While Kansans pay more for health insurance and property taxes, insurance-linked donors and Koch-linked groups are helping finance politicians asking for even more power.
Through 2025, Kansas’s average annual employer-sponsored family health insurance premium increased about 162% since Ty Masterson entered the Legislature in 2005. Total statewide property-tax levies increased about 115% over that period.
Since Dan Hawkins entered the Legislature in 2013, those increases were approximately 63% for family health insurance premiums and 66% for statewide property-tax levies.
And in 2026, the average ACA benchmark silver premium for a family of four in Kansas jumped another 28.9% before tax credits, a separate measure showing the pressure on families buying their own coverage.
Meanwhile, Hawkins’s Kansas Insurance Commissioner campaign has received at least $109,766.60 in insurance-linked contributions from businesses, industry PACs and individuals with identifiable insurance ties. The industry he would be asked to regulate.
Groups with documented Koch funding connections account for more than $9 million in reported Kansas election spending and reserved advertising, overwhelmingly benefiting Masterson. With more disclosure reports still coming in.
Those financial relationships deserve scrutiny. Whose interests come first when the people paying the bills need protection from the industries helping finance these campaigns?
Every Kansan deserves representation, including those who don’t vote for you.
That is why the attached October 5, 2025 radio clip matters.
Former Wichita Rep. John Whitmer complains that “Lawrence and parts of Leavenworth and Johnson County are running the show.” He then declares, “Lawrence is not Kansas.”
Hawkins agrees, then adds, “The People’s Republic of Lawrence?”
When Whitmer says communities in NE Kansas don’t represent the state, Hawkins agrees: “No, they don’t.”
Lawrence is Kansas. Leavenworth is Kansas. Every community in Johnson County is Kansas.
Their residents pay insurance premiums, file claims, own businesses, support schools and pay taxes. Their political views do not diminish their right to fair treatment or representation.
Hawkins is asking those same people to trust him as insurance commissioner after three decades in the insurance business. Kansas News Service reports that his financial disclosures list income from multiple insurance companies. He owes voters a clear explanation of how he would put policyholders first when regulating the industry that has provided his livelihood.
Masterson campaigns on “Take Back Kansas.” A PAC supporting him is officially named Take Back Kansas Action Inc.
Take it back from whom?
Masterson and Hawkins have spent six years leading the Kansas Legislature. They owe voters an accounting of the power they have already held and the decisions they have already made.
Masterson also owes Kansans transparency about his financial relationships. The Kansas City Star reported that he received more than $1.1 million over a decade for directing GoCreate, a Koch-funded program at Wichita State. He has also held leadership positions in Koch-funded ALEC, whose model legislation has shaped many Kansas laws.
Voters deserve to know how those relationships influence his priorities, and whose interests he will serve when those interests conflict.
Candidates should explain how they will make insurance affordable, strengthen schools, support communities and improve life across Kansas. They can challenge policies without dismissing entire communities or treating political disagreement as evidence that someone doesn’t belong.
Public office carries a responsibility to serve every constituent. Nobody should have to pass a political loyalty test to count as a Kansan.
If they are this dismissive while asking for our votes, imagine how they will act with even more power.
#KsLeg #KsGov #Kansas #insurance #Taxes #Election2026 #VoteForChange