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For the first time in 32 years, Kansas voters will only have two choices for governor — Republican Ty Masterson or Democrat Cindy Holscher.

Kansas’ last seven gubernatorial cycles have featured at least one independent or third-party candidate on the November ballot. None have cracked double-digit percentage points in the vote share. But their presence has shaped races and fueled accusations of playing spoiler.

When Democrat Laura Kelly won her first term as governor in 2018, she bested Republican Kris Kobach by 5 percentage points. Independent Greg Orman earned 6.5% of the vote.

Four years later, Kelly defeated Republican Derek Schmidt by 2.2 percentage points. An independent and a Libertarian candidate received a combined 3.1% of the vote.

The Kansas Secretary of State’s office confirmed that no independent candidates for governor collected enough signatures to appear on the ballot this year.

“When there’s a third or fourth candidate on the ballot, they get votes but in some ways it doesn’t really matter who they are,” said Bob Beatty, who teaches political science at Washburn University.

“There’s a percentage of people that don’t want to vote for either party,” he added.

This year, Kansas voters disenchanted with the major-party candidates won’t have the option of casting a protest vote. That means they may stay home or they may listen a bit more intently to the arguments that Holscher and Masterson make, Beatty said.

Courting unaffiliated voters

If unaffiliated voters were their own political party, they would be the second largest party in Kansas, which has roughly 2 million registered voters.

In November 2025, there were 897,243 registered Republicans, 495,691 registered Democrats and 575,983 unaffiliated voters in Kansas, according to the Secretary of State’s most recent data.

“Unaffiliateds go Democratic in statewide elections, according to exit polls,” Beatty said. “They’re out there. They’re a group for Democrats to have if they can reach them.”

But unaffiliated voters are also the most likely to skip going to the polls, he said.

“It’s a big task for that Democrat because they’re fighting party ID with Republicans who overperform on general election day,” Beatty said.

National Republicans have identified Kansas as one of the best targets to flip a governorship from blue to red in 2026. The Republican Governors Association has already booked nearly $7 million in ad buys supporting Masterson, the Kansas Senate president, and attacking Holscher, an Overland Park senator, between now and November.

In a statement, Masterson laid out his pitch to unaffiliated voters.

“Unaffiliated voters pay the same property taxes and grocery bills as everyone else, and they deserve a governor who listens to them,” Masterson said. “Everyone gets a seat at my table, ‘R’ next to their name or not.”

The Andover Republican touted the endorsement he received from Kansas’ transportation workers union over the weekend after the union’s legislative director feuded with Holscher during the primary.

“Even Laura Kelly calls my opponent an extremist on the left wing,” Masterson said. “Kansans in the middle deserve better than that.”

Kelly supported Fairway Sen. Ethan Corson in the primary but has since endorsed her party’s nominee, telling reporters the day after the primary that it’s “absolutely imperative that Cindy Holscher win this election.”

Riley Osen, a spokesperson for Holscher’s campaign, painted Masterson as a corrupt “MAGA extremist” and a loyalist to Kelly’s predecessor, former GOP Gov. Sam Brownback, whose deep tax cuts imperiled state finances before they were repealed. Masterson voted against the tax cut reversal.

“There are many Republicans, moderates, and independents who think Sam Brownback went too far, who don’t want an extreme abortion ban and are sick of politics as usual,” Osen said.

In a head-to-head race between two longtime lawmakers, Osen said Holscher’s record is the one that should appeal to undecided voters.

“In the Legislature, Cindy Holscher has worked across the aisle to solve problems, including ending the failed Brownback experiment, taking on special interests, and standing up for victims of sexual assault,” Osen said. “She’s laser-focused on lowering the cost of living, and she’s running a campaign that will appeal to all Kansans regardless of party label.”

‘Fed up’ independents

Dennis Pyle, a former conservative state senator who left the Republican Party in 2022 before launching an independent bid for governor, said he doesn’t regret his campaign — even though Republicans widely blamed him for then-Attorney General Derek Schmidt’s loss to Kelly.

“People are pretty much tied into the two-party system to a degree that they don’t see the third-party candidates as winners,” Pyle said.

Kelly bested Schmidt by 22,258 votes in the last gubernatorial election. Pyle collected 20,452 votes. Libertarian Seth Cordell drew 11,106 votes.

“I just believed in my heart that I needed to run as an independent in 2022,” said Pyle, who was stripped of his Senate committee assignments by Masterson after he sided with Democrats attempting to block the passage of a map with new congressional district boundaries.

He plans to vote in this year’s governor race. But he said plenty of people won’t because they don’t feel represented by either the Republicans or the Democrats.

“They’re fed up with it,” Pyle said. “I think there is a lot of that sentiment today.”

If the 30-second attack ad is to be believed, the Rev. Adam Hamilton speaks in disjointed English to indoctrinate his congregation on divisive topics like Black Lives Matter protests and consumption of beef.

Main Street Fund, a new Massachusetts-based super PAC, launched a commercial this month casting Hamilton as “way too woke for Kansas.” The political action committee text-blasted the video to Kansas voters just days after Hamilton won his Democratic U.S. Senate primary to challenge incumbent Republican Sen. Roger Marshall in November.

The ad splices together quotes from two sermons that the founding pastor of Church of the Resurrection delivered in 2020 about climate change and the mass demonstrations demanding racial justice and police accountability following George Floyd’s murder in Minnesota.

“Black Lives Matter . . . Marching for righteousness,” Hamilton is quoted in the ad, which cost just over $600,000 to produce and distribute, federal campaign finance records show.

“By virtue of being white . . . I have to repent,” Hamilton continues.

The on-screen text includes ellipses to demonstrate that the megachurch pastor said words in between the ones highlighted by Main Street Fund. But Hamilton’s campaign says the ad stitches his words together deceptively to take him out of context.

Tyson Brody, Hamilton’s campaign spokesperson, called the attack ad “as dishonest as Roger Marshall’s claim to live in Kansas.”

Super PACs are political action committees that can raise unlimited amounts of money to run ads, but cannot coordinate with or give directly to candidates.

The anti-Hamilton offensive comes as the pastor, who built his reputation and national profile in large part through his willingness to discuss politically charged issues from the pulpit, attempts to brand himself as a moderate and “independent-minded” Democrat.

A Kansas Democrat last won a U.S. Senate race in 1932.

What did Hamilton actually say?

In the original sermon from June 2020, which is available on YouTube, Hamilton shared photos and videos of himself and other demonstrators at a Black Lives Matter rally in Kansas City. He said every great reform movement in history started with somebody speaking up and protesting. He said protesters’ outrage over the killing was justified.

“There’s a whole lot of people who were angry and filled with rage because the life experience that they had had somewhere along the way — maybe many times along the way — was reflected in that image of George Floyd dying on the ground, begging to catch a breath,” he said.

The portion of the sermon clipped for the attack ad came later, as Hamilton reflected on the moment of national upheaval as an opportunity for himself and others to acknowledge their blind spots.

“I have certain benefits by virtue of being educated, white and male, right?” Hamilton said in the sermon. “And we don’t like to hear that. Especially white folks don’t like to hear that.”

The back half of the quote clipped in the commercial came almost a minute later, after Hamilton said he didn’t have the same anxieties about being pulled over by law enforcement as Black people who had confided in him about their fear that a simple traffic stop could turn violent.

“I have to listen and understand and finally be able to see the brokenness in myself, my indifference,” Hamilton said. “Before I can do anything to help anyone else, I have to have a conversion. I have to repent.”

In the same sermon, Hamilton preached against looting and violence in protests and added that he believes “all lives matter.”

“Everyone understands white lives matter, blue lives matter,” Hamilton said. “The problem is right now it doesn’t seem like Black lives matter to a lot of people.”

Hamilton on climate change

Partway through the ad, the narrator suggests that Hamilton believes “Kansas ranchers and beef-eaters” are committing sins by raising cattle and incorporating beef into their diet.

“Cattle end up producing more carbon dioxide . . . I’m calling us to repentance,” Hamilton says in a spliced clip from a January 2020 sermon titled “What would Jesus say about climate change?”

In video from the sermon, Hamilton said he chose to tackle the divisive topic because Millennial and Generation Z parishioners identified it as a top concern in a church survey.

Hamilton started the sermon by pointing out that the broad majority of climate scientists agree human activity, such as burning fossil fuels, contributes to global warming by releasing heat-trapping greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.

