By BRENT MARTIN
St. Joseph Post
A state senator new to legislative sessions in Topeka says he entered the race for District One to give northeast Kansas different representation in the Kansas Senate.
Sen. Craig Bowser, a Republican from Holton, says there’s no secret as to why he entered the race.
“If you think back in time, our current state senator that was representing Senate District Number One; he left the Republican Party, became an independent, and ran for governor,” Bowser tells KFEQ/St. Joseph. “He lost that race, but at that point in time, I thought that our district needed better representation and so that’s when I really decided to run.”
Bowser defeated incumbent, Sen. Dennis Pyle of Hiwatha, and another candidate last year to earn the seat.
Kansas Republicans fumed when Pyle decided to become an independent and run for governor. Pyle lost badly, garnering only 2% of the vote. Still, some Republicans blamed Pyle for the party coming up short in its bid to unseat incumbent Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly, who won the race with 49.5% of the vote, edging Republican challenger, Attorney General Derek Schmidt, who received 47.33% of the vote. A Libertarian candidate took one percent of the vote.
Schmidt would bounce back to win the Second Congressional District race, succeeding Congressman Jake LaTurner, who decided not to run for re-election.
Bowser says he has had to hit the ground running in Topeka.
“I can tell you the current legislative session here has been a lot busier than I anticipated,” Bowser says.
Last year, the Kansas legislative session didn’t wrap up until early June.
This year, lawmakers hope to wrap up business at the state Capitol by mid-April.
“They’re condensing it by about six weeks and, of course, when you do that there’s still a large volume of bills that need to be heard and work that needs to be done,” Bowser says. “And so that compression has really made for a busy 2025 legislative session.”
Bowser works in cyber security. He has been active in politics for a while, but this is the first office he has held.
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