Johnson elected State Treasurer

 

Steven Johnson has been elected State Treasurer in Kansas.

Johnson is a member of the Kansas House who runs a farm near Salina. 

 

Johnson (R) defeated incumbent State Treasurer Lynn Rogers (D) by a margin of 13%.

Johnson received 54% of the vote, and Rogers received 41%. Libertarian Steve Roberts received 5%.

Lynn Rogers served as Gov. Laura Kelly’s Lieutenant Governor before Kelly appointed Rogers to serve as State Treasurer after the previous treasurer, Jake LaTurner, was elected to Congress in 2020.

 

Johnson had a much tougher race in the Republican primary, where he narrowly defeated State Senator Caryn Tyson.

Johnson won that election by only 474 votes, or 0.11%.

Johnson received 50.05% of the vote, and Tyson received 49.95%.

 

Johnson won his general election contest by 13%.

By all accounts, that’s a solid win.

But Johnson won by a smaller margin than Republicans in previous State Treasurer races.

A Republican won each of the four previous most-recent State Treasurer elections in Kansas, by an average margin of 24%.

In fact, Johnson won by the smallest margin of any Republican candidate in a State Treasurer race since 2006, the earliest year with a State Treasurer election for which data is publicly available on the Kansas Secretary of State’s website.

 

Johnson won by a smaller margin than I predicted.

I predicted Johnson would win by 30%.

I voted for Lynn Rogers in the general election.

 

Here is one of Johnson’s campaign ads, which uses a fiery explosion and a ninja to humorously make his experience with the Kansas budget seem interesting.