There are partisan primary races in six Kansas House districts in Johnson County on the Aug. 4 ballot.
These races will determine who moves on to represent their respective party in the November general election, when every Kansas House seat will be on the ballot.
Since these races are partisan, only voters registered with the party for those candidates will be able to cast ballots. These races are also confined to voters who live within the boundaries of these legislative districts.
This candidate guide will focus only on candidates running in their respective contested primaries.
The profiles below were compiled using information from the candidates’ websites, their social media accounts (if they have them), their responses to the Post’s questionnaire (if they responded), Ballotpedia profiles and their answers to a Vote JoCo questionnaire distributed by local chambers of commerce.
Kansas House District 5 (Republican)
Three Republicans are vying for their party’s nomination in House District 5, which covers a small corner of southwestern Johnson County, as well as chunks of Douglas, Franklin and Miami counties.
The winner of this race will face Democrat Henry Johns, who does not have a primary opponent.
Jon Chitwood
Political experience: Jon Chitwood currently serves on the Spring Hill USD 230 Board of Education and was first elected to that role in 2023. This is his first run for the state legislature.- Personal and professional life: His campaign website says Chitwood is a full-time farmer who has owned and worked land in District 5 for nearly 20 years. He lives near Lane, Kansas, in Franklin County with his wife and children.
- Platform: Chitwood says his priority is passing a school funding formula that fully funds special education before the current one expires. He also says Kansas “can’t afford vouchers” until it meets its funding obligation. He proposes a statewide bond pool to help districts build teacher housing and opposes statewide zoning rules that would override local control of development like data centers.
Courtney Crawford
Political experience: This is Courtney Crawford’s first run for political office. According to her Facebook page, she has the endorsement of former Rep. Carrie Barth, who held the District 5 seat before she resigned last fall.- Personal and professional life: Crawford lives in Paola and works in financial administration and data management at Kansas City-based CBIZ. She is a graduate of MidAmerica Nazarene University.
- Platform: Crawford has made data center oversight her signature issue, pledging to end special tax breaks for hyperscale data centers and saying she would have voted against SB 98, the state’s data center bill. She also opposes state laws limiting county authority over water transfers and calls for impact studies, buffer zones and public input before major projects proceed.
Campaign website; Facebook page
Courtney Sappington (incumbent)
Political experience: Courtney Sappington was appointed to the District 5 seat in October 2025 to fill the vacancy created by the resignation of Rep. Carrie Barth last fall. She serves on several legislative committees, including Child Welfare/Foster Care Reform and Judiciary. She volunteered on Barth’s campaigns in 2022 and 2024.- Personal and professional life: Sappington is a stay-at-home mom with two children through foster care and a third via adoption. She lives in rural Douglas County and previously worked in logistics. She holds a degree from Truman State University and also has served on the Baldwin City Recreation Commission board.
- Platform: Sappington says her top priorities are property tax relief, including tighter state spending and scrutiny of sales tax exemptions, as well as growing the state economy through deregulation and affordability “for all demographics.” A member of the conservative Kansas Truth Caucus, she also describes herself as “unabashedly pro-life” and emphasizes foster care reform.
Kansas House District 26 (Democratic)
Two Democrats are vying for their party’s nomination in House District 26, which covers parts of Olathe, Overland Park and Spring Hill.
The winner of this race will face Republican Rep. Chip VanHouden, who was first elected to the seat in 2024 after running unopposed. He does not have a primary opponent this year.
Robert Collins
Political experience: Robert Collins has never held elected office but his campaign website says he spent years working on public policy, lobbying for nonprofits and helping other campaigns. On his website and in his questionnaires, he says helped author the Kansas False Claims Act and also helped create the Kansas Medicaid Inspector General’s Office.- Personal and professional life: Collins is an attorney and law office owner who has lived in Olathe with his wife, Heather, since 2010. The couple’s pastimes include cheering on the Royals and Chiefs and spending time with their two Shelties.
- Platform: Collins says his top priority is property tax relief, including limiting residential valuation increases and reversing the effects of the “Brownback tax experiment,” which he says shifted more costs onto homeowners. He also supports fully funding public schools and special education while opposing vouchers, and emphasizes rooting out government waste, fraud and abuse.
Laura Johnson
Political experience: Laura Johnson has not previously held or sought elected office. She says on her campaign website that her civic involvement includes work with Loud Light, a Kansas voter engagement organization, and this is her first campaign.- Personal and professional life: Johnson says she was raised in Nebraska by two educators and studied vocal performance at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and moved to Olathe after marrying her husband. She works remotely as an administrative assistant for an Omaha accounting firm.
- Platform: Johnson’s priorities are fully funding public schools, especially the state’s special education obligation, and expanding access to affordable and preventive health care, including Medicaid expansion, she says on her website. She also calls for stronger local input and environmental accountability on data center development, saying growth shouldn’t come “at the cost of our children’s health.”
