Republican gubernatorial candidate Charolette O’Hara has made untruthful, deceptive and specious remarks lately directed at House Speaker Dan Hawkins and Senate President Ty Masterson over congressional redistricting in Kansas. That criticism deserves a clear, fact-based response, one grounded in reality, not labels or feigned outrage.
First, something that should be recognized is that Charlotte O’Hara is a conservative, and her concern for Kansas and for conservative outcomes is genuine. Passion for principle is a good thing in our party. But passion does not change facts, and facts still matter when untrue and misleading statements are made by a politician, especially one who’s running for the highest elected office in the state.
In the Fall of 2025, Republican legislative leadership attempted to call a special session of the Kansas Legislature to address two issues, mid-decade congressional redistricting and legislative oversight of major rural healthcare funding program. Hawkins and Masterson circulated a petition seeking the constitutionally required signatures to reconvene lawmakers, with redrawing U.S. House district maps as the primary focus and rural healthcare oversight, specifically more than $1 billion in assistance for rural hospitals and healthcare facilities, as an additional agenda item. While Senate Republicans secured the necessary signatures, the effort ultimately failed when the Kansas House did not reach the two-thirds threshold or 84 signatures needed due, in part to ten House Republicans declining to sign the petition. As a result, the special session was not convened.
Republicans in the Kansas House understand, at least historically, that procedural votes are where unity matters most. They are not endorsements of policy outcomes; they are the mechanism that allows the majority party to govern at all. When Speaker Hawkins asked members to sign the petition calling for a special session, he was exercising a procedural tool explicitly designed to protect legislative authority and keep decision-making inside the elected body, rather than ceding it to another authority. Preserving unanimity on such procedural steps is how a caucus safeguards its institutional power, even when members disagree sharply on the substance.
When the ten Republicans refused to sign the petition, they weakened the Speaker’s ability to manage the House and, by extension, the Republican majority’s ability to control the process. That kind of fracture doesn’t strengthen the Republican party or conservative principles, it hands leverage to the minority and invites chaos. Strong Republican leadership always depends on a shared understanding, you can fight vigorously on policy, but you close ranks on procedure. Speaker Hawkins was defending that tradition, not demanding blind loyalty. The long-term health and strength of the Republican caucus depend on remembering the difference.
Here are the facts:
Under the Kansas Constitution, overriding Governor Laura Kelly’s veto of a congressional redistricting plan required a two-thirds supermajority, 84 votes in the Kansas House. Republicans did not have those votes.
Not because Speaker Dan Hawkins refused to act.
Not because Senate President Ty Masterson blocked anything.
But because ten Republican House members failed to support the special-session procedural vote needed to even attempt a veto override.
That is not opinion. That is arithmetic. Bringing a bill to the floor without the votes is not courage. It is political theater, and it guarantees failure. Leadership is not measured by who shouts the loudest or forces a doomed vote for optics. Leadership is measured by who counts the votes, understands constitutional reality, and protects the party from self-inflicted losses.
The responsibility of legislative leadership, both in the House and the Senate, is to protect the integrity of their chambers, preserve Republican leverage for future sessions, and avoid handing Governor Kelly and Democrats an easy public victory. Procedural discipline is how majorities govern. When Republicans fracture on procedural votes, Democrats win. Calling leadership “cowardly” for refusing to run the party into a brick wall during the 2026 legislative session ignores the real problem, internal Republican disunity.
Claims that Speaker Hawkins or President Masterson blocked redistricting to “protect RINOs” collapse under even basic scrutiny. If leadership truly controlled the votes, there would have been 84 Republicans ready to override a Laura Kelly veto. There were not. The Speaker could not manufacture 84 votes needed to override a Laura Kelly override. The failure occurred before the gavel ever came down to begin the 2026 session.
It is also false to suggest that this single issue explains every conservative policy setback in Kansas. Under Republican legislative leadership, Kansas has passed major tax relief, expanded parental rights, protected agricultural and property interests, and delivered historic economic development growth. Those victories evidenced party discipline, not RINO behavior.
Charlotte O’Hara’s rhetoric does one thing well, it helps Democrats. It divides Republicans heading into an election year, weakens conservative leadership statewide, and replaces strategy with performative anger. Governor Kelly and Democrats benefit when Republicans attack Republicans more aggressively than they attack liberal Democrats.
So, let’s be clear about the labels. Dan Hawkins is not a RINO. Ty Masterson is not a RINO.
Their voting records, leadership roles, and long-standing conservative credentials speak for themselves. Disagreeing over tactics or timing does not erase years of conservative governance.
Speaker Hawkins and President Ty Masterson did not “refuse to fight.” They refused to lose on purpose. Leadership sometimes means telling activists an uncomfortable truth, you cannot override a veto without the votes.
Republicans win when we govern like a majority. We lose when we tear down our own leadership.
Choosing responsibility over spectacle is not surrender. It is leadership, and Kansas Republicans are stronger for it.
Jay Vanier
Jay Vanier is a Salina, Kansas based entrepreneur focused on developing and commercializing advanced water-treatment technologies. His work centers on innovative systems designed to address PFAS, heavy metals, and other contaminants affecting municipal and industrial water supplies. He graduated from Kansas State University with a degree in Journalism and Mass Communications and earned his Juris Doctor (JD) from Washburn University School of Law.
