Morgan Chilson, Kansas Reflector

Kansas officials refused persistent demands from the federal government for access to residents’ personal data solely based on the legal responsibility to protect that data, a state leader says.

In the midst of political attacks and two lawsuits, Department for Children and Families secretary Laura Howard and Gov. Laura Kelly pushed back against federal demands because they don’t know how Kansans’ personal data will be used. The release of information isn’t about detecting fraud because those procedures are already in place, Howard said.

The state has denied requests to turn over personal information of Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program recipients, which the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Food and Nutrition Service has requested since May.

Since then, Kansas House Speaker Dan Hawkins has accused Howard and Kelly of a “massive cover-up of waste, fraud and abuse” because they failed to comply with federal demands.

But Howard said in an interview that the federal government already monitors the Kansas SNAP program for such problems.

“The federal SNAP law today allows data to be shared for the administration of the program, including fraud, waste and abuse,” she said.

However, the law is also clear the data cannot be shared “except as it relates to the administration of the program,” Howard said.

The first letter received from Food and Nutrition Service in May did not include information about how the data would be used, which led to DCF’s initial refusal, she said.

Lawsuit outcome

A lawsuit was filed in June by privacy organizations arguing against the data collection, followed by a July lawsuit filed by multiple states asking the courts to stay the data request, Howard said.

“USDA makes this demand for the stated purpose of detecting ‘overpayments and fraud,’ ” the state lawsuit said. “Instead, the move appears to be part of the federal government’s well-publicized campaign to amass enormous troves of personal and private data, including information on taxpayers and Medicaid recipients, to advance goals that have nothing to do with combating waste, fraud, or abuse in federal benefit programs.”

Howard said she is concerned about what could happen based on the lawsuit outcome.

“I honestly believe that if I were to release that data, then the courts find in favor of the states, then I’m putting the state at liability for releasing the personal information of more than 700,000 Kansans,” she said.

In a legislative meeting earlier this month, state Attorney General Kris Kobach said his office is exploring whether it is legal for Kansas to withhold the information requested.

“Attorneys in the office of the attorney general are investigating the matter. A decision about how to proceed is expected to be made within the next three weeks,” spokeswoman Danedri Herbert said Thursday.

Federal Register

Howard said additional concerns about whether the data should be released occurred in June when the USDA published the request for data, highlighting the intention to create a SNAP information database in the Federal Register.

“The notice in the Federal Register talks about 10 or 12 uses of the data, and one of those talks about sharing it with other federal entities,” Howard said. “It talks about things to do with anything regulatory or civil or criminal. It doesn’t say for the purpose of administering the SNAP program.”

The list is too broad and underlines DCF’s concerns, Howard said.

Titled “Notice of a new system of records,” the Federal Register notice said: “The primary purposes of this system are to validate the accuracy of eligibility determinations and strengthen SNAP and government program integrity.”

The notice lists 11 categories of “routine” uses of the records.

SNAP error rate

A point raised by Hawkins and Senate president Ty Masterson, who want the data turned over, is that the state has a high error rate in the SNAP program and the sharing of data would help discover fraud or abuse.

Hawkins has repeatedly referred to an inaccurate current error rate in the SNAP program and insists the sharing the data could help lower the rate. But that rate isn’t about fraud detection, which Howard said is already occurring in the SNAP program.

Hawkins did not respond to a request for comment for this story.

Howard said a robust fraud detection system is already in place in partnership with the USDA, and account data is freely shared for that purpose. In fact, of all federal funds processed through DCF, she said SNAP and Medicaid have the most extensive programs looking for any problems.

Medicaid isn’t as complicated to process as the SNAP benefits are because staff are only determining whether the applicant is eligible, Howard said. With SNAP, they’re also figuring out how much the payment should be.

“States are responsible for conducting these quality control processes,” she said. “There are samples of cases that are drawn every month. We have quality control staff that look at those cases. They’re essentially redetermining that eligibility from scratch, and that includes verifications.”

Once quality control staff go through the detailed information collected from SNAP applicants, which includes income, shelter, work and household member information, they determine whether mistakes were made.

“Then the feds look at a sample of our sample, just to verify that our quality control is accurate,” Howard said.

It’s not about finding fraud because the error rate is attributed to mistakes, Howard said.

“None of it’s about fraud,” she said. “If, in the context of the original determination, if a worker believed that someone was being untruthful, then we have a separate process to refer that for a fraud investigation.”

Multiple factors go into determining whether someone is eligible for SNAP and how much they should receive, including all assets, income, shelter costs, whether they must be working, if roommates are contributing to utilities and much more, Howard said. Simple things like a teenager who works at a fast-food restaurant turning 18, which means their income should be added to household income, can cause eligibility errors.