He proceeded to show video of interviews he conducted with the regional director of National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and a church member who was an employee of the nonprofit Nature Conservancy.

The global food system accounts for roughly 25% of greenhouse gas emissions, the Resurrection parishioner noted in the interview. Decisions about how long to graze cattle and how often to till soil can have a measurable impact on sustainability, he said.

Hamilton’s call to action was for members of his congregation to consider ways to minimize and offset their carbon footprints.

“You’ve got to do everything you can to reduce your own usage of fossil fuels, and maybe changing your diet so that the things that you eat are requiring less production that creates methane and carbon dioxide and everything else,” Hamilton said.

But more must be done to abide by the commandment God gives in Genesis to “take charge of the planet and to care for it on my behalf,” Hamilton said.

“If you really care about this, if you’re a Republican, you need to talk to your senators and congresspeople,” Hamilton said. “If you’re a Democrat, you need to talk to your senators and congresspeople and say, ‘Hey, this really matters to me. I’m one of the voices in your community and this matters to me that we are taking care of (the environment).

“And that comes sometimes in tax policies that incentivize people to create new forms of creating energy that are more energy efficient and a thousand other ways that we can address this,” he said. “But it has to be addressed both personally and at a societal level.”

In a campaign video on Friday, Hamilton responded to accusations that he’s anti-beef by grilling and eating a steak while critiquing Marshall’s priorities.

“Marshall votes with the corrupt herd in Washington for tariffs and war while farmers and families in Kansas get cooked by high prices,” Hamilton said in the video. “Maybe Marshall hasn’t noticed farm bankruptcies piling up on his watch because it’s really rare that he’s even in Kansas.”

The Kansas Livestock Association, which supported Marshall when he first ran for the U.S. House in 2016 and when he first ran for U.S. Senate in 2020, has so far opted not to endorse in this year’s contest between Marshall and Hamilton. KLA did not respond to a request for comment on Monday.

LGBTQ+ issues

In the attack ad’s final salvo, the narrator says Hamilton has “no beef with drag queen story time for kids,” claiming that he “used church funds to pay for it.”

Main Street Fund includes no citation for this assertion, and there is no evidence that Resurrection has hosted a drag queen story time event at any of its nine campuses across the Kansas City metro.

Church of the Resurrection was one of at least 17 churches that participated in KC Pridefest 2026, according to the event’s vendor list.

In 2024, Hamilton was a strong supporter of the decision by the United Methodist Church to allow LGBTQ+ clergy.

But donating directly to LGBTQ+ causes has not been a major priority for the church.

Resurrection’s annual mission report shows that in 2025, the congregation gave $2.1 million to various charities around the world, including clean water initiatives, food ministries and support for natural disaster responses in California and Texas.

“Marshall desperately needs Washington to rescue his flailing campaign because Kansans know Roger Marshall has spent a decade in Washington voting to raise prices, make gas an groceries more expensive, voting to cut our healthcare and voting for foreign wars,” said Brody, Hamilton’s campaign spokesperson.

Marshall’s campaign declined to comment for this story.

Charles Gantt, who is listed as Main Street Fund’s treasurer in federal election filings, did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

Because the super PAC was incorporated in August, the Federal Election Commission won’t require it to disclose its donors in a quarterly report until mid-October.

The students and staff at Wichita State University’s GoCreate makerspace will have to do without their director — at least for the next three months.

Kansas Senate President Ty Masterson will step away from the directorship role he has held since 2016 starting next week, his campaign confirmed. If all goes to plan, the Republican nominee for governor won’t be back.

“Consistent with his longstanding practice during legislative sessions, Ty Masterson is taking a leave from GoCreate effective Aug. 17, allowing time to transition his responsibilities to other members of his team while he focuses on the general election,” spokesperson Garrett Henson said in a statement.

“Ty will formally conclude his decade plus of service to GoCreate upon taking office,” Henson added.

Masterson’s longstanding employment at the Koch family-funded community workshop emerged as a potential vulnerability in the closing stretch of the primary race when GOP rival Philip Sarnecki repeatedly characterized it as a “no-show job.” Sarnecki has since endorsed Masterson.

After The Star reported on Masterson’s flexible schedule and the opaque source of his privately funded salary, numerous other outlets picked up the story.

Since winning the Democratic nomination, Sen. Cindy Holscher of Overland Park has assumed the role of Masterson’s chief antagonist over his second job.

“How do you go on leave of absence from a job you never show up for?” Holscher quipped in response to news of her opponent’s decision to focus on the campaign.

Masteron’s WSU salary is listed as $217,350, but he goes on unpaid leave during the Kansas Legislature’s annual session, which cuts into his take-home pay. State records show he collected $163,000 in 2025 and has made more than $1.1 million over the last decade on top of his legislative salary.

Masterson took leave as usual in January, but he went back on WSU payroll in April, as he traversed the state promoting his Trump-endorsed bid for governor.

That prompted an ethics complaint from a former GOP senator and Sarnecki supporter who accused the Andover Republican of campaigning during work hours. That complaint, filed in the closing days of the campaign, was dismissed on the eve of the primary by the Kansas Public Disclosure Commission. The ethics entity did not explain its reasoning.

Masterson decried the complaint as a baseless political stunt. He also called it a stunt this spring when Sen. Patrick Schmidt, a Topeka Democrat, proposed eliminating funding for the GoCreate director from the state budget on the grounds that “it isn’t actually being filled right now.” Masterson scolded him, pointing out that the position was funded through philanthropy — not state tax dollars.

Schmidt was the only senator of either party to vote for his motion. Holscher joined the other lawmakers who opposed it.

In response to a Star open records request, Wichita State said it did not possess an employment contract with Masterson. However, the university provided a 2022 document outlining the GoCreate director’s job responsibilities and necessary qualifications — a high school diploma or equivalent and at least nine years of experience working in operational management or a related field.

The WSU general counsel’s office provided only basic information about the source of Masterson’s salary at the Koch makerspace.

“Mr. Masterson’s salary is not funded by WSU Foundation — or a single source of funding,” the email said, describing the records request as “overly broad”. “

“Nevertheless, we can confirm that, over the years, GoCreate has been supported with funding from various sources including grants, philanthropic donations, university and affiliate funding, and revenue generated directly by GoCreate,” the general counsel’s office said.

Masterson said in a June interview that as director, he’s responsible for sourcing equipment and mentoring at GoCreate, as well as “making sure we have the investors in place.”

“It is highly fortunate that since it’s in the administrative side of things that I don’t have to be on site,” Masterson said, adding, “I do get on site a couple days a week. Some weeks, I do two to three (days of in-person work) and some weeks I won’t.”

Masterson’s campaign defended his tenure at GoCreate as “some of the work he’s proudest of in his life.”

Hans Torgenson, a spokesperson for the Kansas Democratic Party, said Masterson’s decision to step away from GoCreate until at least November shouldn’t detract from questions about the ethics of his longstanding arrangement with WSU.

“Ty Masterson did not walk away from his no-show job because he suddenly decided there was something wrong with collecting $1.1 million from a Koch-backed program while serving as Senate president,” Torgenson said in a statement.

“He walked away because reporters exposed the arrangement, Kansans started asking questions he could not answer and the political cost of defending it became too high.”

Five months after winning the city of Leavenworth’s permission to reopen a shuttered prison as an immigrant detention center, CoreCivic has sold the facility to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security for $238.4 million.

The nation’s largest private prison chain said in a press release on Wednesday that it anticipates continuing to operate the 1,033-bed facility under its existing contract with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) — for now, at least.

“However, the company can provide no assurance that it will continue to manage these facilities in the future, or that the terms of the existing management agreements will remain the same,” CoreCivic said in its press release, which also announced the sale of a 1,600-bed detention center in Appleton, Minnesota, to the federal government.

As a condition for reopening the CoreCivic prison after a prior stint marked by violence and understaffing, the city of Leavenworth established a community relations advisory board charged with ensuring that the company upheld operating standards it had agreed to.

In its own release, the city said officials have had no conversations with DHS or ICE about the impact the ownership change will have on operations.

“We remain committed to the open dialogue between the city and CoreCivic that we have established over these last few months,” the city release said. “We are reviewing the available information in consultation with our legal counsel and do not have any further comment at this time.”

Leavenworth City Manager Scott Peterson said in an email that CoreCivic informed the city of the sale on Wednesday, the same day the company publicized the transaction.

