Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach was in Overland Park Monday night to lend a hand to conservative Republican Senate candidate David Harvey.
Kobach dipped into his political action committee to give $1,000 to Harvey, who is running against moderate Republican Kay Wolf in House District 7 in northeast Johnson County.
Speaking to a group of a couple dozen Harvey supporters, Kobach believes conservatives can win up to 25 seats in the 40-member state Senate, which has been blamed for blocking Republican Gov. Sam Brownback's conservative agenda.
"If all the close races go the conservatives way, it's quite conceivable the conservatives could see 24 or 25 seats," Kobach said.
Looking across the state, Kobach is forecasting a close senate race in Johnson County between conservative Republican state Rep. Jim Denning and moderate incumbent Tim Owens as well as a tight race in Topeka pitting conservative Rep. Joe Patton against moderate Sen. Vicki Schmidt.
Kobach also predicted tough race between moderate incumbent Sen. Carolyn McGinn and conservative challenger Gary Mason in the Wichita area. He acknowledged that McGinn would be tough to knock out of the Senate.
Kobach said he didn't believe incumbency was much of an asset in this year's elections because of the way the federal judges shook up the districts when they had to step in and draw election boundaries in June.
"If suddenly your district is changed, then the incumbent is just as much of a newcomer to the district as the challenger is," Kobach said.
Kobach pointed to the Denning/Owens race as an example.
Kobach said only part of Owens' old district -- about 31 percent -- was in his new district. Consequently, about 70 percent of the voters in District 8 haven't voted for Owens in a Senate race (MDP isn't sure about how much of that district, if any, Owens might have represented on the Overland Park City Council or as a member of the state House).
Meanwhile, about 20 percent of Denning's old state House district is in the new Senate District 8, which covers parts of Overland Park and Lenexa.
"The incumbency advantage is radically reduced," Kobach said. "In a race like that where there's a lot of intensity, the incumbent has no advantage."