Kansas House District 27 (Democratic)
Two Democrats are vying for their party’s nomination in House District 27, which covers parts of southern Leawood and Overland Park, near the state line.
The winner of this race will face Republican Rep. Sean Tarwater, who is seeking his sixth term in the Kansas House and has no primary opponent this year.
Sara Kiewiet
Political experience: Sara Kiewiet has not previously held elected office, and this is her first campaign. Her civic involvement includes three years as a PTO secretary in the Blue Valley school district. For her Post questionnaire, she says she has met with Blue Valley-area superintendents, board members and special education leaders to inform her education platform.- Personal and professional life: Kiewiet is an attorney specializing in data privacy and AI. Before that, she had a career in commercial litigation and 15 years in legal technology, according to her campaign website. Raised in Casper, Wyoming, as the daughter of a mechanic, she earned her law degree from Ohio State University and lives in Overland Park with her husband, Justin, and their children.
- Platform: Kiewiet says she is running to protect public schools, calling for full, predictable funding of K-12 and special education and opposing vouchers. She also backs property tax relief through a larger residential exemption and targeted help for seniors and veterans. According to her Post questionnaire, she also supports what she calls responsibly managed data center growth rather than a moratorium.
Campaign website; Facebook page
C. Edward Young
Political experience: C. Edward Young has not held elected office before but did previously serve as Kansas’ director of aviation from 2005 to 2013 under three governors. According to his campaign website, he has also served stints as city administrator of Tonganoxie and as a county administrator in southwestern Kansas. His campaign biography says he also chairs the Kansas Commission on Aerospace Education.- Personal and professional life: Young is an attorney with Jetlaw and a Kansas State University instructor who graduated from Olathe North High School, Johnson County Community College and the University of Kansas, where he earned a law degree. His campaign website also says he is a commercial pilot, a former firefighter and EMT who was inducted into the Kansas Aviation Hall of Fame in 2019.
- Platform: Young supports a moratorium on AI data centers and opposes their tax breaks, saying projects lack cost-benefit analysis. He proposes that governments receive equity stakes in businesses they subsidize, with dividends offsetting property taxes. In his Post questionnaire responses, he also emphasizes meeting the state’s constitutional education obligations while opposing vouchers.
Kansas House District 30 (Democratic)
Three Democrats are vying for their party’s nomination in House District 30, which covers parts of Lenexa, Olathe and Shawnee in central Johnson County.
The winner of this race will face Republican Rep. Laura Williams, who is seeking her third term in the Kansas House and has no primary opponent this year.
Zachary Thomas Hawkins
Political experience: Zachary Thomas Hawkins has not held elected office. He is an active member of the Johnson County Democrats and was previously active with the Douglas County Democrats, according to past questionnaires.- Personal and professional life: Hawkins works as a laboratory technician in Lenexa and lives in Olathe, according to his candidate questionnaire. On his campaign website, he describes himself as a lifelong Kansan, a third-generation Olathean and a product of Kansas public schools.
- Platform: In response to the Post’s questionnaire, Hawkins says his top priority is fully funding special education, which he calls “the single biggest issue facing Kansas today.” He opposes vouchers and touts the backing of the Kansas National Education Association. He says he supports a one-year data center moratorium and property tax relief by eliminating the state’s share and ending unfunded mandates.
Tyler Homes
Political experience: Tyler Holmes has not held elected office before, but his civic experience includes serving as a court-appointed special advocate for two children and sitting on a Blue Valley school board advisory committee for curriculum and instruction, according to his campaign website. This is his first campaign.- Personal and professional life: Holmes is a fourth-generation Johnson County resident and attorney whose career has focused on work such as legal aid and judicial independence programs. A Blue Valley North graduate, he earned bachelor’s and law degrees from the University of Kansas and volunteers with Lenexa’s Project 1020 and Kanbe’s Markets, according to his campaign biography.
- Platform: According to his answers on the Post’s questionnaire, Holmes’ priorities are fully funding public schools, including special education at 92% of excess costs, and opposing vouchers. On data centers, he calls for full transparency, an end to non-disclosure agreements and clawback provisions if projects underdeliver, and he opposes property tax caps that “hamstring local officials.”
Amelia Wiederaenders
Political experience: According to her campaign website, Amelia Wiederaenders has worked in politics for more than 16 years but has not held elected office. She has experience working on past campaigns, including Barbara Bollier’s 2010 Kansas House run and U.S. Sen. Claire McCaskill’s 2012 reelection bid. She worked for Prairie Roots in 2022 and was volunteer coordinator for Stacey Knoell’s 2024 state Senate campaign.- Personal and professional life: Wiederaenders, an Olathe resident, has spent the past seven years as a full-time caregiver for her 103-year-old grandmother, according to her website and questionnaires. She holds a political science degree from Kansas State University and a master’s in public administration from the University of San Francisco.