“We don’t yet know what impact the change of ownership will have on the Special Use Permit and Performance Agreement,” Peterson said. “We are discussing with our attorneys, and we will likely get that sorted out in the coming days.”

ICE prison conditions and accountability

Misty Mackey, a CoreCivic employee named warden of the Midwest Regional Reception Center (MRCC), said at the most recent community relations advisory board meeting that 365 men and 112 women were being held in ICE detention there as of July 28.

Two community groups that have been in contact with ICE detainees and their families told The Star that the prison changing hands doesn’t bode well for people being held there.

Northland Neighbors United said in a statement that since June, detainees have reported concerns about medical neglect, long lockdowns and trouble communicating with their legal teams, due in part to staff shortages at MRCC.

“We demand increased accountability of this center in the hands of DHS, because as a community, we have witnessed CoreCivic already cause alleged suffering and neglect for the immigrants who are being held at MRCC since it re-opened as an ICE holding facility in March 2026,” the Northland Neighbors United statement said.

CoreCivic denied the claims about dire conditions, understaffing and barriers for detainees attempting to contact their legal teams.

“It seems you’ve received some bad information, as those allegations don’t reflect the operational reality at the facility,” company spokesperson Ryan Gustin said in an email. “The safety, health and well-being of the individuals entrusted to our care is our top priority.”

Daniel McIntosh, an organizer with Leavenworth Community Response, said he’s concerned about what the change in ownership could mean for the city’s ability to provide oversight and demand humane conditions.

“If city oversight is no longer possible, then the channels for detainees to safely express their concerns and have them met are now extremely limited,” McIntosh said.

“While it was far less oversight than we were hoping for, efforts by the city of Leavenworth to monitor conditions within the facility made sure that decent people were occasionally checking in on conditions,” he said.

On two separate occasions, McIntosh said, the community response group was notified of detainees’ serious medical issues and was able to persuade the city to intervene to ensure they received proper care.

“Detainees had tried going through CoreCivic’s channels, but their issues were frequently met with band-aid solutions, such as merely providing Tylenol when surgery was required,” McIntosh said. “Detainees and their families reached out to community groups. We passed the information along to the city, and suddenly CoreCivic would take steps to address the problems.”

CoreCivic has so far denied community relations advisory board members’ requests to review detainees’ grievances or to be informed of trends in their complaints.

Gustin, the CoreCivic spokesperson, pushed back against allegations of medical neglect in the Leavenworth facility.

“All detainees have daily access to sign up for medical care, including mental health services,” Gustin said. “Our clinic is staffed with licensed, credentialed doctors, nurses and mental health professionals who contractually meet the highest standards of care.

He said medication prescribed to detainees is either managed by CoreCivic’s health services team or by the detainees themselves, depending on the type of medication.

Gustin said that although CoreCivic continues to advertise for open positions in Leavenworth, understaffing has not been a problem so far in 2026, as it was in the lead-up to the prison’s 2021 closure, when an employee shortage exacerbated chronic violence and rampant drug abuse inside the facility.

“For safety reasons, we do not share specific staffing numbers at any of our facilities,” Gustin said. “However, I can confirm that we are appropriately staffed based on the number of individuals in our care.”

He said detainees’ legal representatives are allowed to visit the facility seven days a week, and 30- or 60-minute video consultations can be scheduled with attorneys if proper forms are filled out.

“One pre-representation visit can occur without this form being completed,” Gustin said. “If a legal representative requests additional time beyond the allotted 30 or 60 minutes, our facility staff work to accommodate these requests.”

DHS denies medical neglect

A spokesperson for DHS did not respond to specific questions about how acquiring the detention center would impact operations in Leavenworth. Instead, the agency provided an unattributed email statement. “

“It should not come as news that ICE will be making arrests in states across the U.S. and ensuring we have resources to carry out President Trump’s mission,” DHS said.

The agency said that all detainees have access to comprehensive medical care from the moment they enter ICE custody.

“This includes medical, dental, and mental health services as available, and access to medical appointments and 24-hour emergency care,” the DHS statement said, claiming that it provides “the best healthcare than many aliens have received in their entire lives.”

“In fact, ICE has higher detention standards than most U.S. prisons that hold actual U.S. citizens,” DHS said. “All detainees are provided with proper meals, water, medical treatment, and have opportunities to communicate with their family members and lawyers.”

CoreCivic has faced a slew of lawsuits that include accusations of medical neglect and falsifying records to cover up unsafe conditions in its facilities. Roughly 100 lawsuits had already been filed against the company, its wardens, officers and medical staff in 2025 by August, Nashville Scene reported.

In addition to the transaction for MRCC and the Minnesota facility, CoreCivic sold two of its California detention centers to DHS last month.

“We remain committed to growing the company’s businesses and returning value to our shareholders, while remaining a dependable and flexible partner for government,” CoreCivic CEO Patrick Swindle said in the company’s press release.

Before securing Leavenworth officials’ permission to reopen this spring, CoreCivic fought the city in court for roughly a year, arguing in hearings and filings that it should be allowed to operate as an ICE permission by right without first receiving a local zoning permit.

The Department of Justice backed CoreCivic in its legal battle last September, filing a statement of interest in federal court that characterized the city’s efforts to force the company to abide by standard zoning practices as “aggressive and unlawful” interference with federal immigration enforcement.

In a major victory for supporters of abortion rights in Kansas, a Johnson County District Court judge on Monday granted a permanent injunction blocking a bevy of state laws that imposed strict requirements for abortion providers and patients.

“Today’s ruling allows me to do my job the way I was trained to and focus on what’s most important: my patients,” said Dr. Traci Nauser, an OB-GYN who owns an Overland Park clinic that provides abortions.

The lawsuit against the state of Kansas was brought by Hodes & Nauser and Planned Parenthood Great Plains, another Overland Park abortion clinic.

Monday’s decision invalidates various provider mandates that the clinic owners argued were designed to scare and shame people out of terminating pregnancies.

The 261-page ruling comes more than nine months after a bench trial in Johnson County. It was filed with the court on Monday, the same day that its author, K. Christopher Jayaram, was sworn in as the newest member of the Kansas Supreme Court.

Some of the restrictions enjoined by the decision have been on the books since 1997. Others, including a requirement that abortion providers survey women about their reasons for seeking the procedure and provide medically dubious information suggesting that pill abortions are reversible, were adopted by the Kansas Legislature in 2023.

Those and other pre-existing requirements, including Kansas’ 24-hour waiting period for abortions and a rule that physicians must listen to a fetus’s heartbeat 30 minutes before an abortion, were temporarily halted by Jayaram in the early stages of the court proceedings in 2023. Additional requirements adopted in 2024 were also blocked on a temporary basis before the permanent injunction was granted.

The ruling was handed down on the eve of a primary election where voters will weigh a proposed constitutional amendment that would overhaul the process for selecting Supreme Court justices by switching to direct election — a proposed reform that Republican officials believe could help the cause of assembling an anti-abortion majority on the high court.

The GOP lawmakers who placed the proposal on the ballot have long been frustrated by the Supreme Court’s stubborn independence, including its 2019 determination that the right to an abortion is enshrined in the Kansas Constitution.

One example of Kansas state government spending that millionaire entrepreneur Philip Sarnecki says he would cut if elected governor is the cost of official travel by private jet.

The first-time Republican candidate has vowed to sell the state’s private jet, a Cessna Citation CJ3+ used by the governor and other Kansas officials for out-of-state trips.

“Kansas taxpayers will not pay for my plane,” Sarnecki said in a statement.

Sarnecki’s campaign declined to answer specific questions about the candidate’s personal plane, a Cessna Citation XLS, which public flight records show has logged dozens of hours in the air since June during the closing stretch of the primary, flitting from coast to coast with regular return trips to Kansas City Downtown Airport - Wheeler Field.

The only explanation the campaign provided about the jet’s activity was to say most of the flights in recent months have been handled through a third-party charter company that rents the plane out to travelers with Sarnecki’s permission.

But his most recent campaign finance filing with the Kansas Secretary of State suggests at least some of the flights were related to Sarnecki’s bid to overcome President Donald Trump’s endorsement of rival Ty Masterson and secure the Republican nomination.

Flight records show that on the afternoon of July 20, Sarnecki’s jet flew from Kansas City to Aspen, Colorado. On the morning of July 22, it flew from Aspen to Wichita.

