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Kansas - Adjournment Graphic

Kansas adjourned its 2018 legislative session on May 4 having passed 211 bills. Governor Jeff Colyer (R) concluded activity on bills sent to his desk on May 14. School funding issues dominated the session, with the legislature reaching a compromise deal that will provide $500 million more to Kansas schools over the next five years. However, a proposed constitutional amendment to prevent further lawsuits over the issue failed to pass.

Legislative Highlights

  • The legislature passed a controversial measure allowing adoption agencies to deny placement with prospective parents for religious reasons. Critics argue the law could lead to discrimination against same-sex couples, but also single people and minorities.
  • Governor Colyer signed a bill that makes it illegal for people convicted of domestic violence, illegal fugitives, illegal immigrants, and people under stalking and abuse orders to own guns. However, a bill to lower the age for concealed carry from 21 to 18 stalled in the Senate.
  • A bill to expand Medicaid eligibility failed to garner as much support as it did in 2017, when the legislature passed a bill that then-Governor Sam Brownback vetoed.
  • A late push to enact tax cuts in response to federal tax reform changes fell flat. The proposed bill would have given corporations a one-year exemption on foreign assets repatriated in the United States and allowed state taxpayers to itemize deductions even if they didn’t itemize on their federal returns.

Election Preview

Kansas voters will go to the election booths on November 6 to elect a governor, lieutenant governor, attorney general, secretary of state, treasurer, insurance commissioner, state board of education, and all 125 state House seats. Governor Colyer, who replaced Sam Brownback when he took a post in the Trump Administration, will seek election to his first full term, but faces a tough primary campaign against Secretary of State Kris Kobach. State Senator Laura Kelly, former Agriculture Secretary Josh Svaty, and former Wichita Mayor Carl Brewer are the Democrats looking to win back the governor’s mansion.