- Platform: According to her questionnaire responses, Wiederaenders’ top issues are affordability, including housing, health care and childcare, fully funding public schools and protecting reproductive health care. She opposes a statewide data center moratorium as “too simple,” saying local communities should decide, and would repeal the state’s new 25-foot buffer law around first responders.
Campaign website; Facebook page
Kansas House District 78 (Democratic)
Two Democrats are vying for their party’s nomination in House District 78, which covers a portion of Olathe in south-central Johnson County.
The winner of this race will face Republican Rep. Robyn Essex, an Olathe city councilmember who is seeking her third term in the Kansas House. She has no primary opponent this year.
KaMesha Bernard
Political experience: Katie Bernard has not held elected office and does not appear to have a campaign website or social media accounts related to her run for office. In a survey completed for Ballotopedia, she describes herself as a community advocate with a professional background in criminal justice.- Personal and professional life: Again, according to the Ballotpedia survey, Bernard says she has lived in Kansas for most of her life and that her criminal justice work has shown her how policy decisions affect public safety, economic stability and fairness. She did not respond to the Post’s questionnaire.
- Platform: Based on her responses to Ballotpedia, Bernard’s stated priorities are economic opportunity — including wage growth and affordable housing for families “living paycheck to paycheck” — improving school funding, transparency and teacher support, and immigration enforcement accountability. She told Ballotpedia that ICE actions should protect due process and not undermine community trust.
Tim Lundberg
Political experience: Tim Lundberg has not held elected office but served as a Democratic precinct leader from 2022 to 2024 and says on his campaign website that he has volunteered for the Democratic Party since before he was old enough to vote. He also held elected union positions with his National Air Traffic Controllers Association local, according to his campaign biography.- Personal and professional life: Lundberg calls himself a lifelong Kansan who has lived in Olathe since 1988. He is a Shawnee Mission North and Kansas State University graduate who spent 22 years as an air traffic controller before training dispatchers at the FAA Academy and working for the Overland Park Police Department, ultimately as police fleet operations supervisor, according to his campaign website. He is now retired.
- Platform: According to his responses to the Post’s questionnaire, Lundberg’s priorities are fully funding public schools, including special education, while opposing vouchers. He also emphasizes property tax relief for seniors —he’d let homeowners 67 and older defer the state’s portion until their home sells. He opposes a data center moratorium but wants regulation, such as requiring facilities to generate some of their own power on site.
Kansas House District 121 (Republican)
Two Republicans are vying for their party’s nomination in House District 121, which covers a large swath of western Johnson County, including parts of De Soto, Gardner and Olathe.
The winner of this race will face Democrat Kelsey Stock, who does not have a primary opponent.
Thomas Palenske
Political experience: Thomas Palenske has not previously held elected office, and this is his first campaign. His campaign touts the endorsement of Liz Resman, widow of longtime District 121 Rep. John Resman, whose death in March created the vacancy now filled by Palenske’s opponent Mike Storm.- Personal and professional life: According to his campaign website, Palenske is a retired Air Force brigadier general who served nearly four decades in the armed forces, eventually rising to a special operations command pilot with more than 3,500 flight hours, earning the Bronze Star and Distinguished Flying Cross. After retiring, he returned to Kansas with his wife, Jeryn, and runs a defense consulting business.
- Platform: According to his Post questionnaire responses, Palenske’s priorities are stopping “skyrocketing” property taxes — he says he’d vote for the valuation-cap amendment — cutting wasteful spending and backing law enforcement on crime and illegal immigration. He supports school choice, saying vouchers let families pick schools “in line with their values,” along with term limits.
Campaign website; Facebook page
Mike Storm (incumbent)
Political experience: Mike Storm was selected by Republican precinct leaders in March 2026 to fill the District 121 seat after the death of Rep. John Resman. He has previously run campaigns for Johnson County commission in 2024 and the Johnson County Community College board of trustees in 2025, but did not win. He has also served as a site council president for Olathe schools, according to a Vote JoCo candidate questionnaire.- Personal and professional life: Storm is a fourth-generation Kansan, 40-year Johnson County resident, Navy veteran and small business owner, according to his campaign website. He and his wife, Jennie, have three daughters who grew up in the Olathe school district. He says he enjoys woodworking and restoring classic cars and trucks.
- Platform: Storm says he voted for every property tax relief measure in his first session this year, including the valuation-cap amendment, and voted to fully fund K-12 and increase special education funding, according to his Post questionnaire. He voices “serious concerns” about data center expansion and wants stronger environmental reviews before further taxpayer incentives. He also backed the ICE cooperation law and the 25-foot first responder buffer passed this year by the Legislature.