On July 23, Sarnecki reported loaning his campaign $3,663 for “out-of-pocket travel and campaign expenses,” campaign finance records show. He also reported spending $81 for “meetings/travel meals while traveling” at the St. Regis Aspen, a luxury mountain hotel, on July 23.

On July 16, the same day the candidate loaned his campaign $5,551 for out-of-pocket travel expenses, his jet flew from Kansas City to Austin and on to Omaha before returning to Kansas City.

On several instances, the plane left the metro area for multiple days at a time, including one excursion from July 2-5 with flights to Texarkana, Washington, D.C., back to Texarkana, and Charleston, South Carolina before returning to Kansas City.

On June 28, the plane flew from the Kansas City area to Santa Rosa, California, and back within 12 hours — a roughly 3,000-mile round trip.

The flight and campaign finance records raise questions about how often Sarnecki has traveled out of state on campaign business and who has borrowed his jet while he was in Kansas. Sarnecki has reported loaning his campaign more than $2.5 million as he pitches himself to voters as an outsider whose executive suite experience would transfer well to managing Kansas’ executive branch.

Rather than responding to detailed questions for this story, Sarnecki issued a statement criticizing wasteful government spending.

“The career politicians in Topeka have created a lavish lifestyle for themselves off the backs of the Kansas taxpayer . . . Meanwhile, they have given themselves luxury suites, six-figure no show jobs, and a corporate jet paid for by the taxpayers,” Sarnecki said.

His campaign did not respond to a question about how future governors without their own jets would be expected to travel if he sold the state’s plane, which is maintained by the Kansas Highway Patrol.

In a statement, Kansas Democratic Party spokesperson Hans Torgerson accused Sarnecki of hypocrisy.

“Philip Sarnecki loves lecturing others about transparency, but he refuses to explain why his private jet spent weeks crisscrossing Washington and major Republican donor cities while barely stopping in Kansas,” Torgerson said.

“He cannot call himself the candidate who ‘can’t be bought’ while refusing to say who is using his plane, who is paying for it, and how his campaign might be benefiting,” he added.

Of the $394,844 in individual contributions that Sarnecki’s campaign reported receiving between Jan. 1 and July 23, $38,366 came from donors outside of Kansas, a Star analysis found.

Sarnecki, who built a financial services empire based in Johnson County, sold wealth management, insurance and employee benefits companies before announcing his bid for governor last September.

Sarnecki’s campaign was endorsed by Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s MAHA Institute before Masterson landed Trump’s support in May.

Gift link

In a Kansas Democratic governor primary shaped by personal attacks and long-simmering animosity, dueling accusations could jeopardize the party’s ability to unify behind whoever wins next Tuesday.

Will Lawrence, chief of staff for term-limited Gov. Laura Kelly, says his boss chose to go public with her divorce last year because she felt she was being blackmailed.

Lawrence accused Democratic gubernatorial hopeful Cindy Holscher of threatening to reveal Kelly’s 2024 separation from her husband of more than 40 years — a stunning claim against the Overland Park state senator who held a sizeable lead in the only independent poll from June.

Holscher’s campaign said she was expressing a willingness to publicize information about potential campaign interference — not Kelly’s personal life.

On Aug. 4, Democratic voters will choose between Holscher, Overland Park Mayor Curt Skoog and Sen. Ethan Corson of Fairway, whom Kelly endorsed and has campaigned aggressively for down the stretch.

The extraordinary allegation offers a window into the waning days of an increasingly hostile primary race to replace Kelly, who has enjoyed broad popularity throughout her eight years in office. Republicans widely believe Kansas to be one of the states where they have the best chance of flipping a governorship from blue to red in 2026.

Holscher categorically denied the blackmail allegation, saying she knew nothing about the governor’s marriage ending before Kelly shared her personal news in a Kansas Reflector story last July, roughly nine months after the divorce was finalized. Holscher condemned Lawrence as a bully with a clear agenda supporting Corson.

The Corson campaign declined to comment for this story.

In a statement to The Star in late July, Lawrence said Holscher made the alleged threat in a text message on June 12, 2025, the day she launched her campaign for governor.

The Star reviewed the text message in question, which was paraphrased and quoted in fragments in an August 2025 Reflector story roughly a week after Corson announced his candidacy and Kelly indicated he was her chosen successor.

That story, which includes rebuttals from Lawrence, did not indicate Holscher was referencing Kelly’s divorce.

President Donald Trump issued a call to Kansas Republicans on Wednesday: “Get out and vote, vote, vote for Ty Masterson to be your next governor.”

Trump dialed in for a “tele-rally” in support of the Kansas Senate president, one of seven GOP candidates who will appear on the Aug. 4 primary ballot.

The event lasted just over 10 minutes, including the runtime of a recording of Lee Greenwood’s song “God Bless the USA,” before Trump launched into his speech, calling the Andover Republican “a fighter” and “a winner.”

“Ty Masterson is fantastic and has my complete and total endorsement because he puts America first like we all do, and he puts Kansas first,” Trump said. “He’s a big lover of the state.”

Trump touted Masterson’s record, invoking legislative achievements that Masterson’s campaign has emphasized, including tax cuts, public safety spending increases and Kansas’ 2023 law banning trangender athletes from competing in girls’ and women’s sports.

Trump, who has repeatedly cast doubt on the fairness of U.S. elections and spread conspiracy theories about widespread voter fraud, said Masterson’s record on voting issues is impeccable.

“He defended election integrity like nobody other than maybe me. I fight for it all the time,” Trump said, adding that “if you don’t have integrity with elections, you don’t have a country.”

He also suggested that Masterson can claim credit for lowering Kansans’ property taxes.

“He lowered property taxes, of course,” Trump said.

The Legislature did cut the state property tax levy by 1.5 mills in 2025, but systemic property tax reform has eluded lawmakers, thanks to Republican infighting and term-limited Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly vetoing measures that she characterized as irresponsible.

Republicans are trying to reclaim the governor’s mansion after an eight-year absence. Trump’s endorsement proved pivotal for Masterson, securing his status as the presumptive front-runner in the primary race. After Trump backed him in May, former Gov. Jeff Colyer dropped out of the running. Colyer endorsed Masterson on Tuesday.

After Trump concluded his remarks, Masterson thanked him for his support.

“I know your time is the most valuable time on the planet, so I can’t thank you enough for spending a few minutes with us here tonight,” Masterson said.

A spokesperson for the Kansas Democratic Party issued a statement calling Masterson “Washington first and Kansas last.”

“On tonight’s call, Ty Masterson pledged his loyalty to a Washington agenda that is cutting Medicaid, taxing Kansas farmers and small businesses through chaotic tariffs, and sending grocery and gas prices through the roof,” Hans Torgerson said.

The leader of the largest prosecutor’s office in Kansas issued a scathing critique of a statewide amendment that would change how the Sunflower State selects its Supreme Court, warning the change would politicize the state’s justice system with potentially dire consequences.

In a rare political statement, Sedgwick County District Attorney Marc Bennett laid out reasons for his opposition in a lengthy social media post Tuesday night. He is the highest-profile Republican officeholder to publicly oppose the GOP-backed amendment. He said he was making the statement as an individual, not as an official statement from the district attorney’s office.

Since 1958, Kansas Supreme Court justices have been selected by the governor from a pool of potential candidates put forth by a nine-person nominating commission that includes five lawyers elected by fellow lawyers and four non-lawyers chosen by the governor. Justices stand for a retention vote every six years.

Republicans in the Legislature want to allow election by popular vote, a move Attorney General Kris Kobach suggested in 2022 was part of a plan to remove abortion rights from the Kansas Constitution after voters rejected that very question.

Bennett suggested the amendment would reshape how the state’s high court decides important cases by injecting big money interests and popular opinion into considerations of what the law says.

“Do you think politically elected justices (on the U.S. Supreme Court) would have desegregated schools in 1954 in Brown v. BOE?” Bennett wrote. “Had we elected justices back then, can you imagine the campaigning that would have then followed in 1956 with promises to undo that decision?”

Bennett, who has held elected office since 2012, doesn’t often comment on politics. He has worked on campaigns for several Republican candidates, including Tony Mattivi’s unsuccessful bid for attorney general against Kobach in 2022. He’s one of the few prosecutors in Kansas who has argued cases before the state Supreme Court and appeared before the U.S. Supreme Court (in the high-profile death penalty case involving the Carr Brothers).

