Kansas High Court strikes Democrat from ballot

It was absolutely essential, said Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach, that the state’s Supreme Court decide immediately.

Days earlier, Kobach had decided that Democratic nominee for Senate Chad Taylor, who had dropped out of the race two weeks earlier, had not dropped out using the exact right magic words to get his name removed from the November ballot — something Taylor, most Democrats, supporters of independent candidate Greg Orman, and anyone who didn’t want to see four-term incumbent Sen. Pat Roberts re-elected very much wanted.

But Kobach, a GOP loyalist and an honorary member of Roberts’ campaign committee, very much didn’t want that. In a three-way race, Taylor and Orman split the anti-Roberts vote, giving the septuagenarian senator a chance at a plurality. With Taylor off the ballot, Orman is polling six to ten points ahead of Roberts.

But because Federal law wants absentee ballots mailed to overseas military 45 days before an election, Kobach said he needed to print the ballots by Friday, September 19.

Kobach even made a point of insisting on this deadline in his arguments before the Kansas court.

The justices, in their unanimous beneficence, honored Kobach’s deadline, ruling Thursday night that, any way you slice it, Democrat Taylor had met the requirements of the law and had a right to have his name stripped from the ballot [PDF].

Taylor had asked his name be withdrawn “pursuant to” the law; the court said that seemed like a good way to go about things and that, what’s more, Kobach never offered an alternative interpretation — he just said what Taylor did wasn’t enough. The entire seven-judge panel agreed; Kobach had overstepped his authority in insisting Taylor remain on the ballot.

To which Kobach responded, “Did I say the ballots had to be printed by September 19th? I meant the 27th!”

OK, that is not an exact quote, but here is what Kobach is now arguing: Taylor’s name might not have to appear on the ballot, but under a different Kansas statute, some Democrat’s name does — and the secretary of state had been given a waiver to allow ballots to be mailed later, which would give time to Democrats to nominate a new Senatorial candidate.

What Kobach didn’t say was that his hope is that any name on the Democratic line would pull enough votes from Orman to throw the election to Roberts.

Also not said: just what Kobach could do to enforce all this.

The Kansas statute reportedly gives the offending political party eight days to replace the name of a withdrawing candidate. But Kobach only granted himself a waiver (or asked for and received a waiver ... or just made up a waiver) of eight days. And Kobach has to wait eight days before he finds the Kansas Democratic Party in violation of the law, leaving the SoS no time to go back to court before he absolutely, positively, has to get the ballots in the mail to overseas members of the armed forces.

The Kansas Democratic State Committee was not involved in the suit before the Supreme Court, so the party had no direct comment on Kobach’s latest claim. And because the Democrats were not part this case, the court itself also felt no compunction to weigh in on Kobach’s post-deadline filing of an argument on this secondary contention.

But other Kansas observers (and Supreme Court justices) have noted that in four previous cases where a candidate withdrew close to the deadline, Kobach’s office never demanded the party fill the ballot line.

And this all presents a fresh dilemma for Kobach, himself a candidate for re-election.

Kansas is supposed to be a reliably Republican state, but the current crop of party leaders, from Gov. Sam Brownback on down, has alienated some voters with draconian budget cuts, an aggressive conservative social agenda and a Koch bothers-backed war on the state’s booming wind energy sector.

Kobach faces a tough challenge from Democrat Jean Schodorf, who had been a prominent Republican in the Kansas Senate before a Brownback-sponsored primary challenger took her seat two years ago. Opinion polls showed Schodorf within striking distance of Kobach prior to the ballot scuffle, but the newly minted Democrat has surged ahead since.

The smart political move for the secretary of state would appear to be to let the court’s Taylor decision ride, but that assumes smart to Kobach lies solely within the Sunflower State’s borders.

Kobach has long played to a national audience of conservative activists, helping draft strict anti-immigrant laws for Arizona and Alabama, and representing several municipalities outside of Kansas in defense of their own restrictive immigration statutes. He is also credited with the “self-deportation” plank in the 2012 national Republican Party platform.

There is little doubt if he plays his cards right, Kobach would have a soft landing at any of a number of conservative law firms or lobby shops should his career as a Kansas politician stall, but would that play be the very thing that costs him this election?

Of course, there is no guarantee that Kris Kobach sees it that way — nor any guarantee he really cares.