Republicans gain seats in the Kansas Legislature

  

In 2024, Republicans gained seats in both chambers of the Kansas Legislature.

Republicans gained three seats in the Kansas House, and two seats in the Kansas Senate.

 

All seats in the Kansas Legislature were up for reelection in 2024.

Elections for the Kansas House are held every two years, and elections for the Kansas Senate are held every four years.

 

 

Last year, I covered the electoral geography of elections for the Kansas Legislature, and the policies debated and approved by the Legislature.

“Key races to determine balance of power in Topeka” discussed the Republican Supermajority in the Legislature, and explored the battleground Kansas House districts.

“Republicans chip away at abortion rights in Kansas” examined the ways Kansas Republicans have limited abortion rights, even though Kansas voters decisively rejected a constitutional amendment that would have allowed the legislature to eliminate abortion rights in the state.

“Kansas Republicans approve Trans Sports Ban” discussed the transgender sports ban Kansas Republicans approved over the veto of Democratic Governor Laura Kelly.

“Stop the Flat Tax” covered attempts by Kansas Republicans to cut taxes for the rich by creating a flat tax.

 

 

This article is part of an ongoing series that explores the results of the 2024 general election.

Previously, I covered the results of elections for the US House of Representatives and the US Senate. I also evaluated the accuracy of my predictions for the US Senate elections.

 

 

Democrats can use the results of the 2024 elections for the Kansas Legislature to determine which districts are most likely to be competitive in future elections.

Many of the most competitive districts, in both chambers, are located in Johnson County.

Johnson County is located in northeast Kansas, along the Kansas-Missouri border.

 

 

About 632,000 people lived in Johnson County, and about 2.97 Million people lived in Kansas, in 2024, according to the US Census.

Therefore, Johnson County was home to 21% of the Kansas population in 2024.

That means just over 1 in 5 Kansans live in Johnson County, even though there are 105 counties in the state.

Johnson County is the largest county in Kansas, followed by Sedgwick, Shawnee, Wyandotte, and Douglas counties.

 

Kansas House

 

There are 125 members of the Kansas House.

In 2024, Republicans won 88 seats, and Democrats won 37 seats, in the Kansas House.

 

 

Republicans gained three seats in the Kansas House in 2024.

 

I created the graphs in this series using Flourish, a website that allows users to create compelling visual aids.

 

Since 2011, Republicans have held two-thirds supermajorities in both chambers of the Kansas Legislature.

The Republican supermajority allows Republican legislators to override a Democratic governor’s veto with only Republican votes. 

This grants Republican lawmakers the ability to pass laws without support from any elected Democrats.

 

Republicans have held a supermajority in the Kansas House since the 2010 election.

 

 

 

The following table lists the closest 2024 elections in the Kansas House.

The table is organized by the 2024 margin of victory in each district, with the closest races listed first.

The two races listed at the bottom of the table weren’t competitive in 2024, but they were competitive in 2022.

 

The names of elected incumbents are followed by “(i)”.

 

As you can see, four Kansas House races were decided by less than 200 votes.

 

The margin swung in favor of Republicans in 14 of the 15 elections shown in the table above.

The margin swung in favor of Democrats in only one district, District 48, in Johnson County, where incumbent Democrat Dan Osman increased his margin of victory, compared to 2022.

 

 

Republicans flipped control of Districts 14 and 15, in Johnson County, and District 102 in Reno County.

The 2024 Kansas House races in Districts 28 and 14, in Johnson County, and District 95 in Sedgwick County, were rematches between the same candidates who ran against each other in 2022.

 

 

The following paragraphs list the counties where the districts, in the table above, are located.

The districts will be listed in the order they appear in the table, with the most competitive districts listed first.

 

Districts 28, 49, 15, 14, 39, 30, and 48 are located entirely in Johnson County.

District 117 is located in Johnson and Douglas counties.

 

District 88 is located in Sedgwick and Butler counties.

District 102 is in Reno County.

District 67 is in Riley County.

District 41 is in Leavenworth County.

District 53 is in Shawnee County.

District 95 is in Sedgwick County.

District 33 is in Wyandotte County.

 

 

 

Eight out of 125, or 6.4%, of the races for the Kansas House were decided by less than 5%.

 

Five of the eight Kansas House races decided by less than 5% were in Johnson County.

That means 62.5% of Kansas House races decided by less than 5% were in Johnson County.

 

 

Eleven out of 125, or 8.8%, of the races for the Kansas House were decided by less than 6%.

 

Seven of the eleven Kansas House races decided by less than 6% were located in Johnson County.

That means 63.6% of Kansas House races decided by less than 6% were in Johnson County.

