TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) - Kansas has seen its once-conservative Legislature lurch closer to the center with the flowering of a bipartisan coalition bent on erasing much of Republican Gov. Sam Brownback’s tax-cutting legacy and ready to bedevil other GOP leaders.
In a week’s time, the state House approved a huge increase in personal income taxes, voted to override Brownback’s all-but-inevitable veto and approved an expansion of the state’s Medicaid program that he vigorously opposes. Supporters of the tax bill couldn’t override the veto in the Senate, but they had a solid majority for undoing the past Brownback-inspired cuts in personal income taxes.
And it wasn’t just Brownback in the sights of Democrats and GOP moderates. When a House committee’s chairman wouldn’t take up a bill restoring guaranteed tenure that public school teachers lost in 2014, supporters forced a successful vote in the chamber anyway. In the Senate, GOP leaders proposed cutting education funding to help fix the state’s cratered budget - then saw support for the idea collapse, even with a Republican supermajority.
“It moved to the left in the last elections,” said state Sen. Julia Lynn, a conservative Olathe Republican.
Voters turned on the term-limited governor last year, with even some Republicans concluding that income tax cuts that he’s still touting nationally are a key factor in the state’s persistent budget woes. Two dozen Brownback allies lost legislative seats.
The split in the House is 85-40 for the GOP, but Democrats and moderate Republicans can muster a two-thirds majority if they team up, as the tax votes showed. Republicans hold a 31-9 advantage in the Senate, and the conservative streak there is stronger, but the bipartisan coalition can put together a majority.
Forty of the House’s 125 members are new to the Legislature. Fourteen of the 40 senators are new, though five served previously in the House. Many freshmen, including Republicans, won seats by criticizing Brownback.
“We are now governing more in the center,” said House Minority Leader Don Hineman, a Dighton Republican who rose to his job after the shift.
GOP legislators slashed personal income taxes in 2012 and 2013 at Brownback’s urging, and the state has struggled to balance its budget since, with projected shortfalls totaling nearly $1.1 billion through June 2019.
He told reporters in announcing his veto that he told legislative leaders he’s ready work with them, and, “Let’s see what we can come up with.”
The governor contends slumps in agriculture and energy production are responsible for the state’s budget problems. But many lawmakers and constituents don’t buy the explanation.
“I went door to door, and people said to me, ’Just go fix it,’” said Susie Swanson, a moderate Clay Center Republican.
Brownback has proposed raising cigarette and liquor taxes and increasing annual business filing fees. Those measures cleared committees in both chambers without endorsements, and many lawmakers expect the full House and Senate to reject them.
The House voted to override his tax veto, 85-40. The vote in favor of expanding Medicaid was 81-44, after several years of conservative GOP leaders blocking any vote, relying on Republicans’ worries about the potential cost and disdain for former Democratic President Barack Obama’s signature health care law.
“It appears as if there is a true Renaissance in common sense, or at least a debate for common-sense agenda items,” said state Sen. David Haley, a Kansas City Democrat.
The Senate vote on overriding Brownback’s tax veto was 24-16, three short of the required two-thirds majority. It’s also not clear how much support expanding Medicaid has in that chamber.
But the Senate health committee’s chairwoman wants to have a debate on expanding Medicaid; her predecessors strongly opposed the idea. And on taxes, Senate President Susan Wagle, a conservative Wichita Republican increasingly critical of the governor, said income tax increases would remain a key part of any budget-balancing package.
“There’s a desire to be separating from the governor’s policies,” she said.
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