Craig Bowser

This bill creates a government-funded petition process that allows just 10% of registered voters to block school districts, cities, and counties from raising property tax revenue above the prior year's level. There is no protection for wages and benefits already negotiated in union contracts — meaning a successful petition could prevent a public employer from funding raises it already agreed to pay. The bill also embeds petition signature pages directly into tax notices mailed to every property owner at taxpayer expense, giving anti-tax groups a built-in organizing tool that labor has no equivalent way to counter.

The conference committee report on HB 2513 became the omnibus state budget after conferees gutted the original claims bill and replaced it entirely. The final budget included only a 1% across-the-board salary increase for roughly 35,000 executive branch and Kansas Board of Regents university employees — despite Governor Kelly recommending 2.5% and a 2025 market salary study showing state workers falling further behind. Meanwhile, legislators had already awarded themselves an automatic 4% raise indexed to average wage growth and given their own professional staff 10% increases. Senate Minority Leader Dinah Sykes called the 1% offer a slap in the face. The budget also imposed 1.5% cuts across 24 state agencies while projecting depletion of 1.1 billion in reserves over three years. A NAY vote supported demanding meaningful investment in the state workforce that keeps Kansas running.

HB 2468 doubles the tax credit cap for private school voucher scholarships from $10 million to $20 million and opts Kansas into a new federal tax credit, steering more public dollars toward private schools. This amendment would have required private schools receiving these taxpayer-funded scholarships to meet basic accountability standards. Labor supports the amendment because expanding vouchers without oversight drains funding from public schools where union members teach and work, weakening both the schools and the educators who serve Kansas kids.

SB 394 creates a "poison pill" that automatically eliminates no-excuse mail voting if any court strikes down the state's signature verification rules. If triggered, only voters who are sick, disabled, or out of the county on Election Day could vote by mail — leaving out shift workers, nurses, and hourly employees who simply can't get to the polls during work hours. The bill also forces all legal challenges to election laws into a single courthouse in Topeka, making it harder and more expensive for voters anywhere else in the state to fight back.

SB 363 raises the age limit for SNAP work requirements from 49 to 64, forcing older displaced workers to meet strict work hour mandates or lose food assistance. It also requires quarterly Medicaid eligibility paperwork — a burden that causes eligible working families to lose health coverage through administrative red tape — and eliminates existing exemptions for veterans, homeless individuals, and former foster youth. The bill also bars the governor from issuing emergency waivers during recessions or plant closures, removing a critical safety net for workers when they need it most.

SB 452 makes it a crime to come within 25 feet of a first responder — including federal immigration agents — after being told to back away, even during lawful picketing where police are present. It also shields state and local officials from civil lawsuits when they help enforce federal executive orders, including immigration raids at workplaces. Together, these provisions threaten workers' ability to picket freely and create a chilling effect on organizing at meatpacking plants, farms, and construction sites where immigrant coworkers could face enforcement actions.

SCR 1616 proposes amending the Kansas Constitution to cap annual increases in assessed property values at 3%, rolling the baseline back to 2022 levels. Despite being marketed as property tax relief, the cap does not limit actual tax bills — local governments retain full authority to raise mill levies to meet budget needs, simply shifting the burden onto new homeowners, new construction, and commercial property. The result is squeezed revenue for cities, counties, and school districts whose budgets fund the wages, benefits, and jobs of thousands of union-represented teachers, firefighters, road crews, and public safety workers. The cap also penalizes new construction by taxing it at full market value while capping existing properties, directly undermining housing affordability and construction trades employment — contradicting the Senate's own vote the same week to encourage new home building. The Senate adopted the resolution 30-10 on Emergency Final Action.

SB 375 imposes new legal burdens on proxy advisory firms — the companies that union pension funds and retirement plans hire to research and recommend how to vote their shares on corporate issues like executive pay, workplace safety, and governance. By requiring a narrow type of "written financial analysis" for any recommendation that goes against company management, the bill makes it harder and more expensive for these advisors to recommend votes on labor, environmental, and governance proposals that workers' retirement funds depend on. This is part of a national campaign to weaken the tools unions use to hold corporations accountable as shareholders.

SB 413 prohibits attorneys from suggesting a specific dollar amount for pain and suffering damages in civil cases — but only for the injured party's lawyer. Defense attorneys face no such restriction. This one-sided rule hurts workers who sue over workplace injuries, discrimination, or harassment by making it harder for juries to put a fair dollar figure on their suffering, while employers can freely argue damages should be minimal.

