TOPEKA - Senior Kansas Republicans this week applauded President Donald Trump for reaching a tentative trade deal with Mexico. But at least one, U.S. Sen. Pat Roberts, who chairs the Senate Agriculture Committee, also expressed skepticism of a proposed emergency aid package for farmers who are being adversely affected by retaliatory tariffs that other major trading partners have imposed on U.S. agricultural ...
TOPEKA - Gov. Jeff Colyer's office announced Tuesday that communications director Kendall Marr has stepped down and that press secretary Kara Zeyer, formerly Kara Fullmer, will move into that position. Both Marr and Zeyer joined Colyer's office in 2017 when Colyer was still lieutenant governor but was preparing to become governor pending U.S. Senate confirmation of Gov. Sam Brownback to a diplomatic ...
TOPEKA - Steve Baccus, a former president of Kansas Farm Bureau who chaired Gov. Jeff Colyer's re-election campaign, is about to become co-chair of independent candidate Greg Orman's campaign. “I made it clear when I joined Governor Colyer’s campaign that I believed Kansas needed a leader who was committed to the state,” Baccus said in a statement released by the Orman campaign. “While my candidate in ...
One of the more interesting side notes to the Kansas Democratic Party's "Demofest" convention in Wichita this past weekend was the surprise sighting of a Republican political celebrity, former U.S. House Speaker John Boehner. In what appeared to be a bizarre coincidence, both he and former Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius were spotted checking into the convention hotel at the same time Saturday evening. What's ...
TOPEKA - After expressing grave skepticism earlier in the campaign, Republican Party officials in the 2nd District said Monday they are now fully behind their own congressional candidate, Steve Watkins. "Much like our President, Steve came to this race as political outsider," 2nd District chairwoman Cheryl Reynolds said in a statement. "As we have gotten the opportunity to get to know Steve, the officers have ...
TOPEKA — A task force set up by the Legislature to review the state's child welfare system was told Monday that it should recommend a review of the privatized model it has been operating under since 1996 to decide whether it's really in the best interests of the state. That was one of several recommendations for reform that the Child Welfare System Task Force received from two working groups it set up to ...