Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly is governing on tiptoes: 'I had to broker a deal'

Jun. 7--When I used to call my now 24-year-old daughter "sensible child," I meant it as a compliment, and that she took it as one proved my point. There are times, though, when I wish Kansas' sensible governor were less consistently well behaved. A little one who walks on tiptoes is darling, but a leader who does is irrelevant.

There was nothing invigorating about watching Gov. Laura Kelly participate in her own diminishment during this fast and infuriating special legislative session that just ended.

And why not just veto the very bad deal she keeps describing as "not ideal"?

In an interview on Friday, she tried to help me understand why she's so eager to sign legislation that strips her of much of her power to maneuver during this pandemic that isn't over just because we're over it.

The bill also gives way too much coronavirus-related immunity to businesses and hospitals and nursing homes.

If Republicans saw their alternative to this bill as leaving her power "unchecked," then why help them check it?

The Democratic governor never considered killing the new and improved version of this thing agreed on in the special session, she said, and was on the contrary "very involved in it. I had a lot of input." To what end, again? "We made tremendous progress in being able to protect the people of Kansas," and preserved "some semblance of being able to respond quickly" in a crisis.

What I saw a semblance of was capitulation, at the end of a truncated session in which the promised Medicaid expansion didn't even get as close to passing as it did last year.

True, Republicans agreed to extend the state of emergency, which had been due to expire on Wednesday, so $1.25 billion in federal relief aid will still flow, and she can still call on the National Guard to move supplies.

Were those very basic abilities ever truly in doubt? She thinks so, and might not be wrong, though if you never play "chicken," you never win.

Here I think is the point: "You know," she said, "I've been here for 16 years, for 16 years in the minority," and from the first day knew she'd have to work across the aisle.

She's governor now, but still too often on the margins, not that all of her realism and modest expectations have kept her from being called a wannabe dictator and other things.

Kelly didn't disagree with lawmakers, she said, that it was a good idea to revisit her emergency powers, which were really meant to be used after floods and other natural disasters, to tailor them to the very different context of a pandemic.

"They should have done it in an interim committee, thoughtfully," but -- Topeka shocker -- "instead they went for broke, and I had to broker a deal. We brokered what I believe is the best deal we could possibly get. If I had held out for no immunity for nursing homes" instead of only modified immunity, the deal would never have happened and Kansas wouldn't be getting its relief aid, she said. "There was too much at stake."

Safeguarding the ability to help Kansans hurt by COVID-19 was only an issue at all because she's not from the majority party, she said. "It was just a power struggle. This would never have happened if I hadn't been a Democrat."

So, a slice of a loaf is tastier than none?

Kelly does not see it that way, of course, and said the fact that "everything in this expires on Jan. 26 played into my willingness, particularly on the immunity issues."

She isn't too worried that now she'll have to get permission from the board of education to close schools because they "came to us" when she closed them the first time. "They wanted it. We wouldn't have done that without them anyway."

Kelly doesn't regret making her careful, phased-in approach to reopening businesses strictly advisory, because "it had to be done for us to move forward" without "the threat of tying us up in the courts."

And "while it does require me to go to the State Finance Council or whatever" for approval on any closures beyond two weeks, "I'm fine with it...I have a lot less problem with it than other people do."

On that point, we agree.

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