Voters solid their ballots on voting machines Tuesday, August 2, 2022, on the Johnson County Arts and Heritage Heart in Overland Park.
cochsner@kcstar.com
A bank card belonging to the Kansas Republican Meeting was offered to advance a statewide recount of the abortion modification vote anticipated to price greater than $229,000, mentioned Mark Gietzen, the group’s president and a strident anti-abortion activist.
The modification, known as Worth Them Each, would have stripped abortion rights from the Kansas Structure. As an alternative the measure suffered a landslide 59% to 41% defeat, with 165,000 extra voters rejecting the proposal than supporting it.
Melissa Leavitt, of Colby, requested a recount of the vote earlier than a 5 p.m. Friday deadline. Kansas requires a bond for the price of the recount earlier than it begins, and a crowd-funding web page had raised lower than $5,000 as of Saturday afternoon.
However Gietzen, who can be director of the Kansas Coalition for Life, mentioned in an interview Saturday {that a} bank card for the Kansas Republican Meeting was offered to the Kansas Secretary of State’s Workplace. The cash has not but been withdrawn from the cardboard, Gietzen mentioned.
The Kansas Republican Meeting, a hard-right group, didn’t find the money for in its account on Friday to cowl the price of a statewide recount, he mentioned. However — between his personal private funds and Leavitt’s on-line fundraising marketing campaign — Gietzen mentioned he’s good for the cash.
“In the event that they have been to run that (card), I wouldn’t have $200,000 within the KRA account,” Gietzen mentioned. “We can have it lined by Monday. I can personally max-out a bunch of bank cards and do no matter it takes.”
Though Leavitt requested a statewide hand recount, Gietzen left open the likelihood the recount may very well be narrowed relying on how a lot cash is in the end accessible.
“We’re undoubtedly going to have a recount,” Gietzen mentioned. “I can’t offer you a definitive on whether or not it’s going to be the entire state.”
Whitney Tempel, a spokeswoman for the Kansas Secretary of State’s Workplace, instructed The Star on Friday that Leavitt had posted a $200,000 bond. Leavitt, who declined to talk to reporters on Friday, wrote on TikTok on Saturday that “the bond was not paid but.” Tempel didn’t reply on Saturday to a request for clarification.
“The following 48 hours goes to have quite a bit to do with God shifting in folks’s lives,” Leavitt mentioned in a video posted to TikTok on Saturday. “And if it’s going to occur, it’s going to occur. And if it doesn’t, it doesn’t.”
People who request recounts get their a refund if the result of the election adjustments. But when the recount doesn’t alter the outcomes, the state disburses the cash to native jurisdictions to offset the prices.
Gietzen, who mentioned he solid a friendship with Leavitt after she testified on the Kansas statehouse earlier this yr, contends the outcomes will change sufficient that he gained’t must pay the bond.
Gietzen has an extended historical past of anti-abortion activism in Kansas. He helped orchestrate candidate recruitment in Sedgwick County in the course of the “Summer time of Mercy,” the 1991 protests in Wichita that helped make abortion a distinguished political challenge in Kansas. Abortion opponents have been then capable of take over the Sedgwick County Republican Celebration the next yr.
Quickly after the modification vote, Gietzen, with out providing proof, raised the opportunity of fraud within the election. In a message final Saturday to supporters of the Kansas Republican Meeting, he known as the outcomes “outlandish” and claimed, falsely, the election wasn’t certifiable “with out an examination of what occurred.”
Earlier than the Aug. 2 election, Gietzen, who is predicated in Wichita, filed a lawsuit in Sedgwick County in an try to cease the usage of poll drop containers. He had cited fears the drop containers can be focused for election fraud within the election. Sedgwick County District Courtroom Decide Deborah Hernandez Mitchell dismissed the lawsuit, saying Gietzen lacks standing.
Gietzen is interesting and mentioned he hopes the recount will present discrepancies he can use in his attraction.
Any recount — whether or not statewide or a subset of counties — is all however assured to affirm the modification’s defeat. Any small variations in vote totals that could be discovered from recounts fall far wanting the 165,000 vote margin of victory.
Gietzen maintains the recount might assist construct confidence in future elections and believes it has a “fifty-fifty” likelihood of fixing the result of the election.
“If there was zero likelihood of fixing it, you realize, then it might be actually questionable whether or not it is a good use of money and time,” Gietzen mentioned.
The Star’s Judy Thomas and the Related Press contributed reporting
Jonathan Shorman is The Kansas Metropolis Star’s lead political reporter, overlaying Kansas and Missouri politics and authorities. He beforehand lined the Kansas Statehouse for The Star and Wichita Eagle. He holds a journalism diploma from The College of Kansas.