 

 

 

Our next table also contains information about the 2024 Kansas House elections, but it’s organized by the margin of victory in these districts in 2022.

The table displays the margin of victory in the most competitive Kansas House races in 2022.

As you can see, the most competitive districts in 2022 and 2024 were largely the same.

 

 

Once again, District 48 is the only election where the margin swung in Democrats favor.

Although, Democrat Linda Featherston, in Johnson County, went from winning by 8.5% in 2022 to running unopposed in 2024, so it doesn’t really make sense to calculate a margin swing for her district.

 

Districts 78 and 16 are located in Johnson County.

 

Members of the Kansas House will be up for reelection in 2026.

Democrats would need to flip five seats in the Kansas House to break the Republican supermajority in the chamber.

 

 

 

Kansas Senate

 

There are 40 members of the Kansas Senate.

In 2024, Republicans won 31 seats, and Democrats won 9 seats, in the Kansas Senate.

 

In 2024, Republicans gained two seats in the Kansas Senate.

 

Republicans have held a supermajority in the Kansas Senate since at least the 2004 elections.

 

 

 

The following table lists the closest 2024 Kansas Senate elections.

As you can see, there is a large jump between the races that were decided by less than 6% and the races that were decided by more than 14%.

 

This is the first election for the Kansas Senate that was held after redistricting, so I didn’t include results from the 2020 elections.

 

The closest election was in District 5, in Leavenworth and Wyandotte counties, where Republican Jeff Klemp defeated incumbent Democrat Jeff Pittman by only 31 votes, or 0.1%. 

 

 

In 2024, Republicans won all six Kansas Senate races decided by less than 10%.

All six Kansas Senate races decided by less than 10% were also decided by less than 6%.

Let’s examine those races, first.

 

 

Districts 10, 11, and 35 are located in Johnson County.

District 23 is located in Johnson and Miami counties. 

 

District 5 is located in Leavenworth and Wyandotte Counties.

District 22 is located in Riley County.

 

 

Six out of 40, or 15%, of the races for the Kansas Senate were decided by less than 10%.

Those same races were also decided by less than 6%.

Therefore, 15% of the races for Kansas Senate were decided by less than 6%.

 

Four of the six Kansas Senate races decided by less than 10% in 2024 were located entirely or partially in Johnson County.

That means 66.7% of Kansas Senate races decided by less than 10% were located entirely or partially in Johnson County.

 

 

 

Now, let’s examine the Kansas Senate elections that were decided by less than 15%.

 

Incumbent Mary Ware was the only Democrat who won an election for the Kansas Senate that was decided by less than 15%.

Ware was reelected by 14.2% in District 25, in Sedgwick County.

 

 

In 2020, Rick Kloos (R) defeated incumbent Democrat Anthony Hensley in Kansas Senate District 19 by 2.1%.

That was the closest election for the Kansas Senate in 2020.

 

For the 2024 election, Kloos was redistricted into Kansas Senate District 3.

In 2024, Kloos won reelection in District 3 by a landslide margin of 14.8%.

District 3 is located in Osage, Douglas, Franklin, and Shawnee counties.

 

 

 

Members of the Kansas Senate won’t be up for reelection until 2028.

But once they are, we will have a better sense of which districts will be competitive, than we did before the 2024 election.

Democrats would need to flip five seats in the Kansas Senate to break the Republican supermajority in the chamber. 

 

 

Grading my 2024 Senate Predictions

 

Before the 2024 general election, I made several predictions.

In this article, I will evaluate my 2024 Senate predictions, and 538’s Senate polling averages, which I discussed during my election coverage.

 

This article is part of an ongoing series that explores the results of the 2024 general election.

Previously, I covered the results of the elections for the House of Representatives and the Senate.

 

 

 

My Predictions

 

I correctly predicted Republicans would win control of the US Senate.

But I incorrectly predicted the number of seats Republicans would win.

I predicted there would be 51 Republicans in the US Senate after the election. Instead, there are 53.

 

 

On November 3, two days before the election, I published my predictions for eight US Senate contests I believed would be decided by less than 5%.

You can click any of the tables in this series to view a larger version of them.  

 

As you can see, I incorrectly predicted the winners of the Senate races in Ohio and Pennsylvania.

I correctly predicted the winners in six states: Nebraska, Texas, Florida, Wisconsin, Montana, and Michigan. 

Therefore, I correctly predicted the winners in six of the eight contests.  

 

 

 

I attempted to predict the margin of victory in these races to the nearest percent.

 

Republicans outperformed my predictions in all eight races.

On average, my predictions were 5.5% away from the actual margins in these contests.

I’d say my predictions held up pretty well.

 

 

My closest prediction was in Wisconsin, where I was only 2% away from the actual margin.