“I have been hesitant to say anything publicly because I have tried over the last 14 years as an elected District Attorney to keep my personal political opinions to myself,” he wrote. “I’ve said dozens of times in public settings, ‘if you can tell whether I’m a Democrat or Republican by the way I run the office, then I’m not doing my job.’ I believe that to be true and I am loath to give ammunition to anyone who would politicize the office.

“But the stakes are very high in this matter and I don’t want to regret having remained silent,” Bennett said in his statement. “So, the simple answer is that I do not support this amendment.”

What follows is a 1,600-word dissection of popular arguments for and against the amendment.

Wichita State University has broken its silence on Kansas Senate President Ty Masterson’s on-campus employment after previously choosing not to comment on his expectations or performance as director of GoCreate, a Koch Collaborative.

The WSU general counsel’s office provided some information in response to a Kansas Open Records Act request for a copy of Masterson’s employment contract and details about the source of his salary at the Koch family-funded makerspace.

“WSU does not have an employment contract with Ty Masterson,” the general counsel’s office said in an email.

However, the response included a 2022 document outlining the GoCreate director’s job responsibilities and necessary qualifications — a high school diploma or equivalent and at least nine years of experience working in operational management or a related field.

Masterson, the Trump-endorsed Republican candidate for governor, has faced attacks from GOP primary rival Philip Sarnecki, who publicly questioned whether Masterson is qualified for the directorship and what he does to earn his six-figure salary.

The WSU job description outlines five “essential functions” of the GoCreate director: managing the program’s overall vision; building and maintaining relationships with community, faculty, students and industry partners; pursuing philanthropic and grant funding opportunities; mentoring program staff and overseeing GoCreate’s budget, including acquiring tools and determining “appropriate staff and resource allocations.”

Masterson’s construction company, Masterbuilt Homes, failed in 2006 — the year after he was appointed to the Legislature. Masterson filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy in 2010, blaming his financial predicament on a former employee’s errors.

He was named GoCreate director before the community workshop opened in 2017. Public records show he has been paid more than $1.1 million since then, including $163,000 in 2025. The WSU budget book lists Masterson’s salary at $217,350, but he goes on unpaid leave during the Kansas Legislature’s annual session, which cuts into his take-home pay.

Masterson’s campaign confirmed in a statement that he went back on the WSU payroll after the Senate gaveled out in April. The campaign also pushed back against accusations of a “no-show” job, saying the candidate “continues to work in person nearly every week and remotely when he’s not on campus.”

Who pays Masterson’s GoCreate salary?

The WSU general counsel’s office provided only basic information about the source of Masterson’s salary at the Koch makerspace.

“Mr. Masterson’s salary is not funded by WSU Foundation — or a single source of funding,” the email said, describing The Star’s records request as “overly broad”.

“Nevertheless, we can confirm that, over the years, GoCreate has been supported with funding from various sources including grants, philanthropic donations, university and affiliate funding, and revenue generated directly by GoCreate,” the general counsel’s office said.

“Wichita State University employs Mr. Masterson and pays his salary. Funding comes from GoCreate’s budget and account,” the email continued.

The WSU budget book notes that the director’s pay, like that of all GoCreate staff, is “fully funded from restricted use sources.”

In March, when the Legislature was hammering out the state budget, Sen. Patrick Schmidt, a Topeka Democrat, proposed defunding the GoCreate director role during a floor debate.

“I’m concerned that this position isn’t actually being filled right now,” said Schmidt, who is one of 11 Democrats running to challenge U.S. Sen. Roger Marshall this year.

Masterson retorted that Schmidt’s budget amendment wouldn’t save the state any money, saying the position is “funded by philanthropy.”

“No matter what you do there, you’re not saving the state coffers a dime,” Masterson said. “All you’d be doing is trying to damage something that’s going really good down at Wichita State.”

No Democrats or Republicans in the Senate joined Schmidt in voting for his amendment, which died.

‘Deceitful at best’

The morning after The Star published its reporting on Masterson’s GoCreate job, he went on Pete Mundo’s KCMO radio show to address the story and criticism he had received.

“It’s what you’d expect from political opposition,” Masterson said

“It’s deceitful at best. But I couldn’t be more excited about what I do down there (at WSU),” he added. “And so, just like a good Republican, I want people to judge me on my outcomes, on my merits.”

Masterson went on to say that the work he’s done at GoCreate has changed lives.

“Nothing gets me more excited than a single mom with no degree starting a small business that’s successful,” Masterson said. “So, I don’t feel like I need to answer for anything other than the results.”

Masterson’s campaign said GoCreate has had more than 2,000 members since 2017.

In a statement to KWCH in Wichita, WSU defended Masterson’s tenure at GoCreate.

“Mr. Masterson has been actively engaged in the leadership and strategic direction of GoCreate and continues to make significant contributions to the development and advancement of key institutional initiatives,” the statement said.

“The nature of Mr. Masterson’s responsibilities extends beyond maintaining a physical presence in the office and includes strategic planning, collaboration with internal and external stakeholders, and work conducted across multiple locations and settings.”

Three weeks out from the August primary, Kansas voters are being inundated with political messaging about a proposed seismic overhaul of the state Supreme Court.

The voices arguing for and against direct election of Kansas Supreme Court justices make their cases in stark terms. Both sides urge voters to choose wisely or risk letting special interest groups dictate the course of justice in the Sunflower State.

Critics of the proposed constitutional amendment put forward by Republican lawmakers frame it as a hostile takeover of the court that would inject millions of dollars from out of state into judicial elections, mirroring recent record-breaking state court races across the country.

“If this ballot measure passes, impartial judges will become politicians for sale. Billionaires will bankroll campaigns and then push whatever laws they want,” warns a recent commercial from Kansas United for Impartial Courts, one coalition of groups fighting to defeat the amendment.

Proponents of the ballot measure have branded it the “right to vote amendment,” seizing on the fact that in the nearly 70 years since Kansas switched to a nominating commission and appointment system, voters have never fired a justice in a retention election.

“Kansas is the only state in America where lawyers run the entire show. The system was designed to cut you out. And it worked… until now,” reads a mailer sent by Prairie Fire PAC, a political action committee run by Attorney General Kris Kobach, who has clashed repeatedly with the Supreme Court and previously outlined his vision for reshaping the bench in service of eventually abolishing the right to an abortion in Kansas.

Abortion subtext

In September 2022, the month after Kansas voters became the first in the nation to reject an effort to restrict state-level abortion following the reversal of Roe v. Wade, Kobach told supporters that he was calling on lawmakers to craft a direct election ballot measure that would allow conservatives to “slowly and quietly” assemble an anti-abortion majority on the court.

“It’s not just about abortion. It’s about this whole panoply of potential areas where plaintiffs can ask a state Supreme Court to create a new liberty interest that is far broader than anything created in the U.S. Constitution,” Kobach told the New York Times in a recent interview, where he argued that direct election would make justices more accountable to voters.

Emily Wales, the president and CEO of Planned Parenthood Great Plains Votes, told The Star that abortion opponents have “already said the quiet part out loud” about their quest to circumvent the will of Kansans, who voted to preserve abortion access by 18 percentage points.

“The anti-abortion legislature put on the ballot (in 2022) the provision that would have ended the constitutional protection for abortion in Kansas and they didn’t like the outcome,” Wales said. “So this (judicial amendment) is just a runaround to try to get to the same thing.”

Supreme Court justice selection

State Supreme Court seats are filled by a variety of methods across the country, from partisan or nominally nonpartisan elections to direct appointment by governors or lawmakers.

Kansas is one of 21 states that rely on governors selecting appointees from a pre-approved list of candidates screened by nominating commissions, a Star analysis found. Kansas governors appoint supreme court justices from a short list of three candidates vetted by a commission composed of members representing specific geographic areas of the state.

Practicing attorneys in each of Kansas’ four congressional districts elect a representative to serve on the nominating commission, and governors also appoint a member from each congressional district. Lawyers statewide choose the sole at-large member, making Kansas the only state where attorneys hold a majority of seats on the nominating commission — an eccentricity that Kobach and conservative lawmakers have emphasized.

Pro-amendment advertising minimizes the existence of regular retention elections, arguing that voters are “completely cut out” of the judicial selection process.

“For a hundred years, the citizens — people like you — voted for Kansas Supreme Court judges,” says a commercial from the pro-amendment group Kansans for Democracy. “It worked well. People did the research and voted. But the elites took over. Now they decide who’s on the Kansas Supreme Court. Behind closed doors. Trading favors. Rewarding friends.”

