Recent polls have Republican Kansas Senate President Ty Masterson holding an advantage in the race for governor as fellow Democratic state Sen. Cindy Holscher hits the road hoping more traditional in-person campaigning can put her on the minds of more voters.
Holscher is traveling across the state trying to raise her profile with voters, while Masterson is seeking to protect his lead while visiting county GOP headquarters and businesses throughout Kansas.
She recently brought her campaign to Emporia, where she spoke with educators about the challenges facing Kansas schools.
Polling suggests Holscher has less name recognition than Masterson, while the Republican is also viewed as more polarizing with voters.
A New York Times/Siena College poll released this month showed Masterson leading Holscher outside the poll’s margin of error.
Holscher said she believes the race is much closer than the polling indicates.
“This race is neck and neck,” she said. “I'm working to make sure I'm getting my messaging out there.”
The Emerson College/Nexstar Media poll released in September also showed Masterson with a lead. The same day that poll was released, Masterson’s campaign said he did not plan to participate in additional formal debates.
For a candidate leading in the polls, avoiding additional debates can limit the opportunity for an opponent to change the direction of the race.
Masterson is taking part in some other types of events, like a meet and greet where both candidates will appear in Baxter Springs.
Instead of relying on another televised debate, Holscher is taking her campaign directly to voters.
Republican Governor's Assocation Right Direction Pac
Money differences
Money has been a difference in this year’s race for governor.
Laura Kelly outspent Republican gubernatorial candidate Derek Schmidt four years ago.
The most recent campaign finance reports show that the Democrat is at a significant disadvantage, with Masterson having about $360,000 more in his war chest than Holscher.
Money isn’t everything in politics, as Democratic Kansas U.S. senate candidate Adam Hamilton can attest. The last quarterly election finance report shows that Hamilton is being outspent three-to-one by incumbent Republican U.S. Sen. Roger Marshall, but Hamilton is still within the margin of error.
Property taxes and education at the forefront
James Carville famously said, “It’s the economy, stupid!” as a rallying cry during Democrat Bill Clinton’s 1992 presidential campaign.
For both gubernatorial candidates the main issues could be summed up as “it’s education and property taxes, stupid!”
Both candidates have listed these two topics as issues they want to fix with completely different plans on how to fix them.
Education plans
Holscher is emphasizing public education and other populist policies she argues have broad support among Kansans. That also includes recreational marijuana legalization and a focus on cutting property taxes.
“Those are all things supported by at least 65 percent of the population of Kansas,” she said. “Those are things that I stand with the people on.”
But with her name recognition lagging behind she continues on the campaign trail, like a recent stop in Emporia to try and rally Kansans behind her popular policies.
Educators who attended Holscher’s roundtable in Emporia said they support her focus on fully funding schools. But they also said the discussion needs to go beyond how much money the state spends.
Brian Smith has taught for more than three decades. He has worked in classrooms from Ethiopia to Idaho and now teaches fifth grade at Riverside Elementary School in Emporia.
Smith said teachers need more input when policymakers make changes to education.
“These conversations need to happen to be able to make adjustments quicker, because education is a very slow machine to change,” he said.
The educators at the Emporia roundtable seemed surprised that Holscher was talking to them.
One person even told the group that this is the first time he could recall a politician coming to talk to educators for input.
Education is also central to Masterson’s campaign, but he is approaching the issue differently.
Masterson has emphasized literacy and pointed to efforts in Mississippi as a model Kansas could consider.
He has said Kansas has a serious reading problem, and the issue is personal for him because he is dyslexic and has dyslexic children and grandchildren.
“We have a literacy issue,” Masterson said. “If you don't teach a kid to read, they can't read to learn.”
Masterson said he plans on working on literacy in schools early in his tenure if he’s elected.
The National Center for Education Statistics shows Kansas was comparable to the U.S. average reading level for 4th and 8th graders.
The Kansas State Department of Education has shown an improvement from 2024 to 2025 in English Language Arts performance outcomes.
Masterson also argued that Kansas should take a business-oriented approach to education by looking more closely at what taxpayers are getting for the billions of dollars the state spends on schools.
“Education is such this third rail we talk about. We spend so much money in that area, and it's not that we have to cut it,” Masterson said at a Sedgwick County GOP primary candidates forum. “We just can't keep piling the new money in. I mean, it is billions and billions of dollars that we spend and not get an outcome.”
This business-oriented approach includes the idea that market competition from private schools in the form of tax-credit programs, also known as school vouchers, will force public schools to improve.
Property tax proposals
The candidates’ differ on property taxes but both say they want to cut the bills people pay.
Holscher has connected education spending to property taxes.
At the Kansas State Fair debate in September, she argued that state decisions about school funding can affect the amount local governments and taxpayers have to cover.
“Ty and his allies don’t want to fund special education,” she said. “That burden gets shifted to the local level and makes your property taxes go up.”
Holscher aims to lower property tax assessment rates without a hard cap by decreasing the residential assessment rate by 2.5%. This would take a constitutional amendment.
Opponents of Holscher’s plan, which Democrats have long supported, say that it will shift the tax burden to commercial property owners and agriculture landowners.
Property taxes have been a central issue for Masterson. He has proposed a constitutional amendment that would put a cap on annual growth of taxable assessed property value to 3% or less.
Kansas lawmakers attempted to control property taxes in a somewhat similar way with a “lid” that required public votes when property tax collections grew, but concerns about local control helped repeal it in 2021.
Masterson has framed his homeowners bill of rights as a way to prevent property tax bills from squeezing Kansans.
“We have to stop people from being taxed out of their homes, off of their farms, or out of their businesses. My homeowners' bill of rights will stop that runaway property tax.”
Opponents of Masterson’s cap plan say it would shift the tax burden to new property buyers, new construction and commercial properties while hurting local governments that rely on property tax funds.
The Republican candidate’s focus on taxes and economic growth also appeals to voters who say the economy is a major concern.
One of those voters is 18-year-old James Eakle, who is preparing to vote for the first time. Eakle supported Masterson at the Kansas State Fair debate and said taxes and economic growth are important to him.
“I’m worried about taxes. I want low taxes,” Eakle said. “I want a lot of economic growth because an economy that isn't growing is stagnating, and government regulations just really stagnate the economy.”
The final weeks of the campaign are likely to remain focused on the same issues that have defined the race.
If political strategist Carville was working on the campaigns, he’d probably say, “It’s education and property taxes, stupid!”
Zach Boblitt reports on the Kansas Statehouse for the Kansas News Service.
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