My least accurate prediction was in Florida, where I was 10% off from the actual margin.

My second least accurate prediction was in Nebraska, where I was 7% off from the actual margin.

 

 

I tried to predict which races would be decided by less than 5%.

I correctly predicted Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Ohio would be decided by less than 5%.

I incorrectly predicted Florida, Texas, Montana, and Nebraska would be decided by less than 5%. Instead, they were decided by more than 5%.

Nevada and Arizona were decided by less than 5%, which I hadn’t predicted.

 

 

 

Grading 538’s Polling Averages

 

538 is a news organization that covers US politics and elections.

538 is best known for its polling averages and election forecasts.

 

At 6 a.m., on election day, Nov. 5, FiveThirtyEight stopped updating its polling averages. 

The next two tables compare 538’s final polling averages for the 2024 US Senate races to the actual margins in those races.

The first table is organized by the actual margin, with the closest races listed first.

 

The second table, which shows the same information, is organized by 538’s final polling averages, with elections they predicted would be the closest, listed first.

 

In the tables above, Republican candidates outperformed 538’s polling averages in 11 of the Senate elections, and Democratic candidates outperformed 538’s polling averages in two Senate elections. 

 

 

The final 538 polling average was less than one percent away from the actual margin in Montana, Maryland, and New Mexico.  

538’s largest miss was in Florida, where the Rick Scott, the Republican candidate, outperformed 538’s final polling average by 7.8%.

 

 

On average, 538’s final polling averages were only 2.9% away from the actual margins in these races.

 

I predicted Democrats would outperform their Senate polls.

Instead, Republicans outperformed their Senate polls.

On average, Republicans outperformed 538’s final senate polling averages by 2.8%.

 

 

I found 538’s final senate polling averages through 538’s Senate Forecast, which is now only accessible through the Wayback Machine, a service provided by the Internet Archive.

 

 

538’s Senate Forecast predicted Republicans would control 52 seats after the election.

Their forecast was off by only one seat.

538’s Senate Forecast predicted Bob Casey Jr. (D) would win in Pennsylvania. Dave McCormick (R) won, instead.

The Pennsylvania Senate race was the closest Senate race in 2024, as you can see in the table below.

 

 

 

 

 

Early 538 Polling Averages

 

Polling tends to be the most accurate right before an election.

But people who follow politics generally begin to pay attention to polling much earlier than that.

How accurate were 538’s Senate polling averages a few weeks before the election?

 

 

I published a table of 538’s polling averages for Senate races in "Nebraska may determine Senate Control,” which I published on Oct. 16.

Therefore, these polling averages are from 20 days before the election.

 

 

The following table compares these early 538 Senate polling averages to the final results.

 

Republican candidates outperformed the early 538 polling averages in 10 races.

Only one Democratic candidate, Angela Alsobrooks in Maryland, outperformed the early 538 polling average in her race.

 

 

The early 538 Senate polling averages predicted the correct winner in 9 of the 11 contests. The early averages predicted incorrect Senate winners in Ohio and Pennsylvania.

 

 

The early 538 Senate polling average was the most accurate in Montana. The Republican candidate, Tim Sheehy, only outperformed the early polling average by 1.7%.

The early 538 Senate polling averages were the least accurate in Florida, Nevada, Nebraska, and Ohio. 

Republican candidates outperformed all four of these polling averages by more than 5%.  

Florida was the least accurate prediction among the early polling averages. 

Rick Scott, the Republican candidate, outperformed the early polling average in Florida by 8.2%.  

 

 

On average, the early 538 Senate polling averages were 4.8% away from the final margin.

On average, Republican candidates outperformed the early polling averages by 4.2%.

 

Even these early polling averages were fairly accurate, compared to the final results.

 

 

Now let’s compare these three sets of predictions.

My predicted margins were the least accurate, 538’s early polling averages were in the middle, and 538’s final polling averages were the most accurate.

Nevertheless, all of these predictions were fairly accurate, overall.

 

 

 

Lessons

 

So what lessons, if any, should Democrats take from the 2024 Senate elections?

 

There were many competitive Senate races in 2024.

That made it challenging for activists to know where to dedicate their time, money, and attention.

Personally, my coverage focused on the Senate races in Nebraska and Ohio.

Many liberal political news programs focused on the Senate races in Texas, Florida, and Montana.

 

 

Considering the final margins, Democratic activists should have spent more of their time and money on the Senate elections in Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin, which were each decided by less than 1%.

But the polls underestimated Republicans, which obscured the relative importance of these races, especially considering there were so many competitive Senate elections competing for our attention. 

 

Going forward, I will be more likely to assume Senate races in swing states will be competitive, even if polling indicates otherwise.