Supreme Court nomination commission candidate interviews are filmed, and livestreams of meetings are posted to the Kansas Judicial Branch’s YouTube channel.

Anti-amendment organizers describe the nominating commission system as merit-based and say it allows the court to serve as an independent check on the other overtly partisan branches of government.

“(The Kansas Supreme Court) kept government out of your private medical decisions, stopped unconstitutional cuts to our schools, and held Gov. Brownback and Gov. Kelly accountable,” says an ad by the Kansas Fair Courts Fund, an advocacy group fighting direct election.

The ballot measure includes few specifics about how elections would function in practice. With voter approval, the GOP-controlled Legislature would be granted broad authority to decide how elections would be administered and whether judicial nominees would be chosen statewide or by geographic district.

The Kansas Supreme Court is currently composed of five liberal justices and one conservative justice. On Monday, Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly named Johnson County District Court Judge K. Christopher Jayaram to fill a vacancy in what could be the last appointment to the state’s high court. It’s unclear how many of the court’s current justices would choose to run for election if voters approve the ballot measure next month.

Kansas ‘Triple Play’ scandal

Before the nominating commission and retention election system was approved by voters in 1958, the Kansas Supreme Court was filled by direct election of justices, who remained actively engaged in state party politics and defended their seats against opponents every six years.

The switch away from direct election followed a notorious scandal involving an outgoing Republican governor who conspired with the court’s chief justice and his own lieutenant governor to have himself appointed to the Supreme Court after losing a re-election bid.

The 1950s scandal was widely portrayed as an embarrassment by contemporary observers, who dubbed it the “Triple Play”. It prompted lawmakers to quickly propose the nominating commission model adopted by other states as a reform designed to depoliticize the courts.

Chief Justice William Smith had served on the Supreme Court for 26 years when he announced his impending retirement, citing health problems. That left the matter of filling the seat on the bench to Smith’s close political ally, Gov. Fred Hall, who was days away from leaving office after being ousted in the Republican primary months earlier.

“(Smith) had been on the Supreme Court, and as a politician, he had to remain a politician since he had to run for re-election every six years. And he was very close to Fred Hall,” said Virgil Dean, a history professor and the former longtime editor of “Kansas History: A Journal of the Central Plains.”

Although justices were directly elected, state law at the time allowed governors to unilaterally appoint a candidate of their choice to the Supreme Court when a vacancy occurred in the middle of a judicial term. In a matter of minutes in January 1957, Hall abruptly resigned as governor, which automatically elevated his former running mate, John McCuish, to chief executive. In his only official act as governor, McCuish appointed Hall to the Kansas Supreme Court, sparking the backlash that led to the nominating commission system being adopted the following year.

Dean said that at the time, the switch away from direct elections was supported by a broad coalition of conservative and liberal interest groups. The fact that Kansas Bar Association members would occupy a majority of seats on the nominating commission didn’t compromise the reform’s popularity in the 1950s.

“The fact that half of the nominating commission is made up of lawyers is kind of a negative thing for people who think lawyers have too much influence. Well, who should have influence on the qualifications for a justice of the Supreme Court if not lawyers?” said Dean, whose front yard features a “Vote No” sign.

“We’re in an age where some people are very skeptical of professionals in whatever field — science, the law, education — I guess, you name it,” Dean said.

In a Star guest commentary, state Rep. Bob Lewis, a Garden City Republican and attorney, argued that rather than shielding the high court from politics, Kansas’ current selection system ensures lawyers will always play an outsized role in selecting justices.

“Kansans should reject a rigged system run by a small group of elite professionals and political insiders who pretend to be above politics, and in its stead adopt a transparent system that gives voters a voice in selecting those who are the final arbiters of the meaning and application of the laws by which they are government,” Lewis wrote.

Undeterred by polling that shows Sen. Cindy Holscher’s anti-establishment message is resonating with likely Democratic voters, Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly has taken to the airwaves to make an impassioned case for her chosen successor.

“When a storm hits or a crisis lands on your desk, I know what that’s like because I’ve sat in the chair. It’s why I’m supporting Ethan Corson for governor,” Kelly says in a new commercial, part of the Corson campaign’s nearly $1 million television ad offensive ahead of the Aug. 4 primary.

Kelly looks into the camera and declares the Fairway attorney and former Obama Commerce Department official has the strength, judgment and backbone to continue her legacy.

She doesn’t have any kind words for the other two Democrats in the race.

The term-limited governor, whose personal popularity has remained high among Kansans throughout her nearly eight years in office, said in a phone interview that she believes only Corson — not Holscher or Overland Park Mayor Curt Skoog — can win in November with the support of moderate Republicans and independent voters.

“If he’s not elected, I’m very concerned about the direction Kansas will go in,” Kelly said.

The message is a remarkable one coming from the state’s Democratic standard-bearer, who will likely be expected to unify left-leaning voters behind the party’s eventual nominee in the aftermath of a contentious primary. For now, at least, she appears intent on playing the role of power broker.

With the Democratic brand in crisis nationally, Kelly said it would be a mistake to assume that a string of victories for Democratic socialist candidates in New York and beyond means Kansas is ready to elect a governor who leans into progressive politics.

“Kansas is not New York. We’re not going to elect an extremist,” Kelly said. “We didn’t elect an extremist on the right wing in 2018 or 2022. We’re not going to elect an extremist on the left wing this year.”

Courting progressives

Holscher has styled herself as a populist outsider and a foil to Kelly. She’s the only Democrat in the race to criticize the Kansas City Chiefs’ Wyandotte County stadium deal and to call for a statewide data center moratorium — although she voted for the initial stadium incentive structure in 2024 and voted to give data center developers tax breaks in 2025.

Holscher says her evolving positions on both issues have been shaped by extensive conversations with Kansans who believe the state is too generous to rich corporations and billionaires.

In an independent survey of 1,000 likely Democratic voters last month, 37% of respondents either supported or leaned towards voting for Holscher, compared to 10% for Corson and 7% for Skoog, who joined the race roughly two weeks before the poll was conducted.

Kelly shrugged it off as a relatively inconsequential data point.

“Very few people are paying attention early on,” she said, pointing out that roughly half of respondents said they were undecided on who to vote for.

“One way it was presented, forty-six percent had not made up their mind,” Kelly said. “If it was presented another way, fifty-five percent had not made up their mind. So you have all of those people who are still in the chute waiting to decide who to vote for. That’s when you put the rush on with your ads.”

Holscher launched her own TV ad this week, which asserts that “working people are tired of being sold out by both parties.”

Kelly said Holscher’s strategy won’t play well in a general election because “Kansas business leaders, Kansans themselves, are extraordinarily moderate.”

“In some ways, by running against the establishment, you’re running against the very people you want to vote for you — that you need to have vote for you,” Kelly said.

“I don’t think there are four Kansans who believe that the Democrats have anything like an establishment here in the state of Kansas,” she added. “It’s just not realistic to think that way. We don’t. So, when I hear ‘establishment,’ I’m thinking about the Republican Party . . . and I’m thinking of the business community, which, that’s who I would think she’s targeting. And I don’t think an anti-business candidate has a shot at a general election in Kansas.”

At a stop in Wichita on Wednesday, Holscher pushed back against Kelly’s characterization, saying her policy priorities “align with mainstream Kansans.”

“There’s no way I’m a leftwing fanatic or whatever,” Holscher said. “I know that’s how Republicans are going to try to beat me and I know that’s how my opponents in the primary are going to try to beat me. You don’t win four elections in red districts by being far left. You just don’t.”

Electability in Kansas governor race

Skoog also drew Kelly’s ire when he entered the race on the day of the candidate filing deadline. She sharply criticized the late entry as “opportunistic” and “foolhardy.”

Skoog told The Star that he joined the fray because he disagrees with Kelly’s assessment of Corson as a candidate with broad appeal.

“I love Ethan. Ethan’s very talented,” Skoog said. “But he doesn’t connect with people if you go out and ask people out in the world. That’s why I’m in this race. People said, ‘The governor’s endorsed Ethan and he has not delivered for her.’”

Kelly did not respond to a follow-up question through a spokesperson about whether she plans to endorse the eventual Democratic nominee if it isn’t Corson.

Kansas Republican governor hopeful Ty Masterson has two offices.

One is on the third floor of the Kansas State Capitol, behind the ornate copper- and marble-accented chamber where he presides as Senate president.

