The Republican Party, a bigoted gang of kleptocrats that has fooled an increasingly narrow group of people into think that screaming at women and minorities is a solid substitute for governance and will help them in ways that go beyond scratching their primordial itches, continues to get more and more pathetic and corrupt.
Tonight, Kansas declared that Kris Kobach, the uber-controversial, nakedly-racist, and incredibly ineffective Secretary of State, has won the GOP primary for governor. This is a state that just suffered tremendously under a far-right bigot named Sam Brownback, whose policies of extreme austerity and religious intolerance Kobach would not only extend, but actually double down on.
Kobach is the architect of the extremely and purposely flawed Interstate Voter Registration Crosscheck Program, which was designed to disenfranchise voters across the country. He was the head of Trump’s failed Voter Fraud commission. And he swindled cities and towns across the Midwest out of millions of dollars by promising to set up anti-immigration ordinances and then cashing in when they got sued into oblivion.
His victory is a terrible shame… except that it makes a Democratic win a bit more likely in this typically red state. Of course, people said that about Trump winning the GOP nomination, so we can’t take anything for granted. That’s why we need to go all-in to help the Democratic nominee Laura Kelly, a longtime state legislator.
If you want to know how different the two candidates are, just read this bit from Kelly’s About page and imagine any Republican saying any of these things:
She was a key player in the establishment and funding of the Early Childhood Development Block Grants, which have helped thousands of Kansas children enter kindergarten ready to learn. As a mom, Laura understands how devastating the costs of child care can be for low-income women who just want to go to work and provide for their families. She’s fought to make child care more affordable for these parents, and she took a leading role in fighting Governor Brownback’s attempts to dismantle Kansas’ prized early learning system in 2016.
Most recently, Laura fought to repeal the Brownback tax plan and put Kansas back on sound financial footing. She knows it is important for everyone, including the wealthy, to pay their fair share to fund our priorities – like roads and schools. She was key to building the bipartisan coalition to reverse Brownback’s tax plan putting Kansas on the road to fiscal recovery. Laura has fought – from her first session to her most recent – for additional funding for K-12 schools, colleges, technical schools and universities.
Obviously, it’ll be an uphill battle. But having Kobach being in power instead of prison is too scary a prospect to ignore. We need to sweep these corrupt Republicans out of public life entirely, not let them retreat and regain power on the state level. This race immediately becomes one of the highest-stakes state races in the 2018 election.
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