By Tim Carpenter, Kansas Reflector
TOPEKA — Kansas attorney general candidates Chris Mann and Kris Kobach took advantage of a televised debate to blast each other with prickly questions on holding influential people accountable for criminal conduct and the human cost of lax enforcement of immigration law.
Kobach, the state’s Republican attorney general and a former constitutional law professor, asked Mann during KTWU’s debate Wednesday night to explain criticism of immigration raids in the context of two women killed by men without authority to be in the United States.
Mann, a Democrat and former Lawrence police officer with a law practice focused on victims of drunk driving, queried Kobach about the plea bargain his staff offered disgraced Neosho County Attorney Linus Thuston.
Mann said the attorney general’s office developed a plan to help Thuston avoid jail time if the county prosecutor pleaded guilty to two misdemeanors for misuse of a county credit card and falsification of a document to avoid taxes on a vehicle purchase. Kobach’s staff abandoned the idea of charging Thuston for allegedly extorting about 50 women with demands for nude photos, Mann said.
“The judge on that case had to overrule the deal to give some jail time,” Mann said. “You say you’re tough on crime. Why would you let the powerful go free?”
Kobach, who is seeking election to a second term as attorney general, said he didn’t personally handle the plea bargain. In the 2024 case, Kobach’s staff recommended Thuston avoid jail by paying a $10,000 fine.
“In some instances when you’re brought in to prosecute a case, the evidence that you think is there to put someone behind bars or to impose a very significant penalty isn’t there,” Kobach said. “I didn’t negotiate that deal. My criminal prosecution team did, but they felt that that was the absolute most they could get given the limited facts that they have.”
“We go for the most severe penalty we can in every single case, and I don’t think anyone watching seriously believes that we’d be cutting deals to anyone breaking the law,” Kobach added.
Retired District Judge Merlin Wheeler accepted Thuston’s guilty pleas, but ordered the county prosecutor to pay more than $3,000 and serve 120 days in jail — 60 days for each misdemeanor offense.
A special prosecutor subsequently charged Thuston with felony crimes related to his testimony in a drug case about working with off-the-books confidential informants, including late-night meetings with a woman who sent him nude photos. A jury in August found Thuston guilty of perjury.
“When I’m attorney general, we’ll make sure we go after offenders no matter how powerful they are,” Mann said.
When it was Kobach’s chance to turn the table, he accused Mann of saying Kansas should strive to keep the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement from conducting raids to arrest and deport people lacking documentation to live in the United States.
The attorney general personalized the issue by touching on the murder in 2005 of Maria Morfin-Rojas in Lenexa and the death in 2007 of Amanda Bixby near Basehor.
Rojas, 30, was stabbed to death by Angel Herrera, who fled the United States and wasn’t arrested until 2023 in El Salvador. Back in Kansas, he was sentenced to 50 years in prison. Bixby, 19, of Tonganoxie, died in a three-vehicle crash caused when Ricardo Flores ran a stop sign. He was initially charged with vehicular homicide, but the case was dismissed.
“They were illegal aliens who killed them. If those aliens had been deported, those people would be alive today and their families would not be grieving,” Kobach told Mann. “Yet, you said, ‘We need to do everything we can to stop ICE deportations in Kansas.’ I’m doing everything I can to help. How would you explain your position to those family members?”
Mann said the attorney general was falsely spreading a claim that he proposed cessation of immigration enforcement activities.
“I never said that to any audience,” Mann said.
Kobach, however, said he had a recording of Mann making the comment.
Mann said violent offenders, whether U.S. citizens or not, should be removed from the streets to make communities safer. He condemned Kobach’s advocacy for a proposed law requiring county sheriffs to sign 287(g) agreements with ICE. The agreements enable local law enforcement to be trained and deputized so they could take on federal immigration duties.
“Many of them don’t have the resources to take on an agreement like that or simply don’t want to,” Mann said. “My opponent has never walked a day in the life, in the shoes, of the men and women who are protecting our communities. I’m going to trust local law enforcement.”
Kobach said the Kansas Bureau of Investigation, which falls under jurisdiction of the attorney general, and 30 Kansas sheriffs had 287(g) deals with ICE to assist with detaining people for possible deportation.
“We’ve also deported a lot of illegal aliens from Kansas,” Kobach said, “and that would probably end if my opponent became attorney general.”
Debate moderator Bob Beatty, a professor at Washburn University, asked the candidates to explain what they would do to address crime in Kansas. He said violent crime in Kansas increased 7.5% despite an overall decline of 5% in the state’s crime rate during 2025.
“Property crimes have been steadily decreasing over the past 18 years,” Mann said. “Aggravated assaults are at a 10-year high and domestic-violence-related homicides are up 65%. While my opponent’s been hanging his ‘mission accomplished’ banner and taken a victory lap, I’ve been on the ground talking to sheriffs and talking to law enforcement leaders throughout the state. They’ve told me they need a better partner in the attorney general’s office.”
Kobach said his work as attorney general was partially responsible for reducing the state’s crime rate to the lowest level in 57 years.
“In the last year only, there was a slight bump upward in violent crime. But property crimes were dropping dramatically. In fact, burglary is now at its lowest point in more than 60 years,” Kobach said.
In advance of the Nov. 3 election, Mann was endorsed by the Kansas State Lodge of the Fraternal Order of Police. It was the first time since 2002 the union representing 4,300 law enforcement officers endorsed a Democratic candidate for attorney general. Kobach said 53 sheriffs endorsed his reelection.
Kobach said it was important to recognize the attorney general’s office led an effort to drive down fentanyl deaths. Fatalities in Kansas caused by people ingesting the powerful drug declined 17%, he said.
“The availability of fentanyl on the streets in Kansas is 120th of what it was when I started in office. Huge accomplishment,” the attorney general said.
Mann said Kansas documented more than 2,000 deaths related to fentanyl and earlier this year Wichita reported 29 fentanyl overdoses in a single weekend.
“The crisis is not over,” he said.