SB 462 shields corporations from public nuisance lawsuits by prohibiting claims based on the design, manufacturing, or marketing of legal products — the same legal theory communities used to hold opioid manufacturers accountable. The bill also bars private class actions for public nuisances, hands sole authority over multi-county cases to the Attorney General, and retroactively applies to cases already pending in court. For workers and their families harmed by corporate pollution, chemical exposure like PFAS, or future public health crises, this bill shuts the courthouse door.

This bill repeals the state law that blocked Kansas cities and counties from setting wage and benefit standards on publicly funded construction projects. Since Kansas eliminated its state prevailing wage law in 1987, local governments have been the only possible safeguard against a race to the bottom on public construction wages — and this bill restores that authority. It also raises the threshold for competitive public bidding on county construction contracts from $25,000 to $100,000.

This bill doubles the maximum time juveniles can be held in detention (from 45 to 90 days), increases penalties for young offenders, and requires the state to contract with private residential facilities for juvenile beds. The mandatory private contracting provision routes state dollars to private operators with no requirements for fair wages, adequate staffing levels, or worker protections — undermining public-sector corrections workers who provide these services today. It sets a troubling precedent for privatizing juvenile justice functions without any labor standards attached to the contracts.

SB 463 rewrites Kansas negligent security law to make it far harder for workers to hold employers accountable when they fail to protect against foreseeable workplace violence. Under current law, employers have a duty to address safety risks a reasonable person would anticipate; this bill replaces that standard with a near-impossible requirement that the employer had actual documented knowledge of a substantially similar incident at the same location within the past year — rewarding employers who simply don't keep records. The bill also lets employers escape liability by hiring any security contractor regardless of quality, and forces juries to spread blame to police departments and other parties to dilute what injured workers can recover.

SB 391 prohibits Kansas cities and counties from passing local laws that protect tenants who use housing vouchers or other rental assistance. It also bars local governments from restricting landlords' use of criminal history, credit scores, and eviction records when screening tenants — blocking fair chance housing policies that help working people with records stay housed after getting back to work. This bill uses the same state preemption playbook that has already been used to strip local minimum wage authority from Kansas communities.

This bill requires all restrooms and locker rooms in public buildings to be designated by biological sex at birth, with criminal penalties for violations — including for workers simply using the restroom at their own workplace. It also forces the state to invalidate and reissue driver's licenses and birth certificates, creating potential gaps in the identity documents workers need for employment verification. The bill redefines "gender" across all Kansas law in ways that could weaken employment discrimination protections for years to come.

This bill requires Kansas agencies to hand over SNAP and Medicaid recipient data to federal agencies "without conditions or limitations" within 30 days of any request — stripping the state's ability to negotiate privacy protections or data security safeguards. Hundreds of thousands of working Kansans in low-wage jobs rely on these programs, including workers in meatpacking, food service, healthcare, and construction. Removing all state-level privacy protections creates a chilling effect that discourages eligible working families from accessing the benefits they've earned.

SB 387 requires school districts to annually verify household income for every at-risk student — an unfunded mandate the Kansas Department of Education warned violates federal regulations and risks $250 million in annual federal school nutrition funding. The bill also blocks schools from participating in the federal Community Eligibility Provision for free meals without first obtaining legislative permission, inserting a political veto into a federal anti-poverty program. Working families with irregular hours or modest wages face the highest documentation barriers, and children who lose at-risk status don't become less poor — their schools just lose the supplemental funding that supports paraprofessional positions, counselors, and support staff. Thirty-nine organizations testified against the bill and only three in favor; even eight Republican senators voted no, citing the burden on resource-stressed rural districts. The Senate passed the bill 22-18 on Emergency Final Action.

This bill requires restrooms and locker rooms in all public buildings to be segregated by biological sex at birth, with criminal penalties for repeated violations — meaning transgender public employees like teachers, state workers, and city employees face misdemeanor charges for using the restroom at work. It also invalidates driver's licenses and birth certificates that don't match sex assigned at birth, disrupting identity documents workers need for employment verification. The bill redefines "gender" across all Kansas statutes in ways that could weaken employment discrimination protections for years to come.

SB 254 bars undocumented immigrants from receiving state and local public benefits, voids Kansas's existing in-state tuition law, and creates a legal presumption that noncitizens charged with any crime are a flight risk — making pretrial detention more likely. For workers in meatpacking, construction, and other industries, the flight-risk provision discourages reporting unsafe working conditions, filing workers' comp claims, and speaking up about wage theft — putting all workers on those job sites at greater risk. The bill also imposes new federal verification duties on state and county employees who administer public benefits, adding workload with no additional resources.

