A credit card belonging to the Kansas Republican Assembly was provided to promote a recount of the vote on the abortion amendment that is expected to cost more than $229,000, said Mark Gitgen, the group’s chairman and a staunch anti-abortion activist. The amendment, called Value Them Both, would have stripped abortion rights from the Kansas Constitution. Instead, the measure suffered a landslide defeat of 59% to 41%, with 165,000 more voters rejecting the proposal than supporting it. Melissa Leavitt, of Colby, requested a recount before Friday’s 5 p.m. deadline. Kansas requires a bond for the cost of the recount before it can begin, and a crowd-funding page had raised less than $5,000 as of Saturday afternoon. But Gitzen, who is also director of the Kansas Coalition for Life, said in an interview Saturday that a credit card for the Kansas Republican Convention was provided to the Kansas Secretary of State’s Office. The money has not yet been withdrawn from the card, Gietzen said. The Kansas Republican Convention, a far-right group, did not have enough money in its account Friday to cover the cost of a statewide recount, he said. But — between his personal funds and Leavitt’s online fundraising campaign — Gietzen said he’s good for the money. “If they were to run that (card), I don’t have $200,000 in the KRA account,” Gietzen said. “We’ll cover it by Monday. I can personally max out a bunch of credit cards and do whatever it takes.” Although Leavitt called for a statewide recount, Gietzen left open the possibility that the recount could be limited depending on how much money is ultimately available. “We’re definitely going to do a recount,” Gitchen said. “I can’t give you a definitive word on whether it’s going to be the entire state.” Whitney Tempel, spokeswoman for the Kansas Secretary of State’s Office, told The Star on Friday that Leavitt had posted a $200,000 bond. Leavitt, who declined to speak to reporters on Friday, wrote on TikTok on Saturday that “the bond has not been paid yet.” Tempel did not respond Saturday to a request for comment. “The next 48 hours is going to be a lot about God moving in people’s lives,” Leavitt said in a video posted to TikTok on Saturday. “And if it’s going to happen, it’s going to happen. And if he doesn’t, he doesn’t.” People who request a recount get their money back if the election result changes. But if the recount doesn’t change the results, the state disburses the money to local jurisdictions to offset the costs. Gietzen, who said he developed a friendship with Leavitt after she testified at Kansas State earlier this year, argues that the results will change enough that he won’t have to pay the bond. Gietzen has a long history of anti-abortion activism in Kansas. He helped orchestrate the recruitment of candidates in Sedgwick County during the “Summer of Mercy,” the 1991 protests in Wichita that helped make abortion a prominent political issue in Kansas. Abortion opponents were then able to take over the Sedgwick County Republican Party the following year. Shortly after the vote on the amendment, Gietzen, without offering evidence, raised the possibility of election fraud. In a message last Saturday to supporters of the Kansas Republican Convention, he called the results “outlandish” and claimed, falsely, that the election was not valid “without looking at what happened.” Before the Aug. 2 election, Gietzen, who is based in Wichita, filed a lawsuit in Sedgwick County in an attempt to stop the use of ballots. He had cited fears that drop boxes would be targeted for voter fraud in elections. Sedgwick County Circuit Court Judge Deborah Hernandez Mitchell dismissed the lawsuit, saying Gietzen has no standing. Gitgen is appealing and said he hopes the recount will show discrepancies he can use in his appeal. Any recount — whether statewide or in a subset of counties — is guaranteed to confirm the amendment’s defeat. Any small differences in vote totals that may be found from the recounts fall well short of the 165,000-vote margin of victory. Gietzen argues that a recount could help build confidence in future elections and believes it has a “fifty-fifty” chance of changing the outcome of the election. “If there was no chance of changing it, you know, then it would be really questionable whether it’s a good use of time and money,” Gietzen said. The Star’s Judy Thomas and The Associated Press contributed reporting Related stories from the Kansas City Star Jonathan Shorman is the lead political reporter for the Kansas City Star, covering Kansas and Missouri politics and government. He previously covered the Kansas Statehouse for The Star and the Wichita Eagle. He holds a bachelor’s degree in journalism from the University of Kansas.
Chance Swaim covers investigations for The Wichita Eagle. His work has been recognized with national and local awards, including a George Polk Award for Political Reporting, a Betty Gage Holland Award for Investigative Reporting, and a Victor Murdock Award for Journalistic Excellence. Most recently, he was a finalist for the Goldsmith Prize for Investigative Reporting. He can be reached at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter @byChanceSwaim.