The Johnson County Post will host a forum for candidates running for Kansas’ Third Congressional District next month, but Rep. Sharice Davids won’t be there.
The Democratic Congresswoman vying for her fifth term representing Johnson County in Washington, D.C., declined the Post’s offer to participate.
Her two challengers, Republican Eric Jenkins and Libertarian Steve Hohe, have agreed to continue with the event in Davids’ absence.
The forum is scheduled to take place on Oct. 13. The audience will be limited to family and a small group of campaign staffers for each candidate.
The Post will livestream the forum on our Facebook page and YouTube channel.
Five possible dates offered
I first reached out to all three candidates in late August, looking to organize a forum for the Third Congressional District.
I started by proffering five possible dates in September and October. Within a few days, I heard back from Jenkins and Hohe, who both said they were available on all five offered dates.
On Aug. 31, a Davids campaign staffer responded, requesting more details.
“We can’t confirm a date without the event format, rules, and logistics,” this staffer wrote in an email.
The next day, Sept. 1, I sent all three campaigns a list of proposed ground rules that specified things like the forum’s duration, the arrangement of podiums, how microphones would be used and how long each candidate would get to respond to questions.
Hohe, the Libertarian candidate, responded that day, agreeing to the terms and saying he was still available on all five dates.
Jenkins’ campaign responded on Sept. 8 with a few questions about the ground rules. After my response answering those questions, Jenkins’ campaign agreed to the format on Sept. 9, again saying the Republican candidate was still available on all five dates.
I also heard from Davids’ campaign on Sept. 8, but it wasn’t what I was expecting.
In that Sept. 8 response, a campaign spokesperson said:
“I really appreciate the invitation and you thinking of Rep. Davids. We’ve decided to pass on this opportunity, but I of course look forward to working together on future interviews and stories as they come up. Thank you again!”
Within an hour, I responded, writing, “Can you explain more about your all’s reasoning for declining the opportunity to participate? Frankly, it’s surprising and disappointing to get an outright rejection. I understand if there are some quibbles about specific ground rules, and I was prepared to negotiate through that, but there hasn’t been any other candidate I’ve spoken with at any level for whom we’re prepping forums this fall who has flatly said ‘no’ to participating.”
The campaign spokesperson responded an hour later but did not elaborate on the reasoning behind the decision.
“I understand your disappointment and appreciate you giving us the opportunity. We’ve given the format some thought and, after looking at the next couple [of] months, decided this was the right call for us,” they said.
That was the last word I heard from Davids’ campaign regarding a possible forum.
Forum with other candidates will be on Oct. 13
It took a couple of more weeks to shore up the details of the forum. During this time, I was also organizing and planning the final details for seven other candidate forums for Kansas House, county commission and Prairie Village mayor, as well as going through reader-submitted questions for our annual candidate questionnaires.
Finally, on Sept. 23, I confirmed with Hohe’s and Jenkins’ campaigns that Oct. 13 would work as a date for our Congressional forum. (Oct. 13 was one of the original five dates I offered.)
After getting their commitments, I followed up with both campaigns, telling them that Davids did not plan to participate. I asked if that would impact their decision to also participate.
By Friday, Sept. 25, I received confirmation from both Hohe and Jenkins that they were still willing to move ahead with an event without Davids.
Jenkins, a former Shawnee city councilmember, offered this statement in response to Davids’ declining to participate:
“I’m disappointed in Sharice’s decision to not participate. It shows a lack of transparency at a time when the 3rd District faces harsh challenges. The public deserves to hear from their candidates and especially the incumbent.”
Davids has done candidate debates before
What made Davids’ decision surprising was the fact that she’s done debate-style events before, organized in part by the Post.
In 2022 and 2024, along with Kansas City PBS and KCUR 89.3, I helped organize debates between Davids and her Republican opponents, Amanda Adkins in 2022 and Prasanth Reddy in 2024.
Davids participated in those events, which were taped in front of a small audience in a closed studio at Kansas City PBS and later aired on TV and radio.
The event I proposed for Congressional candidates this year was not a traditional one-on-one debate like those events but was more in line with the conversational-style forums the Post does for lower-level offices every year.
