A race in Riley County for the Kansas Legislature features two candidates with impressive resumes and involves key issues in contemporary Kansas politics.
Incumbent Republican Mike Dodson is running for reelection to represent Kansas House District 67 against Democratic challenger Kim Zito.
Both Dodson and Zito are residents of Manhattan.
District 67 includes parts of Manhattan and Riley County.
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| Source:rileycountyks.gov |
Dodson was first elected to represent District 67 in the Kansas Legislature in 2020.
Dodson previously served as Manhattan Mayor, Manhattan City Commissioner, and Chair of the Riley County Law Board, which oversees the Riley County Police Department.
Dodson served in the US Army for 37 years. During that time, he served as the commanding general for Fort Riley, a US Army base near Manhattan and Junction City.
Kim Zito is a former journalist who reported for the European edition of the Wall Street Journal; Dow Jones Newswires; CNBC Europe; and WUSF, an NPR station based in Tampa, Florida.
Zito moved to Manhattan in 2019 when her husband was sent to Fort Riley.
Zito is a former chair of the Riley County Democratic Party. She is also a local community activist.
Dodson was first elected to the Kansas Legislature in 2020, when he defeated his Democratic opponent Cheryl Arthur by a margin of 7%.
Dodson received 54% of the vote, Arthur received 46%.
In March 2021, Zito spoke at a community vigil in Manhattan that sought to combat hatred towards Asian Americans following shootings in Atlanta, Georgia, where a gunman killed eight people, six of whom were of Asian descent.
Medicaid Expansion
Kansas is one of only 12 states that haven’t expanded its Medicaid program under the Affordable Care Act, which is also known as Obamacare.
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| Source: Kaiser Family Foundation |
There have been many legislative attempts to expand Medicaid in Kansas since President Obama signed the Affordable Care Act (ACA) in 2010.
Gov. Sam Brownback (R) vetoed Medicaid expansion in 2017.
The Kansas House voted for Medicaid expansion in 2019, but the bill died in the Kansas Senate.
This year, Gov. Laura Kelly (D) proposed legislation that would expand Medicaid, but the bill died in committee.
If Kansas approved Medicaid expansion, the federal government would cover 90% of the cost of expanding the program.
A total of 145,000 additional Kansans would be covered if the state expanded Medicaid.
That includes 44,000 uninsured Kansans who fall into a coverage gap because they are too poor to qualify for subsidies for private insurance under the ACA, but are currently ineligible for Medicaid.
According to a poll released this month by the American Cancer Society, 72% of registered voters in Kansas support expanding the state’s Medicaid program.
Both Dodson and Zito claim to support Medicaid expansion.
But Dodson had the opportunity to vote for Medicaid expansion in the Kansas House, and he voted against it.
On March 22, Rep. Henry Helgerson, a Democrat from Wichita, proposed an amendment, which would have expanded Medicaid, to an appropriations bill.
The amendment was rejected, by a vote of 49 to 72.
Dodson voted against the amendment.
Dodson did not reply to a message from Meticulous Musings, submitted through Dodson's campaign website, regarding his vote against Helgerson’s Medicaid Expansion amendment.
I actually learned about Helgerson’s Medicaid expansion amendment, and Dodson’s vote against it, from a blog post on Zito’s campaign website.
After looking into her claims, I determined she was correct.
On March 22, the official twitter account of the Kansas House Republican Caucus discussed Helgerson’s amendment and reiterated the state party’s opposition to expanding Medicaid.
“Rep. Helgerson has offered an amendment to add Medicaid expansion to the budget,” the account wrote. “Spending hundreds of millions of dollars in coming years to expand Medicaid under Obamacare is foolish. Expansion would cover thousands of many able-bodied Kansans who choose not to work.”
Abortion Rights
Ever since the US Supreme Court overturned the federal constitutional right to an abortion in June, abortion rights have been a key issue throughout the country.
That has been especially true in Kansas, where voters rejected a constitutional amendment in August that would have limited abortion rights.
But understanding that vote will require a bit of recent history.
In April 2019, the Kansas Supreme Court ruled the Kansas Constitution protects the right to an abortion.
The court found the right to an abortion is implicitly protected by the Kansas Constitution’s Bill of Rights, which states, “All men are possessed of equal and inalienable natural rights, among which are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”
Pro-life lawmakers and activists attempted to amend the Kansas Constitution to overturn the Kansas Supreme Court’s ruling that protected abortion rights.
Amending the Kansas Constitution requires support from two-thirds of both the Kansas House and Kansas Senate, and a majority of voters.
In Jan. 2021, both the Kansas House and Kansas Senate approved a constitutional amendment that states the Kansas Constitution does not create or secure a right to abortion.
In the House, 86 representatives, including Dodson, voted for the amendment.
A total of 38 voted against.
In the Senate, 28 voted in favor of the amendment, and 11 voted against.
Supporters referred to the amendment as the “Value Them Both” amendment, claiming the amendment expressed Kansans’ support for both women and children.
If the amendment had been approved, it would have given the Kansas Legislature the legal authority to approve a highly restrictive abortion ban.
