State board allows Derby GOP candidate Leah Howell to stay on Kansas House ballot
A Kansas board has rejected an attempt to remove Leah Howell from the ballot for Kansas’ 82nd House District, concluding she did not need to physically move to the district before filing to run for the office.
Misty Hobbs, the Democrat running for the seat, filed a complaint against Howell.
Howell served in the Legislature this year for House District 81 when Republican Rep. Blake Carpenter was deployed. After Carpenter returned, Howell stepped down and moved to House District 82 southeast of Wichita to run for office.
Howell said she signed the contract for her home in Derby, changed her address on her driver’s license and voter registration, and filed to run in the GOP primary on May 11. She and her husband, Sedgwick County Commissioner Jim Howell, now live in the 82nd District.
Howell’s filing documents did not list an address within the district as her residence but only as her mailing address, Rep. Vic Miller, a Topeka Democrat representing Hobbs, told the objections board in a hearing Friday
“Her nomination is void,” Miller said. “Had she become a resident and then filed that would have cured it.”
Howell’s attorney, Ryan Krieghauser, argued that knocking Howell from the ballot would have denied her constitutional rights and overturned the will of the voters.
Because Howell signed the lease for a home in District 82 prior to filing to run for office, Krieghauser said, she had the needed intent to return to a home in the district.
“People can change where they live and that doesn’t mean you reject the will of the voters and you strip someone of their constitutional right,” he said.
Howell said she moved into the rental home within about 24 hours of signing the lease. She couldn’t remember why she listed the home as a mailing address but not her residence.
“I think I was just sloppy,” Howell said.
The three board commission accepted Krieghauser’s argument.
Hobbs said she wasn’t surprised by the conclusion but intended to point to Howell’s move in her campaigning.
“I think we as Kansans deserve to see what politics is, and this is it,” Hobbs said. “She was never really a part of us and that someone is just making a power grab for our district.”
Howell dismissed the objection as “political gamesmanship” by the Democrats.
“It’s just part of how the game is played, you know, from one party to the next,” Howell said. “They were looking for something that they could pick on.”