Kansas' Republican attorney general told a racial justice commission two years ago that racial bias “obviously” exists in law enforcement, but he said Tuesday that he wasn't saying systemic racism exists and stood by campaign attacks on the state's Democratic governor for using that phrase.
Attorney General Derek Schmidt and fellow Republicans are portraying Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly as anti-police as Schmidt tries to unseat Kelly in the Nov. 8 election. George Floyd's death in 2020 led Kelly to form a Commission on Racial Justice and Equity to examine policing, declaring as she did, "Systemic racism within law enforcement must end.”
