Bill to fix election law for seat held by Pompeo sent to governor

A bill to ensure that military and other absentee voters can participate in a special election to replace U.S. Rep. Mike Pompeo has been sent to Gov. Sam Brownback.

The Kansas Senate passed the bill unanimously on Tuesday night. The House passed the measure last week.

Pompeo, R-Wichita, was tapped by President-elect Trump to serve as director of the Central Intelligence Agency. If the U.S. Senate confirms Pompeo, Kansas will need to hold a special election to replace him for the 4th Congressional District.

The state has not had to hold a special congressional election since 1950, when a member of the state’s delegation died in office. The state’s special election law is out of compliance with a federal requirement that military and overseas voters receive their ballots 45 days before the election.

Current law requires that a special election take place between 45 to 60 days from when the governor makes his proclamation for a special election. HB 2017 will extend that period from 70 to 90 days to ensure that the state has enough time to mail ballots to military and other absentee voters.

The bill also will enable the Libertarian Party to nominate a candidate and reduce the number of signatures that independent candidates need to collect.

Current law requires that an independent candidate collect 17,000 signatures in order to appear on the ballot. This legislation would reduce that number to 3,000.

Sen. Elaine Bowers, R-Concordia, the Senate Elections Committee chairwoman, said the state would risk a ballot access lawsuit if it did not make this change. The bill also clarifies that independent candidates cannot begin collecting signatures until after the governor calls the election.

Although Libertarians are a recognized party in Kansas, they would not participate in the special election under current law because their most recent candidate for governor didn’t get 5 percent of the votes cast in the 2014 election.

This bill would remove that threshold.

The bill also will allow Democrats, Republicans and Libertarians to select their candidates sooner. Under current law, the parties can hold a meeting to select a candidate 25 days after the governor calls the special election. This legislation allows them to hold that meeting between 15 and 25 days after the governor’s proclamation.

This story was originally published January 17, 2017 at 7:24 PM with the headline "Bill to fix election law for seat held by Pompeo sent to governor."