Legislatures in Missouri and Oklahoma have approved highly restrictive abortion bans, neither of which contain exceptions for rape or incest.
In the August 2 primary election, Kansas voters decisively rejected the amendment, 59% to 41%.
I find it telling that more than 2/3 of the Kansas Legislature voted in favor of the constitutional amendment, which almost 60% of voters rejected.
To me, that’s clearly a sign that the legislature is considerably more conservative on key issues than Kansas voters.
During a candidate forum earlier this month, Dodson said he voted in favor of the amendment to allow voters to decide whether it should be adopted.
“I did it simply because you have three choices,” he said. “you can let the courts decide, you can let the legislature decide, or you can let the people decide. It looks like 60-40 is a pretty definite decision.”
On her campaign blog, Zito expressed her opposition to the amendment on the day the primary election was held.
“Today, I
sure hope that Kansas demonstrates to our country and to the world that we
value and respect women and trust each woman to make her own decision about her
body, no matter the circumstances,” she wrote.
“Today, I hope we tell the country that a person’s agency over their own body is as basic a right as basic rights can get. If we don’t own our own bodies, then we have nothing. Nothing,” she added.
“Today, I hope we tell the country that abortion is health care.”
After the primary election, Zito referred to the amendment’s defeat as “the shot heard round the world,” and encouraged voters who voted against the amendment to vote for Democrats in November.
Transgender Rights
Earlier this year, the Kansas Legislature considered a bill that would ban transgender girls and transgender women from playing on female sports teams at K-12 schools or public colleges.
Both the Kansas House and Kansas Senate approved the bill, which supporters named the, “Fairness in Women’s Sports Act.”
The bill was part of an effort by conservative lawmakers in state legislatures across the country to prevent transgender female athletes from playing on girls’ and women’s’ teams in public schools and colleges.
Republican supporters of the bill claim transgender female athletes have an unfair advantage compared to cisgender female athletes in women’s and girls’ sports.
Dodson voted in favor of the bill.
Gov. Laura Kelly (D) vetoed the bill, which she said would harm both students and the state.
“Both Republican and Democratic Governors have joined me in vetoing similar divisive bills for the same reasons: it’s harmful to students and their families and it’s bad for business,” Kelly stated in a press release.
“We all want a fair and safe place for our kids to play and compete,” she continued “However, this bill didn’t come from the experts at our schools, our athletes, or the Kansas State High School Activities Association. It came from politicians trying to score political points.”
Kelly said the bill would make it harder for Kansas to attract potential employers.
“This bill would also undoubtedly harm our ability to attract and retain businesses. It would send a signal to prospective companies that Kansas is more focused on unnecessary and divisive legislation than strategic, pro-growth lawmaking,” she said.
Kelly vetoed a similar bill last year.
This year, the Senate voted to override Kelly’s veto.
In the House, 81 representatives voted to override Kelly’s veto, only three votes less than the 84 required to reach the two-thirds majority necessary to pass the bill into law.
Dodson voted to override Kelly’s veto.
Kelly’s Republican general election opponent, Derek Schmidt, is running against Kelly based on her opposition to the transgender athlete ban.
Dodson did not respond to a message from Meticulous Musings regarding his position on the bill.
Zito told Meticulous Musings the legislature shouldn’t waste its time trying to prevent transgender girls from playing on female sports teams.
“The notion that there are transgender kids in Kansas K-12 sports is so manufactured and it’s a red herring to divert attention away from real problems that the legislature has options for real solutions,” she said.
Zito said there are few, if any, transgender student athletes in Kansas.
“The last statistic the state has on this is PERHAPS one student. But most likely ZERO,” she said. “This is a non-issue.”
The exact number of transgender student athletes in Kansas is hard to pin down.
Tom Witt, the Executive Director of Equality Kansas, told the Kansas Legislature last year that the Kansas High School Activities Association (KSHSAA) said there are only five transgender high school athletes in Kansas.
Regardless of the precise number of transgender student athletes in the state, it’s certainly very small.
Zito said the legislature wasted time and money by considering the bill.
“Regardless of how many trans students there are who want to play sports, there is already a governing authority in this arena and therefore, the state legislature need not involve their time and resources on this,” she said.
“It is a waste of taxpayer money for this body to spend time on this issue when it doesn’t belong in the legislative purview,” she added.
“I find it rich that the legislature is concerned about protecting women’s sports while they don’t give a flying fig about women. Full stop.”
How I plan to vote
Both Dodson and Zito have impressive resumes.
In particular, serving as the commanding general for Fort Riley is an impressive credential for a Manhattan politician to have.
But I plan to vote for Zito this November.
I support Medicaid expansion and abortion rights, and I believe transgender student athletes should be able to compete on the team where they are most comfortable.
On these key issues, I agree more with Zito than Dodson.
Learn more
You can learn more about the race from the Manhattan Mercury, as well as Zito’s and Dodson’s campaign websites.
Postscript: Dodson is still welcome to elaborate on his votes against medicaid expansion and in favor of limiting eligibility for transgender student athletes.
As always, I can be reached at jasonbeets@gmail.com.
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