Support for Sen. Roger Marshall (R-KS) is lukewarm in Great Bend, Kansas, the town where he spent about three decades as a doctor, according to Kansas City Star columnist David Hudnall.
Marshall is in a tighter race than expected against Democrat Adam Hamilton, a Methodist megachurch minister. Hudnall went to Barton County to find out how locals feel, and often found people unwilling to say. Some acted as though he’d asked about their medical files. One businessman allied with Marshall replied, “No, Thank You,” and another didn’t respond.
Craig Neeland, a retired banker who was Marshall’s loan officer and backed him in 2016 and 2020, says he’s done. “He gives Trump free rein every time,” Neeland said, though he predicted Marshall would probably still prevail.
Retired banker Dan Bonine, a lifelong Republican, said he changed his registration so he could vote for Hamilton, whom he sees as better able to unite people. Ellinwood’s mayor said choosing between the two was like a coin flip.
Hudnall also recounts lingering local resentment over the physician-owned hospital Marshall helped open, which critics say helped end the old nonprofit hospital’s inpatient services. Marshall’s side has argued the old hospital was struggling and the new one improved care.
This follows extensive reporting about Marshall's controversial debt collection practices as a doctor, which saw hundreds of lower-income former patients sued or even arrested over small unpaid medical bills.
Barton County will almost certainly still back Marshall heavily, Hudnall writes, though he ran four points behind Trump there in 2020. Marshall has said he needs Trump’s voters to turn out to win.