying to make a comeback don't a lot of the same issues he was the much more of a known quantity not notably when jenkins was a state

treasurer because says she was much more well known than steve watkins who was walking into this with no political experience but even so that at that level those people almost exclusively back your mind so we went through a very similar process as with a process i was familiar with on the week and then after that we needed to reach out to a bomb to appeal to what i would call traditional republicans that's especially known as the like bob dole or lynn jenkins republicans get them on board because they were skeptical of him and that was a little more complicated because that's like it group as opposed to because it's a it's a it's a collection of people he can sit down and they went that's more about action when in the election the first part was just that when another individual party officials and getting them on board ok cary let's our website take a few minutes to get your own interpretation of the davis campaign at the victory yes sir yes we are coming up after

two pronged carry goods was campaign manager for democratic candidate paul davis and the second district one it was compete everywhere right we know the second district are twenty five counties the other couple really big ones but when you get down to their twenty five counties and when this race we can get killed that we just took that into strong restoration with the vessel system that when things i did with her life that nora dr frieden no ultimate fight that ended with him on that but he was there is for us to not only say that we were going to do while all kicked off his campaign with a political going all right one two so from day one that you always going to go into the towns and towns that democrats don't always or usually expressed in this race other thing was religious is going to turn the race right we kept hearing natalie about how comets is to play what's happening that we did know the elegance of this could have really almost make it we

do things we have to be a place we have to go places and do things to do everything that we could do to boost turnout on for democratic base is much debt all without making any mistakes and davis can second district it's a very republican district right so we had a very very small margin of error if we want to win the race obsolete what i would think that worked out well for us all we did although we didn't even read we have our goals and a lot of these smaller counties that we didnt even think i'm going to get close to you i mean we had a great turnout i think that became really close ok very good renowned walked the two campaigns together just a war with because they have the same kind of environmental issues and everything so dan mcnamara and then ask you to describe on when he came into the campaign what you felt that the arsenal like david's of victory was yeah so i certainly campaigned so i think the problem with it in the

campaign was time i sharif announced her candidacy on valentine's day twenty teenagers very latest to announce a candidacy but there was a change in the primary field and so the resources and time were always the thing we were fighting the campaign over and over again in the primary might have to victory is actually to unwind a county and let everybody else they will arrest and that didn't happen and that the primary and we killed in johnson county ended did not do as well as i thought you and i have been white jail part of our decision to rely heavily on tv in the primary was we didn't know what the electorate was no like and what her nails no light in that particular election and so many new trees every dollar we couldn't go on tv is the one thing we did know why is she recently entrance into the race didn't hurt her none of our primary opponents have higher name recognition than her and we knew the people liked her story the idea of being raised by a single mom going to johnson county community college to the ivy league and working for president obama and wanting to come back here to kansas to make sure everybody had the same

access to opportunity in education and health care that she had and so once we figured out that we won the primary at seven thirty am most are used was on the way to the hospital has one of our staff members have the iowa college town on the macarthur mom we had to quickly i'll move to the general and so what we found was the message that i just said we're going to do go to an ivy league school and then working for president obama was a great message for the general as well so there was a really a week and that we were on tv from july going forward to the campaign and i remember writing budgets in the general and being like oh my god how are we going to raise this money was so hard to raise five thousand dollars in very fast money and in a way where i think we tried it different because i think were caught off guard i was caught off guard how much money we're using and then the one thing we knew is that distributor can define this we were an unknown quantity

to the electorate she had never run for office before and we needed to make sure that everyone knew that sri stevens was raised by a single mother with johnson trinity college with an ivy league law school and then work for president obama and that she wanted everyone to have the same access to education which read it over and over and over again the other thing that's interesting about working for sherry says she's such an interesting person and everyone that hartford needs to wear gloves or she is like just amazed by their unique native american and it was literally a part of her job was to figure out which parts of her story to people really to boston yes so we don't get a lot of data say it's obvious where the message discipline that's what cowell is it comes from and that's very very impressive let me let me than if i may ask you a question related to this kind of a record from a retrospective one from now looking back how big of applause was it for you

to be challenged in the primary by an individual who received senator sanders endorsement the more progressive than i want to have the person has personally very progressive writes this it was helpful at that the hope and eric spears so it was held on the fact that we raise a lot of money and he raised a lot of it raised the profile of the race and it made us work her mean everybody working for sure he says they were trying to save your corporate injuries as car has all of the lights on on them just like it fix it really she is not a record made everyone in the campaign worked ten times harder but the primary as a whole ms barron is more disciplined and it doesn't hurt when you're on tv for a month in a primary and he don't stop tb in any real way from july all the way to meet some of them were ok as cj what was carson the odors that to victory in this election yeah what kind of talking a lot more tactically so our objective basically was deformed to

combine two groups of people in the third district land that happened to be diametrically opposed to each other for nose into a coalition that that would make a majority and it was a victory in may basically forty three forty five percent at this trip to what president trump tends to be conservative republicans and about eight or ten or twelve percent district which is certainly are moderate kind of mosul ricker barbara boy a top republican too very much opposes president and we could not win and honestly we did not win without both of those coalitions and that and be nice or moderate republican coalition just never came home for us but the gold from the outset was to both hold the basin to win over we had seven and won those moderate republicans and only in the past and he's significantly outperformed other up and down ballot republicans in just counting the third district in past elections and as we saw with a lot of these house races across the country but