The other is on the second floor of a nondescript building on the campus of Wichita State University. At the front desk, guests are greeted by a wall-hanging of a Minion from “Despicable Me” mounted on an aluminum sheet metal and bearing the message, “Welcome to GoCreate.”

Before it opened in 2017, Masterson was named director of the 18,000-square-foot workspace — officially branded “GoCreate, a Koch Collaborative” — where students and community members can design, 3D print, laser cut, weld, saw and stitch their creations into being.

Last year, Masterson made $163,000 as GoCreate director — nearly twice the $85,000 salary he earned as a top lawmaker in Topeka, state records show. Over the last decade, Masterson, who lives just outside of Wichita in Andover, has been paid more than $1.1 million by the WSU Foundation.

The details of his employment arrangement with the university, including the source of his privately-funded salary, are opaque.

One leading government ethics expert told The Star that GoCreate’s financial backing from the Koch family, highly influential megadonors with a $157 billion net worth and libertarian political agenda, means the burden is on Masterson to demonstrate to voters that his leadership in Topeka hasn’t been unduly influenced.

WSU did not respond to repeated requests for comment and had not provided a copy of Masterson’s employment contract in response to a public records request as of Wednesday.

The Koch Family Foundation also did not respond to requests for comment.

Masterson’s campaign defended his tenure at GoCreate as “some of the work he’s proudest of in his life,” and emphasized that he has consistently gone on leave without university pay or benefits during legislative sessions, which usually stretch from January to April.

Masterson went back on WSU payroll in April, as he traversed the state promoting his Trump-endorsed bid for governor.

“Ty returned to his role after session this year as usual, and he continues to work in person nearly every week and remotely when he’s not on campus,” campaign spokesperson Garrett Henson said in a statement.

“Several Kansas legislators work for state universities, because Kansas has a part-time citizen legislature by design, so the people who write the laws live under them and hold real jobs,” Henson said.

The issue of Masterson’s employment surfaced last week when one of his Republican primary rivals, entrepreneur Philip Sarnecki, shared a social media post claiming that Masterson rarely shows up on campus and questioning how he landed the job without a college degree.

In a statement, Sarnecki called the GoCreate director position a “no-show job” that “smells like career politician corruption.” Masterson’s campaign dismissed Sarnecki as an elitist “Illinois millionaire” — referencing the state where he grew up and attended college — for questioning his qualifications.

“GoCreate wanted a leader with a non-traditional path, because that’s exactly who it serves,” Henson said. “Ty built a career and a life without a degree, and it’s the reason he connects with the students GoCreate was built for. It’s not a gap on a resume. It’s why he’s the right person for the job.”

Henson said GoCreate has had more than 2,000 members since 2017. Memberships are free for all WSU and WSU Tech students, according to GoCreate’s website. Seniors and veterans can gain access to the workspace for $99 a month, while memberships cost $125 a month for everyone else. Koch philanthropy provides membership assistance for some members, the website says.

In February, the Kansas Department of Commerce bestowed a Merit Award on GoCreate during its annual business awards, recognizing the public-private partnership for its training and educational programs.

In a brief interview after a campaign stop in Wichita in late June, Masterson said that as director, he’s responsible for sourcing equipment and providing guidance to members, as well as “making sure we have the investors in place.”

“It is highly fortunate that since it’s in the administrative side of things that I don’t have to be on site,” Masterson said, adding, “I do get on site a couple days a week. Some weeks, I do two to three (days of in-person work) and some weeks I won’t.”

Masterson’s most recent statement of substantial interest form filed with the Kansas Secretary of State’s office names WSU as his employer. His only other listed source of income was his 100% ownership stake in Springboard LLC, which is described on the form as a consulting and property management business.

On a recent Friday afternoon in June, the GoCreate workroom was buzzing with activity as a team from Envision Inc. tested sensor vests designed to help people with visual impairments navigate their surroundings.

Masterson wasn’t in the office.

The engineering student at the front desk couldn’t say whether the GoCreate director works on site often. When asked about Masterson’s visits, he said he could not put a name to a face.

GoCreate Assistant Director Kimberly McCollum then emerged from her own office and put an end to the impromptu tour, introducing herself as “the director here.”

McCollum said GoCreate employees couldn’t answer questions “because we’re all working for the state.” She referred inquiries to the WSU general counsel’s office, which, along with the university’s strategic communications division, did not respond to questions for this story.

The Star requested a copy of Masterson’s employment contract on June 29. The general counsel’s office said in an email response that it would provide a cost estimate for record retrieval no later than July 17.

Davina Hurt, director of government ethics at the Markkula Center for Applied Ethics at Santa Clara University in California, said Kansas voters deserve answers about Masterson’s two state paychecks and his relationship with the Kochs.

“My question is whether a reasonable Kansas voter would remain confident that their decisions in Topeka are being made independently or wonder whether this decade-long relationship with a single donor network had some pull on them,” Hurt said.

“Taking unpaid leave during a session is a real step, right? It deserves credit,” Hurt said. But it doesn’t answer questions about Masterson’s independence from political influence, she said.

Masterson’s gubernatorial campaign has the backing of the Koch-funded advocacy group Americans for Prosperity-Kansas, which used its endorsement announcement to praise the Senate president as a “proven policy champion.”

Masterson holds a leadership role with another Koch-funded organization — the American Legislative Exchange Council, which is a nonprofit group dedicated to sharing model legislation between conservative state legislatures. Masterson served as ALEC’s national chair in 2024 and remains on its board of directors.

“A decade of drawing a six-figure salary with a Koch-branded university program while also chairing a Koch-funded advocacy group nationally creates a pattern voters deserve to weigh as he asks them for the state’s highest office,” Hurt said. “It’s purely a public trust question.”

Masterson’s campaign spokesperson said “philanthropy doesn’t cut Ty a check.”

“Ty’s salary is not paid by any one group or donor,” Henson said. He added that GoCreate “earns real income of its own, including a recent large-scale prototyping and heavy-welding project that brought in tens of thousands of dollars.”

The campaign did not respond to a follow-up question about whether Koch philanthropy has had any bearing on his policymaking decisions.

If Roger Marshall were to resign his U.S. Senate seat between now and Oct. 2, an untested Kansas law dictates that Republicans in the Legislature would control his successor and voters wouldn’t get to pick a senator until 2028.

Since 1927, Kansas governors have filled each U.S. Senate vacancy with an appointee of their choosing. But a piece of legislation that became law without Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly’s signature in 2025 gives lawmakers broad control over the replacement process by creating a committee that would short-list three Senate candidates for the governor to choose between.

A Kansas Reflector analysis from last week outlined a hypothetical scenario in which Marshall could accept a Trump administration appointment in the coming months, leading to the nullification of November’s highly anticipated Senate contest. In a statement, Kelly lambasted what she called a “ludicrous scheme to hijack political power” by circumventing voters.

In response to the speculation, Marshall’s chief of staff, Brent Robertson, said in a statement that “Senator Marshall will be running for reelection.”

State Sen. Mike Thompson, a Shawnee Republican and the architect of the 2025 bill, denied that Marshall’s office lobbied for it behind the scenes. But he acknowledged that rumors about the Trump loyalist’s political future prompted him to introduce the legislation.

He also suggested that Kansans would be better off if the Legislature still had the power to directly appoint U.S. senators rather than voters choosing them every six years.

Republican U.S. Sen. Roger Marshall of Kansas took to cable news on Wednesday evening to defend the terms of a tentative peace deal with Iran that has sharply divided members of his own party.

In an appearance on CNN’s “The Source with Kaitlan Collins,” Marshall claimed that Iran had never previously agreed to abandon its aspirations for a nuclear weapon, even though that promise was made in the 2015 nuclear deal that President Donald Trump tore up in 2018.

Marshall also echoed Trump’s shifting rhetoric about Iran’s ballistic missile program — the elimination of which was identified by the White House this spring as a “clear and unchanging objective” of the war.

“Senator, are you OK with Iran having missiles?” Collins asked. “I’m hesitating,” Marshall responded. “I certainly don’t want them to have long-distance missiles. I don’t want them to have nuclear-armed missiles. I would prefer they didn’t, but I don’t think that’s the key issue here. I think that they have to be able to defend themselves.”

The alternative would be “a forever war,” he told Collins.

“You’re never going to get them, short of boots on the ground, of surrendering everything, an unconditional agreement, if you will,” Marshall said.

