The October Closers are co-hosting Kansas US Senate candidate Adam Hamilton in person this coming Tuesday, October 13th, at 7 pm in Los Altos! Kansas now has a real chance to be the seat that turns the Senate blue, with Adam having roared into a statistical tie with his opponent Senator Roger Marshall. Kansas is in play!
I wrote recently about my experiences growing up in Wichita during the abortion wars of the early 1990's. Kansas is a strange political bird: extremely conservative with a fiercely independent streak and respect for individual liberties. Call it progressive conservative farmer chic. There is a constant pull between the evangelical movement and the monied oil/gas/agricultural interests (see What's the Matter With Kansas by Thomas Frank) that has made for strange bedfellows.
Famous Kansas politicians—famous for their pragmatism—include Alf Landon, Dwight Eisenhower, Nancy Kassenbaum, Bob Dole, and Dan Glickman. I interned for the latter, a Jewish Democrat and family friend, on Capitol Hill when I was younger—long before he became the Secretary of Agriculture in the Clinton administration. I spent the summer handling constituent calls, which were often eye-opening and sometimes inspiring. Of course they wanted to talk to Dan, not some intern! I did have an authentic Kansas accent, and I succeed in convincing one repeat caller that the CIA had definitely not implanted an alien communication device in his teeth during a recent dental surgery—only after the Congressman spoke to the man directly, and said the CIA had personally assured him they had not done any such procedures recently. Dan, like his mentor Nancy Kassebaum—a Republican U.S. Senator and daughter of Kansas governor and "landslide" presidential loser Alf Landon—knew how to relate with all kinds of people and make them feel heard. He used to say his people were all people.
When I had a Zoom call with Adam Hamilton a few weeks ago, I immediately felt like I was talking to Dan. Even though Adam is a reverend/founder of a Christian megachurch outside Kansas City, you can tell that his actual 'flock' is all humans. Being a pro-choice and pro-LGBTQ+ religious figure in Kansas requires real moral courage. Adam's story is quite inspiring, as he came to his position on abortion despite being the son of a 17-year-old mother who was kicked out of her home for refusing to be flown to Switzerland for an abortion by her TWA-pilot father.
Of course abortion is not on the ballot in Kansas, thanks to the 2022 referendum that enshrined the right in the Kansas Constitution. What is on the ballot is how terrible Adam's opponent is: Senator Roger Marshall. Adam has gained statewide support from Republicans and Democrats, farmers and business owners, who are fed up with the downstream effects on Kansans from Trump policies on immigration, the environment, heath care, and the cost of living—with Senator Marshall cheering every move.
Please come to Los Altos next Tuesday, October 13th, at 7:00 pm to meet Adam Hamilton in person and hear what the first Democratic Senator from Kansas since 1937 (that's actually true) sounds like. If you can't attend, please make whatever donation you can.
—Justin