Error rate increases

The Kansas error rate climbed in the last few years, and Howard said she wishes there was a “magic bullet answer” to how to correct it.

The DCF team is working on retraining staff, rewriting manuals to make sure they’re clear, training staff to interview applicants, among other items.

“We’ve done a whole root cause analysis based on our error rate,” Howard said. “We have to do that for the feds. States have to submit corrective action plans. We know that the areas where we see the most errors have to do with wages and income and shelter deductions. So then, based on that, you train even more in that area.”

The agency is considering automation that may help reduce errors, she said, as well as encouraging more people to use the online application form. That could help reduce data processing typos and misunderstandings that occur when staff interview someone and then enter the information.

In its most recent report for 2024, the state reduced its error rate from 12% in 2023 to just under 10%.

The error rate jumped after the COVID-19 pandemic, when Howard said many experienced workers who had performed eligibility work for years retired. The error rate in 2017 was 3.9%, jumping to 5.9% in 2018 and 7.1% in 2019. The target is to achieve error rates below 5%.

No data is available on the USDA website for 2020 and 2021. In 2022, the rate jumped to 9%, followed by 12% in 2023, which is the highest rate in more than 15 years.

“We were very short staffed for a couple of years,” Howard said. “That really has started to turn around, particularly in some of our regions, and I would attribute that to a number of things. The state’s had some nice salary increases based on some of the market assessments, and then I think things just kind of stabilized after COVID.”

In 2024, there were 205 eligibility workers on average processing applications and confirming eligibility throughout the state, she said.

“I wish I could say, ‘Well, we’re doing these three really glitzy things,’ ” Howard said. “We’re doing hard things. There are a lot of things going on.”

In reality, it comes down to worker training, making sure paperwork is filled out correctly, with the right questions being asked, and then verifying all information, she said.

This story was published in partnership with the Creative Commons collective. Read the full story here.

TOPEKA — A political action committee targeted Leavenworth’s mayor on social media in May for her “liberal agenda,” accusing her of holding back progress in the northeast Kansas town.

The Defend US PAC ran three advertisements in May on Instagram and Facebook that tagged Mayor Holly Pittman. One said Pittman’s agenda was to “waste taxpayer money, lose good-paying jobs and call it ‘progress.’” All three ads encouraged people to call Pittman.

The ads did not directly mention the city’s disagreement with CoreCivic, a private prison planning to reopen as an ICE detention facility, but that is the most recent controversy that could affect community jobs.

Leavenworth city officials went to court to force CoreCivic to follow its development process and apply for a special use permit before reopening. The prison closed in 2021.

CoreCivic did not reply to a question about whether it was involved with running the advertisements.

“I was disappointed to see this PAC targeting and spending money against me,” Pittman said. “As the mayor, I serve as one of five commissioners on the Leavenworth City Commission. Decisions are made collectively by the entire commission, not by me alone.”

She said the ad misrepresents the process and ignores the “collaborative approach” taken in Leavenworth.

Marina Pino, counsel at the elections and government program at the Brennan Center for Justice, said the issue of PACs spending money at the state and local levels is “especially acute” right now. The Brennan Center has researched dark money funding and its effects on the political process.

Dark money is a term used to denote funds affecting politics that can’t be traced to specific donors.

“When you have these hidden funders of advertising, they often hold economic interests in the contests where these outcomes could have significant and immediate impact on their bottom lines,” Pino said.

One concern about PAC donations is the way they may shift local elections.

“Local elections and potentially local issues are low-information elections compared to national elections,” she said. “What that means is it may not take much advertising to sway voters.”

Facebook highlights the range of dollars to run an ad. For instance, one of the ads paid for by Defend US Inc. cost between $600 to $699. Defend US spent $2,900+ on the Pittman ads.

“What they spent was a pretty insignificant amount of money in most terms,” Pino said. “When we did this report in 2016, we found that these dark money groups across several states were spending amounts in the low one hundred thousands, or even low ten thousands. For those groups, that’s a modest business expense, but it’s also a major hurdle for local candidates. They’re not spending that type of money on elections.”

Pino said the Brennan Center did a recent report looking at dark money spending in the 2024 elections. Although it didn’t consider local election spending, the two tend to trend the same way, she said.

“We saw the dark money spending in the 2024 election break a serious record,” she said. “It was around $1.9 billion that was spent in the 2024 elections. That’s the money we can trace. It’s becoming increasingly more difficult to trace.”

Pino noted that dark money spending occurs in both Democratic and Republican political races and issues.