HB 2062 removes longstanding legal protections that shielded workers' 401(k)s, IRAs, and other retirement accounts from being seized to pay child support arrearages. The bill allows courts to order the total liquidation of a worker's retirement savings — with the worker absorbing early withdrawal penalties and taxes — when a judge determines the worker is "voluntarily underemployed," a term the bill never defines. That vague trigger could potentially reach workers who go on strike, take FMLA leave, or accept a union-negotiated buyout, putting hard-won retirement security at risk.

This bill requires legislative approval before any state agency can seek federal waivers to expand public assistance programs like Medicaid or make changes to services for people with intellectual and developmental disabilities. It creates a new bureaucratic barrier that can block federal funding for healthcare coverage and delay rate increases for the roughly 10,000 direct support professionals who care for Kansans with disabilities — workers already among the lowest-paid in the state. By adding a legislative veto over routine program improvements, this law makes it harder to expand healthcare access for uninsured working families and harder to raise wages for direct care workers.

SB 14 establishes a continuous state budget, meaning if the legislature doesn't pass a new budget, last year's spending levels automatically roll forward — eliminating the governor's ability to use a budget impasse to push for state worker pay raises, KPERS pension contributions, and funding for worker-serving programs. The bill also gives the Secretary of Administration power to automatically cut state funding for Medicaid, workforce development, and social services whenever federal dollars are reduced, bypassing the legislative process where working families have a voice. Labor opposes this bill because it locks in the status quo of underfunded state services and removes a critical tool for negotiating better outcomes for Kansas workers.

This bill creates a new program in the Attorney General's office that allows businesses to apply to have state regulations waived or suspended for up to three years. Workplace safety rules, wage protections, and other labor regulations are not excluded from the program, and there is no seat for workers or unions on the advisory committee that reviews applications. If an understaffed agency like the Kansas Department of Labor fails to respond to an application within 30 days, the rules are automatically treated as waived — a built-in trap that puts working people at risk.

SB 269 creates an automatic trigger that ratchets down Kansas income tax rates whenever state revenues exceed a baseline, putting the state on a path toward a flat tax. While framed as fiscally responsible, once rates drop they never go back up — meaning less money available over time for public schools, state agencies, KPERS retirement contributions, and the services working families depend on. Kansas lived through this story before during the Brownback-era tax experiment, which led to budget crises, funding cuts, and public-sector wage freezes.

This bill gives the Inspector General sweeping new powers — including subpoenas, search warrants, and criminal jurisdiction — to investigate families who receive food assistance (SNAP), cash assistance (TANF), and Medicaid. Many working families rely on these programs to make ends meet when wages fall short, and this law creates a hostile, punitive environment around accessing benefits they've earned. It also allows the IG to compel healthcare and social service workers to turn over records and testify in fraud investigations of their own employers. The Governor vetoed this bill, and this vote was to override that veto.

This bill directs the state to seek a federal waiver to ban the purchase of candy and soft drinks with SNAP food assistance benefits. Many working families rely on food assistance to make ends meet, and this measure would limit their choices while adding enforcement burdens on grocery store workers. Labor opposes this bill because it undermines the dignity and autonomy of working families without addressing the root causes of food insecurity.

This bill removes the authority of local health officers to prohibit public gatherings during infectious disease outbreaks, replacing it with the power to merely "recommend against" them. Without enforceable closure orders, essential workers — nurses, teachers, corrections officers, and food processing employees — lose a critical legal backstop that protected them when employers ignored public health guidance during disease emergencies. The bill also adds new barriers to state-level disease response and gives legislative leaders the power to override health orders, politicizing future outbreak decisions.

SB 5 prohibits state and local election officials from accepting federal funds for elections, voter registration, or voter assistance unless the legislature specifically approves each expenditure — and makes violations a felony. Cutting off federal election funding could force counties to run elections with fewer resources, leading to longer lines, fewer polling places, and reduced voter outreach that disproportionately affects working people. When it's harder to vote, working families lose their voice in the political process.

This vote forced a single up-or-down decision on overriding all of the Governor's line-item vetoes on the state budget at once — denying senators the chance to deliberate on each provision individually. The overridden vetoes included eliminating 12-month continuous Medicaid eligibility for low-wage workers, mandating an AI-driven budget audit program with no collective bargaining protections for affected state employees, requiring elimination of all DEI positions across state government, and imposing across-the-board agency budget cuts that directly pressure state employee wages and staffing.

