Kansas electors cast presidential votes for Trump

Amid boos – and some cheers – Kansas’ Electoral College members cast their votes Monday afternoon for Donald Trump for president.

All six members of the state’s Electoral College officially voted for the Republican ticket.

More than 50 people crowded into the Kansas Senate gallery to watch the electors cast their ballots. Loud boos mixed with scattered cheers when it became clear that Trump and his vice president, Indiana Gov. Mike Pence, had won the state’s votes.

Kansas Treasurer Ron Estes, one of the state’s electors, said he was proud of his vote for Trump and called it a historic moment. And he said he didn’t look at the crowd that had gathered in the gallery as they yelled and booed.

“This is the process,” Estes said. “People have the opportunity to protest if they want to.”

The other Kansas electors were Clay Barker, the state Republican Party’s executive director; state party chairman Kelly Arnold; vice chairwoman Ashley McMillan Hutchinson; and Republican National Committee members Mark Kahrs and Helen Van Etten.

Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach, who presided over the vote, was a vocal Trump supporter during the campaign. He had to quiet the crowd’s outbursts several times.

Some members of the audience stood with their backs to the Electoral College members while they voted.

“Remember the times to come,” one protester yelled. “The blood is on your hands.”

“We need a hero,” another said.

“Shame on you!” another person yelled.

Others joined and shouted about their fear of and frustrations with a Trump presidency.

“That’s the First Amendment,” Kobach said after the meeting was adjourned. “You have a right to be wrong. And no one in government can stop you. ”

The 538 members of the Electoral College were voting across the country on Monday. It was the final step in Trump officially becoming president-elect, with around a month to go until his inauguration.

Electors had been flooded with requests that they vote against Trump. It takes 270 electoral votes to win the presidency. Though the election results on Nov. 8 showed that Trump was the winner, the Electoral College and its state-by-state tally of votes formally picks the president. Democrat Hillary Clinton lost the election despite building a nationwide popular vote lead of more than 2 million votes.

The last-minute protest effort did nothing to sway the six Kansas Republicans tasked with casting a ballot.

Trump was projected to win 306 electoral votes based off the election night results. More than 30 Republican electors would need to vote against Trump to keep him from becoming president outright.

A small crowd of fewer than 10 people had gathered in front of the Senate around two hours before the vote. They said they didn’t even really want to protest the vote but rather to show that they didn’t think Trump should become the next president. Around 20 people also briefly protested in below-freezing temperatures outside the Capitol.

Dawn Olney, 62, a Democrat from Prairie Village, said she hoped objections like hers may lead to the Electoral College being thrown out.

“I don’t think they’re going to change their minds,” Olney said before the vote. “Sometimes we just have to show up, to let them know we’re here.”

This story was originally published December 19, 2016 at 1:39 PM with the headline "Kansas electors cast presidential votes for Trump."