Key Votes

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.

This biennial state budget set spending levels for all state agencies but included zero pay raises for the roughly 40,000 Kansas state employees, despite a market salary study showing workers falling further behind. The budget also directed conference committee negotiations on a pay plan but failed to guarantee any outcome, while containing provisions that weakened job security for university workers. A NAY vote supported sending the budget back for meaningful investment in the state workforce.

This amendment to the state budget would have directed $40.6 million to special education, drawing first from unspent federal ARPA funds already allocated to Kansas. State law requires 92% reimbursement of special education costs, but Kansas has funded only 70-75% for years — a shortfall that forces school districts to increase caseloads, cut support staff positions, and suppress wages for the thousands of teachers, paraprofessionals, and therapists who deliver these services. The amendment represented less than four-tenths of one percent of the state general fund budget.

This bill requires the Department of Insurance to produce cost reports on health coverage bills — but the reports only count premium increases, not the savings workers get from better coverage. Even worse, the underlying data submitted by insurance companies is kept secret from the public, making the reports impossible to verify or challenge. The result is a tool that can be used session after session to kill coverage mandates that protect working families' health benefits.

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.

This bill gives the Attorney General's 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 union members in lower-wage jobs rely on these programs to make ends meet, and healthcare and social service workers at Medicaid-participating facilities could be compelled to turn over records or testify against their own employers. Labor opposes this bill because it builds a coercive enforcement apparatus targeting working families who depend on the safety net, while doing little to hold large contractors accountable.

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 requires legislative approval before any state agency can seek federal waivers to expand Medicaid eligibility or make changes to services for people with intellectual and developmental disabilities. It creates a major barrier to federal funding that could raise wages for Kansas's roughly 10,000 direct support professionals — chronically underpaid workers who provide daily care to some of our most vulnerable neighbors. By adding political hurdles to routine federal waiver requests, this law makes it harder for the state to bring home federal dollars that support healthcare jobs and working families' access to care.

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.

This bill removes the authority of local health officers to prohibit public gatherings during infectious disease outbreaks, downgrading that power to a non-binding recommendation. For nurses, meat-processing workers, corrections officers, and other frontline employees, this eliminates a critical legal backstop — when a health officer could only "recommend" against gatherings, workers who stay home to protect themselves have no legal protection from being fired. The veto override vote stripped away public health enforcement tools that essential workers depend on during emergencies.

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.

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.

This bill transfers the state employee health benefits program to the Insurance Department — a reasonable reorganization on its face. But buried in the fine print, it deletes injured workers' right to have their attorney notified when workers' comp payments are made electronically, repeals ten statutes governing employer contributions for state employees' children's health coverage, and hands permanent control of the state employee health care commission to the elected Commissioner of Insurance rather than a governor's appointee accountable to state workers. These hidden rollbacks were never debated as standalone bills and directly harm the roughly 40,000 state employees and their families who depend on these programs.

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.

This bill bans gender transition care for minors, but buried in its enforcement provisions are direct attacks on workers: it strips healthcare workers of malpractice insurance coverage, mandates automatic license revocation with no professional board discretion, and restricts what state employees can say on the job. The legislature voted to override the Governor's veto, exposing nurses, doctors, and state workers in SEIU and AFSCME bargaining units to career-ending liability with no due process protections. A NAY vote sustained the Governor's veto and protected workers.

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 63 bans gender transition care for minors, but buried in the bill are provisions that directly hit healthcare workers: automatic license revocation with no professional board discretion, a ban on malpractice insurance covering affected providers, and strict personal liability lasting a decade. It also restricts what state employees — including social workers and hospital staff — can say on the job using vague, undefined terms. Labor opposes this bill because it strips workers of due process protections, eliminates insurance coverage, and exposes union members in hospitals, clinics, and state agencies to career-ending punishment without the safeguards that professional licensing boards are supposed to provide.

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.