This bill prohibits the Kansas Department for Children and Families from enforcing placement or licensing policies that conflict with a person's religious or moral beliefs about sexual orientation or gender identity. It creates a new right to sue DCF — including for actions taken by contractors — exposing the agency and its workforce to increased legal liability. This undermines the professional judgment of child welfare workers and creates legal risk for public employees carrying out their duties.

Nine senators voted to force SB 216 — the Kansas Paid Sick Time Act — out of committee and onto the floor for debate. The bill would guarantee every private-sector worker in Kansas earns paid sick leave, a core labor standard that Kansas currently lacks entirely. Thirty senators voted to keep it buried in committee, refusing to allow even a floor vote on a policy that directly affects the health and economic security of working families.

SB 269 creates an automatic trigger that ratchets down Kansas income tax rates whenever revenue exceeds a certain threshold — with no mechanism to restore rates if budgets fall short. While framed as fiscally responsible, every automatic tax cut means less money available for public schools, state agencies, KPERS retirement contributions, and the services working families depend on. Kansas lived through this story before during the Brownback era, when structural revenue losses led to public sector wage freezes, layoffs, and underfunded schools.

This bill prohibits Kansas courts and administrative hearing officers from deferring to state agency expertise when interpreting laws and regulations. That means when the Department of Labor, Workers' Compensation Board, or Public Employee Relations Board rules in a worker's favor, employers can now relitigate those decisions from scratch in court — with no weight given to the agency's interpretation. The result is a playing field tilted toward employers who can afford lengthy court battles to overturn worker-protective rulings on wages, unemployment benefits, workplace safety, and public sector bargaining rights.

Nine senators voted to force SCR 1609 — a proposed constitutional amendment to repeal Kansas\'s right-to-work provision — out of committee and onto the floor. Kansas is one of the few states where right-to-work is enshrined in the constitution itself, requiring a two-thirds supermajority plus a statewide vote to change. Thirty senators voted to prevent the people of Kansas from even having the chance to vote on this question.

Nine senators voted to force SB 218 — a minimum wage increase — out of committee for a floor vote. Kansas has been stuck at the federal minimum of $7.25 per hour since 2009, one of the lowest in the nation. Thirty senators voted to keep the bill buried in committee, blocking any debate on raising wages for the lowest-paid workers in the state.

This massive rewrite of Kansas unemployment insurance law touched dozens of provisions governing who qualifies for benefits, how long they last, and what counts as "suitable work." While early versions contained real wins for workers — including protections against midnight budget cuts to UI and guarantees that union-negotiated supplemental unemployment pay wouldn't reduce state benefits — the final version that came out of conference committee gutted critical worker protections and added harmful restrictions on eligibility and benefits. Labor opposes the bill as passed because the final product failed to protect the provisions that mattered most to working families who depend on unemployment insurance during layoffs.

This bill makes the previous year's state budget automatically continue if the legislature doesn't pass a new one, eliminating the governor's ability to use budget deadlines to push for state employee pay raises and full KPERS pension contributions. It also gives an unelected appointee — the Secretary of Administration — the power to automatically cut state funding for Medicaid, workforce programs, and social services whenever federal dollars are reduced, bypassing the legislature where working families have a voice. Labor opposes this bill because it shifts budget power away from the tools that have historically protected state workers and the programs Kansas families depend on.

This constitutional amendment would abolish Kansas's merit-based system for selecting Supreme Court justices and replace it with partisan elections, while also allowing justices to raise campaign money and participate in party politics. The Kansas Supreme Court is the final word on workers' comp appeals, public employee bargaining rights, and wage enforcement — and partisan elections would open the door for corporate donors to spend unlimited money electing judges friendly to their interests. Labor opposes this measure because the court that decides whether injured workers get compensated and whether public employees can bargain should not be beholden to the biggest campaign contributors.

SB 222 prohibits courts and administrative hearing officers from relying on state agency expertise when interpreting the law — even inside workers' comp hearings, unemployment appeals, and wage claim proceedings where most working people's cases are actually decided. This means employers with deep pockets can re-litigate settled questions from scratch at every level, dragging out cases and discouraging workers from pursuing their claims. Kansas would go further than any other state or even the federal standard by reaching inside the administrative process itself, weakening enforcement of every labor protection on the books.