These events present all participating candidates with the same questions, gleaned in part from reader input before the event. The candidates get the same amount of time to respond. Back-and-forths are limited but, as moderator, I often grant candidates opportunities to rebut something their opponent has said.
These events are meant to give candidates a chance to speak on the issues that Post readers say are important. While candidates have a chance to highlight their campaign priorities during the course of these events, they are also frequently challenged to answer questions and address issues they may otherwise want to avoid in the lead-up to an election.
As I say in my scripted introduction to all of our forums, these Post events allow our readers — the residents of Johnson County — direct access to the people who would hold elected office, decide how their tax dollars are used and govern their communities.
The bigger picture
It’s not totally clear why Davids is avoiding the Post’s forum, but the campaign’s response suggests they don’t think it’s the best use of the Congresswoman’s time.
Political experts I talked with all suggested this could be because Davids feels safe in her Third District seat, which she has won by double-digit percentage-point margins for four straight election cycles.
The Cook Political Report rates Kansas’ Third District as “Solid D (Democratic),” meaning they project a Davids win.
Erin Covey, editor of Cook Political Report’s U.S. House coverage, said Davids’ choice to skip a public forum or debate could be rational from her campaign’s perspective.
“If you don’t have the media spotlight on you because you’re in a safe position, you know it’s like, ‘Why would I put myself in a position where I could give my opponent potential fodder?'” Covey said.
But what’s good for a candidate might not be good for constituents.
Bob Beatty, a political scientist at Washburn University in Topeka and a longtime political observer in Kansas, said public forums help voters get a fuller view of their choices during an election.
“There’s a very negative impact on public discourse and public knowledge when elected officials refuse to engage with constituents either through town halls or debates and forums,” Beatty told me via email.
He said it’s become more common for officials to engage with constituents in environments they directly control, like social media, “telephone town halls” and events organized by the campaign itself.
But there’s “no substitute” for events put on by a third party, like an independent news outlet, he said.
“At town halls and debates, elected officials are asked questions that may be uncomfortable or difficult or even embarrassing but often need to be asked,” he said.
He cited a now-infamous 2025 town hall in western Kansas that Republican Sen. Roger Marshall walked out of after angry audience members questioned him about budget cuts and other actions by the Trump administration. Post-organized forums have, at times in recent years, also gotten raucous, including during a primary forum for Johnson County chair this summer. (All three candidates at that event stuck around to the end.)
Greg Vonnahme, a political scientist at the University of Missouri-Kansas City, agrees that candidate forums are important ways for voters to get a sense of their choices, even if in today’s polarized political landscape the share of undecided voters is getting smaller.
“Candidates don’t do this in any other arena, in any other venue where you have the representatives from the two major political parties on the same stage at the same time answering the same questions,” Vonnahme said.
A broader trend?
Davids’ decision could also fit into a broader trend this election cycle, one that I find unfortunate.
Axios noted earlier this month that candidates appear to be getting increasingly “debate-shy.”
The news outlet reported that in closely watched U.S. Senate contests in North Carolina, Ohio and Texas, as well as in several high-profile gubernatorial races, there are no debates planned so far ahead of Nov. 3.
Beatty, the Washburn political scientist, said, “We’re in an era now of less engagement by incumbents.”
He recalls former U.S. Sen. Bob Dole and others routinely touring the state and visiting with constituents in open town halls. He says now it’s more common for candidates or elected officials to do “invite-only unpublicized meetings with groups of people in a community and then framing that as ‘touring’ the state.”
The Post is disappointed Rep. Davids has opted not to talk directly to constituents through our forum.
We’ve hosted such events for more than 15 years and in annual surveys, they are routinely cited as one of the things our subscribers appreciate most about our coverage.
They’re not perfect, but they do provide Johnson County residents a rare chance — maybe the only one before Election Day — to see all candidates in a given race sharing space and time, talking about the issues that matter most to our readers.
Skipping that, I think, does a disservice to our readers and the voters of Johnson County.
Regardless of Rep. Davids’ rationale, the Post’s invitation to our Oct. 13 forum remains open.
We hope she reconsiders and joins the two other candidates to talk about the issues our readers want to hear about ahead of Nov. 3.