U.S. intelligence indicates that despite the best efforts of the American and Israeli militaries, Iran retains substantial ballistic missile capabilities.

Earlier Wednesday, Trump told reporters in France that Iran couldn’t realistically be compelled to dismantle its missile systems when other countries in the Middle East have their own stockpiles. He downplayed the weapons’ significance, saying, “Missiles, they hurt a little location, but they don’t blow up the planet.”

Last spring, as Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency employed slash-and-burn tactics to bring federal agencies to heel, local farm service centers in Kansas were hit especially hard.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture lost some 24,000 employees from September 2024 to December 2025, federal data shows. In Kansas, more than 500 workers were terminated or took buyouts — a 32% scale-back that constituted the region’s largest USDA staffing reduction.

Now, two members of the Kansas Congressional delegation are teaming up on a plan to prevent a repeat of the mass exodus that led to the temporary closure of several county-level USDA offices where farmers and ranchers could consult with experts on federal programs, farm loans and crop insurance.

“There’s a difference between downsizing towards efficiency and eliminating by taking away the ability to function,” said Kansas 2nd District Rep. Derek Schmidt, a Republican.

“In a lot of these very small offices, downsizing just one or two people can take away the office’s ability to function because it was literally a one- or two-person shop to start with,” he said, describing local service centers as “the front door to USDA for producers.”

Schmidt and Kansas 3rd District Rep. Sharice Davids, a Democrat who serves on the House Agriculture Committee, plan to introduce legislation on Thursday that they’re calling the USDA Field Office Stability Act.

The bill would prohibit the USDA from closing or relocating any Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS), Farm Service Agency (FSA), or Rural Development county and field offices, with limited exceptions for when there’s another service center within 20 miles.

The legislation would also require offices to maintain minimum staffing levels and remain open during normal business hours.

“If we don’t do something right now, our farmers, our ranchers, people who depend on USDA services are going to have a harder time accessing those services,” Davids said.

“If, because of these cuts, a farmer is having to drive significantly further, wait weeks longer for assistance or lose access to the local expertise, that’s not actually saving,” Davids said. “It’s not creating a more efficient system. It is shifting the cost and the burden onto the people that we are supposed to be serving.”

When a massive tax incentive designed to lure data center developments to Kansas passed the Legislature in 2025, it did so with broad bipartisan support.

The bill easily cleared Republican Senate President Ty Masterson’s chamber. Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly signed it into law, guaranteeing a 20-year sales tax exemption for developers who commit to investing $250 million and creating at least 20 permanent jobs.

Now, as communities across Kansas grapple with whether to embrace or reject polarizing tech projects, the issue is emerging as a key point of division among candidates of both parties vying to become the state’s next chief executive.

Four of 10 governor hopefuls now say they would pursue a statewide moratorium to halt new data center construction — at least temporarily. On Monday, Sen. Cindy Holscher of Overland Park became the first Democrat in the race to call for a moratorium, joining Republican candidates Philip Sarnecki, Charlotte O’Hara and Stacy Rogers.

Several Democratic candidates running to challenge Republican U.S. Sen. Roger Marshall are criticizing the Johnson County Democratic Party over its decision not to promote their campaigns to voters ahead of the August primary.

“The Johnson County Democratic Party is committed to supporting candidates who reflect our core values and demonstrate a strong commitment to effective, community-centered leadership,” reads the email from party Chair Deann Mitchell, which was sent to candidates Anne Parelkar, Jason Hart and Kevin Latz.

“While we appreciate every individual who chooses to run as a Democrat, the party is not positioned to support every candidate in every race,” Mitchell continued, emphasizing that the party would only promote candidates who had raised enough money to contend with Marshall’s well-funded re-election bid.

According to the email, the candidates who lost out on support will be excluded from the party’s voter guide, social media posts and website. They also will not be invited to candidate events or training sessions.

State Sen. Patrick Schmidt, who recently lobbed a disputed sex abuse cover-up allegation at the Rev. Adam Hamilton, is also not being promoted by the Johnson County Democrats, even though he has reported raising more money than any other Democratic candidate in the race besides Hamilton.

Parelkar, an Overland Park attorney who launched her campaign months after confronting Marshall at a contentious town hall event in Oakley that he left early, called the Johnson County Democrats’ decision a “slap in the face” to her volunteers.

“I have given them the opportunity to reconsider based on the number of hours volunteers have put into this campaign, which, when aggregated and given a monetary value, would far exceed the amount of funds some of my opponents have raised,” Parelkar posted on social media.

Hart, a former federal prosecutor who recently switched parties, characterized his exclusion by the county Democrats as “personally and professionally offensive.”

“Apparently, I need to constantly ask you for money,” Hart said in his own lengthy social media post. “Never mind that we are all talking about ‘affordability.’ For JoCo to support my candidacy, I need to do a better job at convincing you to give me money instead of paying for your gas or groceries.”

A Friday-evening debate in Overland Park turned into an hour-long sparring match between Kansas Senate President Ty Masterson and Johnson County entrepreneur Philip Sarnecki, who hurled insults as they clashed over which one of them would make a better governor.

Sarnecki turned questions about property taxes and the Kansas City Chiefs’ stadium deal into opportunities to excoriate his rival over his record in the Senate, calling Masterson ineffectual and “the ultimate insider.”

Masterson, who toyed with the idea of skipping the FOX4 GOP debate after winning President Donald Trump’s endorsement, dismissed Sarnecki as “an angry elf” and “all hat, no cattle.”

They were joined on the stage by Secretary of State Scott Schwab, who stayed above the fray while responding to policy questions, and former Johnson County Commissioner Charlotte O’Hara, who called for eliminating the Kansas State Department of Education — even though her running mate is a sitting state school board member.

Insurance Commissioner Vicki Schmidt was disqualified from participating after she refused to sign a Kansas Republican Party’s debate agreement that called for candidates to commit to supporting the party’s eventual nominee.

More than seven months after the final gavel in a high-stakes Johnson County bench trial that could reshape access to reproductive healthcare in Kansas, no ruling has been handed down.

The challenge to existing abortion restrictions and a slate of strict new requirements that Republican lawmakers intend to impose on providers remains unresolved. Now, the judge who presided over the trial is one of three finalists for a seat on the Kansas Supreme Court.

The selection of District Court Judge K. Christopher Jayaram by the nominating commission responsible for screening applicants to the high court comes as Kansas voters prepare to decide in August whether to switch to directly electing state Supreme Court justices. Opponents of the ballot initiative have framed it as a calculated attempt to undermine abortion access.

It’s unclear how the lawsuit brought by Hodes & Nauser and Planned Parenthood Great Plains against the state of Kansas would proceed if Jayaram were to be chosen by Gov. Laura Kelly, who initially appointed him to the Johnson County bench in 2021.

Jayaram has already forcefully denied a motion by the Kansas Attorney General’s office to stay the case while the Supreme Court selection process plays out.

In a motion requesting the stay, Assistant Attorney General Dwight Carswell wrote that postponing the case would avoid “any appearance of a conflict of interest.” He cited a provision of the Kansas Code of Judicial Conduct that says decisions must not factor in “whether particular laws or litigants are popular or unpopular with … government officials.”

In a scathing ruling against the AG’s office, Jayaram characterized the request as “pretextual and without any apparent legal or factual basis.”

“There is no legitimate basis for either a stay or any other related relief, despite the State Defendants’ innuendo regarding some purported conflict that simply does not exist,” Jayaram wrote last month.

This is Jayaram’s second application since 2025 to fill a vacancy on the Supreme Court while presiding over the abortion lawsuit. During a May 2025 status hearing after applying for the first time, Jayaram told attorneys for both sides that the trial dates should be delayed as a precaution in case his advancement through the selection process could derail proceedings.

“I have real concerns that we would get all the way through trial, and if I’m not there, there’s a mistrial, and we have to try the whole case again because I don’t know how somebody is going to step in and look at the transcript and decide this case. I think they need to be the person hearing the evidence and evaluating the credibility of witnesses,” Jayaram said, according to an official transcript of the hearing.

Jayaram made the short list to fill that vacancy, but Kelly ultimately passed him over in favor of Leawood attorney Larkin Walsh. Afterwards, the trial proceeded, playing out over six days in September and October, as witnesses for both sides gave sworn testimony and were subjected to cross-examination.

This time around, the other two finalists for the Supreme Court are fellow Johnson County District Court Judge Robert Wonnell and Douglas County District Court Judge Carl Folsom III.