SB 161 requires a full act of the legislature before any state agency can adjust Medicaid reimbursement rates for disability services or expand public assistance programs. For Kansas's roughly 30,000 direct support professionals — care workers already earning poverty-level wages of $13-15/hour — this hands a historically hostile legislature veto power over the only realistic path to pay increases. Labor opposes this bill because it freezes the administrative flexibility that agencies need to raise care worker wages and capture available federal matching dollars.

SB 76 dictates the exact words every school employee — including custodians, bus drivers, and cafeteria workers — must use when addressing students, and creates a new parent-triggered complaint process to discipline workers who don't comply. This complaint pipeline bypasses union grievance procedures and collectively bargained due process protections, letting school boards investigate and punish employees with no right to representation, no evidentiary standard, and no appeal. Labor opposes this bill because the government should not be mandating workplace speech for public employees or creating discipline systems that go around the contracts workers fought to win.

The Legislature overrode the Governor's veto of SB 63, which bans gender transition care for minors. Buried in the bill are provisions that directly harm healthcare workers: automatic license revocation with no professional board discretion, a ban on malpractice insurance covering affected providers, and vague restrictions on what state employees can say on the job. These provisions strip due process from licensed workers and leave nurses, doctors, and state employees in SEIU, AFSCME, and KSNA bargaining units personally exposed to career-ending liability. A NAY vote sustained the Governor's veto and protected workers' rights.

SB 14 would put the state budget on autopilot, automatically continuing last year's spending levels if the Legislature doesn't act. This eliminates the annual pressure on lawmakers to negotiate and fund public services, making it easier to freeze wages, staffing, and programs that working families depend on. By removing the urgency to pass a budget, it weakens the leverage public employee unions have during the appropriations process and hands sweeping reallocation power to unelected administrators.

This resolution urges Governor Kelly to fully cooperate with the Trump administration's federal immigration enforcement policies. When immigrant workers fear deportation, unscrupulous employers gain leverage to pay below-market wages, ignore safety rules, and retaliate against anyone who speaks up — dragging down standards for all workers. Labor opposes this resolution because a climate of fear in the workplace hurts every working person, not just immigrants.

SB 63 automatically revokes the license of any healthcare worker found in violation — with no review by their professional board and no second chance. It also bars malpractice insurance from covering these workers and restricts what state employees can say on the job using vague, undefined terms. These provisions set a dangerous precedent: the legislature can override professional licensing boards to end a worker's career with zero due process, a template that could be applied to any licensed profession in the future.

SB 521 gives employers a 75% tax credit for paying child care expenses for their workers, setting up on-site child care programs, or pooling resources with other employers to expand community child care availability. Affordable child care is one of the biggest barriers working families face, and this credit changes the economics at the bargaining table by making it significantly cheaper for employers to offer child care as a workplace benefit. Labor supports this bill because employer-provided child care is a real compensation issue for union members with families, and the collaborative investment provision opens new doors for smaller employers to participate.

This amendment to the five-year state budget penalizes school districts financially when staff "encourage, facilitate, or enable" student walkouts — language broad enough to punish a teacher for simply not blocking a door. Public school employees face an impossible choice between exercising professional judgment and exposing their district to funding cuts that hit salaries, staffing levels, and working conditions. The amendment attacks the principle of collective action itself: penalizing institutions for failing to suppress organized protest sets a precedent that could extend to worker actions.

HB 2160 creates the Kansas Municipal Employee Whistleblower Act, making it illegal for supervisors to fire, demote, suspend, or retaliate against city, county, and school district employees who report unlawful or dangerous conduct. Workers can report problems to any agency, organization, or person — including the press or their union — without first going through their boss. This law covers tens of thousands of public-sector workers represented by AFL-CIO unions and gives them the right to sue for damages and attorney fees if they face retaliation for speaking up.

HB 2160 creates the Kansas Municipal Employee Whistleblower Act, making it illegal for supervisors to fire, demote, suspend, or retaliate against city, county, and school district employees who report unlawful or dangerous conduct. Workers can report problems to any outside agency, the press, or their union without going through their boss first — and can sue for damages and attorney fees if they face retaliation. This law directly protects AFSCME, IAFF, IBEW, KNEA, and Teamsters members working in public service across Kansas.

SB 8 requires drivers to slow down and move over when passing any stopped vehicle displaying hazard lights, flares, or safety cones — not just emergency vehicles. This is a workplace safety issue for tow truck operators, utility workers, truckers, and anyone whose job puts them on the side of the road. Labor supports this commonsense protection that helps keep working Kansans safe on the job.