we just couldn't breaking away from the national the national discussion and i can take it a columnist with the steve rose problem and i've got a quote here from his column says that i've come to the painful decision that i cannot vote for kevin yoder for a fifth term representing can store congressional district i've always voted for him in the past the casting about for younger in november six like you'd feel like i'm aiding and abetting president donald trump and that's his desk that eight to twelve percent of the electorate really just felt like steve rosen and no matter what message we deliver to them no matter how many hands that kevin welk ensure can hum the braves who walked in and how how evidently we try to localize the race and emphasize that kevin's local ties in his own career in public service and has been elected official in johnson county for sixteen years but devoted his entire life really entire adult life to serving the community i'm a

candidate yet it was a national race and that's not uncommon and you have historically presidents lose an average of twenty five seats in the first that turns and ten when their approval ratings below fifty they lose an average of thirty seven seats and so that's us president trump has been pretty consistently below fifty percent approval rating and a nice autumn leaves one of the exact path to bring an exact count on its forty yes are good at it just became a national race and i'm there and we can break away so far when i heard that the victory gives your question actually what the visitor the rest of the tab was all boats to summarize the am going about what you thought about these two house races going into the general election not not today not looking backwards but what did some of the restive you think about how these races will that the thing you could feel kind of the feel of the third district were so i think early october john hannah with

the associated press and there was a sense that it didn't matter what your surgeon even if there have been eighteen debates that it didn't matter what and what issues he raised it was it was it was strange because by all odds and this was what was so unusual about this year i candidate with her profile but chile's david's mom not only would she not have been considered anywhere close to likely to win even two years ago that you wouldn't have even been in the mix of candidates and a map that to me is supremely interesting but the second district what's interesting is you getting a lot of discussion and you've got this in the gubernatorial race two of what the davis to roll was he too cautious should he have mentioned pelosi at the outset albeit is so he's out vote for a lot of soup and always with republicans yes saying the name reminds them that

horses out of those things and i'm struck by what stephen ambrose said which is now he lost a close election and the numbers we're seeing now suggest it might have been within a percentage point and so it was just a close election the republican was relatively unknown the democrats very well known in a republican leaning district that's amy turned out the second district are not be a little more interesting race because of the work that watkins had to do to win over his his fellow republicans and we look at the district's nationally like this careless in context right again dr patrick miller from key is to our political science so that the republicans win tin defending what about two dozen seats that clinton held in a practice that was a death sentence for the republicans there is white out in those cities basically hold three clinton districts that they would that they won them barely most damage

recounts so in that sense yeah there probably wasn't that much younger could have done realistically to win the election and only on your right you look a district like the third that have been quite say republicans for some time they've recovered a democrat those losses republicans extend the down ballot the state legislature city council school boards i think that back on a category of district fits into the kind of suburban trend we're seeing that really is the on a pretty underappreciated counterpoint to the rustbelt looking to draw that we don't pay as much attention to districts in the cabinet this week the county's large large suburban wealthier educated counties that actually clinton picked up and romney had one or a district like a county like johnson county goes from eighteen point romney win to a two and a half point trump you know so i think it is is a very interesting category of seats out there like that twenty years ago would've been bedrock republican suburbia but because of how white's are real money on education lines

they are the new swing territory where this i can't you know this is a district that trump won by nineteen twenty points to be a sixty four year public industry gets i mean to paul james his credit he made a competitive but you know this is not a category of district the democrats did very well democrats did well at that thinking of district that trump won by less than ten points really picked up like two or three trump double digit districts of this is the very hard category of cedar the book isn't it in context but you know i also think coming back at some of these candidates in terms of over and under arrest him in getting sometimes candidates get over estimated i think we might have over estimated paul davis his ability too overcome the republican assembly district overestimated years ability to survive in this kind of environment but also conversely underestimated injuries david and watermelons and i think both i much as ever got published that there is a commentator reporter told me from a republican political consultant in johnson county that sri stevens was pardon my language

the democrats and she she she checked off every single demographic box that should make a liberal go crazy but that's really insulting i mean and that reduces her or any cuts and it or you just put them in that box and you don't really recognize the strengths that they bring to their race likely watkins and david did they were able to generate some enthusiasm that it really had a compelling story for some people and they were a lot more of the race than just party and what box you wanna put them so i think that's something that we don't appreciate enough about those two races that's patrick miller assistant professor of political science at the university of kansas dr miller was part of the dole institute of politics post election conference held november twenty eight two thousand eighteen this event also featured dan mcnamara campaign manager for sure is david's cj grover campaign manager for kevin yoder

paul leopold campaign manager for steve watkins carry goods campaign manager for paul davis john hanna with the associated press hunter woodall with the kansas city star caroline sweeney with case cpb five in kansas city giordano ziglar campaign manager forget it like laurie kelly and jared soon with the singular as group a consulting firm that works on republican campaigns and was previously associated with chris kyle backs campaign for governor the dole institute invited representatives of chris kyle box and great or men's gubernatorial campaigns to participate but both declined to do so they can't just post election conference was moderated by bill lacy director of the dole institute special thanks to mark crabtree for audio of this event i'm kate mcintyre k pr present is a production of kansas public radio at the university of kansas