photo by: Peter Hancock

Senate Democratic Leader Anthony Hensley, left, and House Minority Leader Jim Ward air concerns about possible voter suppression efforts in the upcoming elections during a news conference Thursday, Oct. 25, 2018.

TOPEKA – Democratic leaders in Kansas called on Republican Secretary of State Kris Kobach to recuse himself from supervising the upcoming election, saying they have concerns about the integrity of the process, including possible efforts to suppress people’s votes.

“We have an incredibly unique situation in Kansas today where the many who will count the votes could benefit by that count,” House Minority Leader Jim Ward, D-Wichita, said during a news conference, referring to Kobach, who is the Republican candidate for governor.

“We have a much higher degree of confidence in Bryan Caskey, who actually runs the Elections Division of the secretary of state, than we do Kris Kobach or (Deputy Secretary of State) Eric Rucker,” said Senate Minority Leader Anthony Hensley, D-Topeka.

A spokeswoman for Kobach’s campaign dismissed those comments.

“The Secretary of State has a constitutional responsibility to oversee all elections in the state, including his or her own, and that has been the case for as long as there has been an elected Secretary of State in Kansas” spokeswoman Danedri Herbert said in an email. “That is the case in the majority of other states as well.”

Neither Ward nor Hensley offered any evidence that Kobach is personally trying to manipulate the vote count. In fact, the secretary of state has very little role in counting ballots. That is done by county election officials in each of the 105 Kansas counties.

The secretary of state does, however, provide guidance to each county officer. He also appoints the election commissioners in the state’s four largest counties: Sedgwick, Johnson, Wyandotte and Shawnee.

In Johnson County, Ward pointed out, 153 mail-in ballots were rejected because officials in that office believed the signatures on the ballot envelope did not match the signatures of those voters on file in the election office.

On Wednesday, a federal judge in Georgia blocked election officials there from doing the same thing without first contacting those voters to give them an opportunity to clear up the confusion.

Ward and Hensley also pointed to other issues involving this year’s election, including the situation in Dodge City, where Hispanics make up 60 percent of the population, and the town’s only polling place has been moved outside the city limits.

“In an election that may be decided by as few as 300 or 400 votes, every time you make it harder to vote, every time you place challenges before people to vote, it could swing an election in a wrong and improper way,” Ward said.

Herbert, however, said the secretary of state does not determine the number or placement of polling places in any counties except the four where he appoints the county election commissioner.

“That’s why you see such a good distribution of polling places in those four counties,” she said.

Finally, the Democrats pointed to text messages that many voters have gotten in recent days telling them their advance ballots have not been counted. One purports to come from President Donald Trump. The texts also contain links to websites managed by the Republican National Committee.

University of Kansas political science professor Patrick Miller said in a tweet Wednesday that he has received those texts as well.

“I guess this is effective on some voters,” Miller said in the tweet.

But Ward said that kind of tactic is potentially harmful to the election process.

“The whole purpose of sending it out is to sow confusion, because remember, we’re talking about an election that could be determined by 300 or 400 votes,” he said.

Recent polls have shown the race between Kobach and Democrat Laura Kelly to be a virtual tie at about 41 percent each, with independent candidate Greg Orman getting support from about 10 percent of voters.