How I Learned to Stop Resisting Party-Switchers and Support Barbara Bollier

State Sen. Barbara Bollier (D-KS)

I generally have a leery attitude toward party switchers, particularly when they use that switch to quickly run for higher office.  For starters, the list of people who switch parties and then quickly win higher office is short.  Frequently they're people like Richard Painter, becoming "disillusioned" with Trump but not Bush (despite the clear similarities in their policy platforms, though not their actual execution of those decisions).  Other people such as Beth Fukumoto, Bobby Bright, and Gene Taylor were humiliated after running for higher office so quickly switching parties.  There are exceptions to this rule (Chris Koster, Brad Ashford, & Tom O'Halleran have all done it in recent years, proving that it's easier to switch from GOP-to-Democrat than the other way and have success, a fact to keep in mind as we go through this article), but it's not a great public policy strategy.  Many high-profile politicians (ranging from Hillary Clinton to Donald Trump to Elizabeth Warren) were once of a different political persuasion, but all changed their affiliation before they entered electoral politics.  Doing so after entering public life carries a lot of weight & risk, frequently not worth the fight.

It's also hard to take the loyalty of someone who just switched seriously, considering for years they were a political adversary.  I remember finding it absurd when Arlen Specter, after decades of disliking him, went to the Democratic cause and suddenly I was supposed to treat him as a friend (a feeling too many Democrats couldn't get over, as Specter lost the primary to Rep. Joe Sestak, a longer-invested Democratic officeholder).  If they do it right away, it frequently feels like they're doing so just because it's the way the mood has shifted, or because they think it's easier to compete with that label around their neck.  That's not something that sits well with me, particularly considering the life-and-death reality of many political issues for countless Americans.

So I'm as surprised as anyone to tell you today that I think Chuck Schumer is making perhaps his savviest recruitment move this cycle (perhaps the only recruitment move that calls to mind the man who picked up 14 Senate seats when he chaired the DSCC) by persuading State Sen. Barbara Bollier to run for the open Senate seat in Kansas.  Reports this week were that Bollier had met with Schumer and current-DSCC Chair Catherine Cortez Masto while in DC, and was considering entering the Democratic Primary, highlighting her opposition to Donald Trump and reasons for leaving the GOP this past December in her public comments about the meeting.

Bollier is not the only Democrat interested in the seat.  Former US Attorney Barry Grissom and former Rep. Nancy Boyda, for example, are both exploring a bid for this seat publicly, and neither are what you'd consider gadfly candidates (certainly not in a state with a bench as shallow for Democrats as Kansas).  There have even been rumors about former Governor Kathleen Sebelius jumping into the race, a worry that Mitch McConnell has been concerned about with his overtures to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to abandon his post and come run for the Senate.  But even with all of these candidates looking at the race, I think it's political genius for Schumer to be pursuing Bollier, despite her tepid ties to the Democratic Party.

This is because I understand Kansas, and what it takes for Democrats to win there, and the best man to illustrate that is former Rep. Dennis Moore.  Moore spent six terms in the US House representing Kansas, a Democrat for sure, but one who was quite moderate, and who represented a district that was far more conservative nationally than you'd assume considering they kept sending a Democrat by narrow margins to Congress.  He consistently did this by exploiting the (still present) divide between the Kansas Republican Party between moderates and Republicans.  Frequently they have banded together with conservative politicians like Pat Roberts or Mike Pompeo who aren't firebrands, combining what both group is looking for.  However, Moore was able to luck out by having the firebrand nearly always be his opponent, particularly in years that were good for the GOP (like 2004), and retired undefeated.

President Donald Trump with Secretary of State Kris Kobach (R-KS)

The man Moore beat in 2004 is Exhibit A in how to exploit this loophole: Kris Kobach.  Kobach is a statewide-elected official (the former Secretary of State), but he's also about as conservative as you can get, particularly on voting rights and immigration.  This allowed the Democrats to beat him in last year's governor's race (though eight years of wildly unpopular Sam Brownback didn't hurt their chances) with Laura Kelly, a state senator who, like Moore, was seen as moderate and not a "liberal firebrand," which helped considerably in marketing her to a state that went for Donald Trump by 20-points.

Kobach is seen as a probable candidate for the 2020 Senate primary, and while his defeat last year was humiliating, without someone like Pompeo in the race, he's the most well-known figure and could benefit from a splintered primary like he did in 2018 (much is made about how Kobach only won by 400 votes, but perhaps more focus should be on how he only won with 41% of the vote, and could do so again).  Unlike with Roy Moore & Alabama, there's no runoff laws in Kansas, so if Kobach could win a plurality, he'd be the nominee.  And as 2018 proved, Kobach can lose in the right circumstances to a Democrat, but it has to be the right kind of Democrat.

Someone who worked in the Obama administration is too easy for him to paint as a liberal (Grissom, Sebelius).  A Democrat with a federal voting record to link to Nancy Pelosi isn't a great option either (Boyda).  But Bollier can run a campaign that none of those people can pull off, because she's only a recent convert.  Her voting record is likely more conservative than she'd even vote federally (a plus for her campaign), and she can make the argument that it was people like Kobach who forced her to switch parties, not the moderate & fiscally conservative Republicans who don't like all of the policies of Chuck Schumer & Elizabeth Warren, but don't want to be associated with someone so extreme as their senator (the Republican voters who crossed over and gave Kelly the governor's mansion).  Kobach will still paint Bollier as a "Nancy Pelosi Liberal," but she is uniquely qualified to counter this.  And in a state as red as Kansas, you can't sneeze at the Democrat who has the best odds against your most likely opponent, because you're already so far behind in the race to begin with, and there's some evidence to argue you wouldn't want to (party switchers rarely switch back).

Bollier probably won't ultimately be a US Senator, even if she's facing Kobach.  But unlike Sebelius, Boyda, & Grissom, there's a path for her to not just "lose respectably" but to win outright thanks to what Laura Kelly showed us last year.  Chuck Schumer's odds for the Senate next year probably are 1-in-3 (better if Trump's approval ratings in places like North Carolina & Iowa continue to suffer, worse if neophyte candidates in those places can't click with voters).  However, if he can pull off the coup of an accidental senator, someone who might only serve for one term & only won because of truly bizarre circumstances, but would get him another seat to battle Mitch McConnell, he should try everything he can to take it.  After all, if Schumer could get Kansas into his column on a technicality, I'd say his odds went back to 50/50 for taking the majority.  This is why he's going after Bollier, who has the potential to be a Mark Kirk or Heidi Heitkamp-someone who won just once because they happened to be able to take advantage of recent trends in their state.  And party-switcher or not, if you have a chance to win a Senate seat in a red state that hasn't gone for you since 1932, you take it and don't be picky.