A Defend US PAC financial report filed with the Federal Election Commission showed the organization collected $1.6 million in contributions from Jan. 1, 2023, through Dec. 31, 2024. Of that, $729,000 was from individuals and the remainder was from organizations, most of which were conservative PACs, such as the American Exceptionalism Institute.

TOPEKA — A six-member House Select Investigating Committee on Wednesday split votes along party lines and failed to reprimand, censure or expel Rep. Ford Carr for his behavior that included an altercation in a Topeka bar.

Instead, the committee of three Democrats and three Republicans voted 5-1 to write a report for the House about the committee’s failure to reach agreement, potentially recommending Carr, a Wichita Democrat, be admonished. Rep. Mike Amyx, D-Lawrence, was the lone no vote. The committee will reconvene to approve the report before it is sent to the House, as there was some disagreement about asking for an admonishment of Carr.

It wasn’t the result Carr expected.

Pointing to a complaint he filed against Rep. Nick Hoheisel, a Wichita Republican, Carr said the only options presented were dismissal, reprimand, censure or expulsion.

“It angers me,” he said. “None of these were options when it was Rep. Hoheisel.”

Carr said he expected the committee to split votes 3-3 and send the complaint to the House, where it would require a two-thirds vote to take action. Admonishment had never been on the table, he said.

Whatever the term used, Carr said the committee’s determination won’t change him.

“I represent my people the way I represent my people,” he said. “I am in no way going to alter the way I represent my people.”

He added, referring to the fact he retained his seat after last year’s election: “The people have already spoken. I am going to continue to be me.”

Carr has contended that racism and lack of acceptance for a Black man who operates in a different culture fueled the complaint and investigation, all of which the complainant denied immediately in a statement to the committee.

Rep. Leah Howell, a Derby Republican, filed the complaint alleging that Carr broke a House rule about using disorderly words while debating legislation. Listed in her complaint were multiple instances that she said indicate Carr’s behavior is not in line with the decorum and conduct required of a Kansas representative.

“I want to clarify that this complaint is not about retaliation, partisan politics or personal conflicts,” she said. “Contrary to accusations that this complaint is racially motivated, the color of skin and political party have absolutely nothing to do with my decision to file this complaint.”

Howell pointed to an altercation at the Celtic Fox in Topeka in which video surfaced of Carr and Wichita City Councilman Brandon Johnson loudly arguing and calling each other names. When Rep. Henry Helgerson, an Eastborough Democrat, tried to intervene, he was knocked to the floor, although he refused to press charges. Howell, who is married to a Wichita city councilman, said she considered Carr’s words at the Celtic Fox to be threatening. She focused on several incidents that she said make a pattern.

“I will argue that accusing colleagues of racism, calling one of them a racial slur, lying to this committee and that infamous public display of repeated use of racial slurs and aggression by what should be described as an act of battery against two other elected officials can be collectively classified as not only misconduct, but a pattern of violent rhetoric and behavior,” Howell said.

Rep. Susan Humphries is part of the House Select Investigating Committee that considered Wednesday whether to reprimand, censure or expel Rep. Ford Carr. (Sherman Smith/Kansas Reflector)

Carr, during his 15 minutes speaking to the committee, disagreed with Howell’s assessment of what happened in each of the instances she described.

“Not by any stretch of anyone’s imagination is it OK for someone white to explain to me my culture and what I should be doing,” he said. “It is not your place to tell me what I’m supposed to do culturally as a Black man.”

He also explained to the committee the cultural difference between the words “n-----” and “n---a,” the second of which he said he was using in conversations the committee and complainant highlighted.

“Not once did I use the word n-----,” Carr said. “That’s not a word that we use in my culture. That is erroneous.”

Carr also brought out his birth certificate and pointed out that his race was identified as “Negro” on the Kansas document.

Rep. Susan Humphries, R-Wichita, and others on the committee questioned Carr extensively about a comment he made in 2023 on the House floor about a “House Negro,” which brought Carr an admonition from GOP leadership. But the committee ultimately agreed that incident didn’t apply to its considerations Wednesday, except seeing his behavior as part of a pattern.

Ultimately, the committee agreed that expulsion was off the table, commenting that such a move was usually connected to a criminal act. Members debated the difference between censuring and reprimanding, but a vote on reprimanding split 3-3 on party lines.

Even the idea of writing a report caused some contention, as Humphries waffled at the idea of writing a report that didn’t show any concerns with Carr’s behavior.

“I seconded the motion, but I’m not comfortable with a report that does not say that we made a finding,” Humphries said. “We made a finding that we are not going to dismiss, reprimand, censure or expel. Is there any agreement on this committee that there was behavior that was inappropriate?”

“Maybe you don’t want to say it publicly,” she added.

The committee didn’t indicate when it would reconvene to approve the report.