 

 

 

I believe Democrats should focus more on races they need to defend, and focus less on their fantasies that they might flip a seat by defeating a particularly odious Republican in a consistently red state like Texas or Florida.

In the end, Ted Cruz (R) won reelection in Texas by 8.5%, and Rick Scott (R) won reelection in Florida by a whopping 12.8%.

The Nebraska Senate race was more competitive than the races in Florida, Texas, and Montana.

But even there, Deb Fischer (R) won by 6.7%, despite a strong showing by Independent candidate Dan Osborn.

Sometimes, it’s worth investing in stretch goals, but not when doing so comes at the expense of neglecting more competitive races Democrats might otherwise lose.

 

 

In 2026, the polls might not underestimate Republicans, like they did in 2024.

Democrats will likely perform better in 2026 than they did in 2024.

But that doesn’t mean there aren’t valuable lessons we can take from the electoral losses we suffered last year. 

 

 

Little Apple Pride, 2025

 

The Little Apple Pride celebration took place in Manhattan, Kansas, on April 12.

Here is the video I recorded of this year’s Little Apple Pride Parade.

 

 

I observed signs with the following messages in the parade.

• A Just World for All
• Today I hope you know U R Seen!
• Riley County Democratic Party
• Saint Paul’s Episcopal Church
• Trans Healthcare Saves Lives

 

 

This year, I wore my rainbow phoenix shirt, just like I did last year.

 

 

 

I purchased the shirt from Second Wind, a worker-owned company that publishes video game reviews.

Second Wind also creates Adventure is Nigh, an ongoing multi-season Dungeons and Dragons campaign.

 

 

 

I wore a necklace with a transgender symbol, and dragon pins displaying the colors of the genderfluid and transgender flags. 

 

 

I showcased my LGBT button collection in previous articles on Meticulous Musings.

 

 

I painted my fingernails pink for the celebration. 

 

 

This is the third year I’ve recorded the Little Apple Pride Parade.

In 2023 and 2024, I discussed the pride flags that appeared in the parade.

 

Most of the flags in this year’s parade were also in last year’s parade. These include the rainbow, transgender, bisexual, pansexual, progress, lesbian, and asexual pride flags.

 

You can read my article on the 2024 Little Apple Pride celebration to learn about those flags.

Three flags appeared this year that weren’t part of last year’s parade. They are the Philadelphia, Gay Man, and Demisexual pride flags.

I will discuss these flags, next.

 

 

 

Philadelphia Pride Flag

 

 

In 2017, the City of Philadelphia debuted a new LGBT pride flag.

The Philadelphia Pride Flag added black and brown stripes to the top of the six stripe rainbow flag.

Philadelphia’s Office of LGBT Affairs created the flag to draw attention to non-white LGBT people and their concerns, as part of a larger effort to combat racism in the city’s gay bars.

 

 

Daniel Quasar, a nonbinary artist and designer, incorporated black and brown stripes, representing black and brown LGBT people, into the Progress Pride Flag, which Quasar created in 2018.

At the pride events I have attended, the Philadelphia pride flag has been less common than the progress pride flag and the six-stripe rainbow flag.

You can read about the rainbow flag and its variants in my article about last year’s Little Apple Pride Parade.

 

 

 

Gay Man 

 

During the pride parade, someone displayed a fan with the colors of the Gay Man flag. 

 

 

 

 

 

The Gay Man flag, shown above, was created by Mod Hermy in 2016. 

Hermy is nonbinary and bisexual. 

Hermy created the flag in response to an anonymous commenter who asked about creating a flag for gay men specifically, because the rainbow pride flag was increasingly used to represent the LGBT community as a whole. 

The original flag design was published on the ask-pride-color-schemes Tumblr account. 

Hermy worked with a Tumblr user, who is gay and trans, who came up with meanings for each of the flag's stripes.

 

 

Gay men primarily use the rainbow pride flag and its variants, but the Gay Man flag occasionally appears at pride events, even though it’s considerably less common.

 

 

 

Demisexual

 

 I observed someone displaying a demisexual flag in the parade.

 

 

 

 

A demisexual is someone who only experiences sexual attraction after they have formed an emotional bond with someone they are close to.

 

I discussed demisexual and other asexual spectrum identities in my article on Sexual and Romantic Orientations.

 

 

 

After the Parade

 

I watched the somewhat disorganized drag performances at Wefald Pavilion in City Park, and the better organized drag performances that evening at McCain Auditorium, many of which were quite compelling.

 

 

I visited booths for local organizations during the pride celebration.

At one of the booths, I learned about an upcoming anti-Trump protest, organized by our local Indivisible chapter in Manhattan, Kansas. 

 

I took part in the anti-Trump protest, and many more that followed.