Kansas senator's slip of tongue spurs new residency questions
Source: The Hill
Sen. Pat Roberts (R-Kan.) is again facing residency questions from his primary opponent after he misspoke in an interview, saying he returns home to Kansas “every time I get an opponent.”
In an interview with KCMO radio, Roberts was asked about reports that he no longer lives in his home in Kansas and instead rents a room from donors when he returns to the state. That and further reports outlining his relatively infrequent visits home have dogged him in his primary contest with radiologist Milton Wolf and provided fodder for Wolf to hammer him as out-of-touch with his state.
Roberts said his performance shouldn’t be measured on where he lives.
“I don’t measure my competency or my record or the results – and I do get results – on where I put my head on a pillow,” he said.
Read more: http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/211334-roberts-facing-new-residency-questions
NBC also transcribed the senator's interview with KCMO's Greg Knapp, in part:
Roberts: Well I own a home in Dodge City, I have a residence there in Dodge City, I pay taxes there and I vote there
Knapp: Right but you don’t, you’re not answering the question. Why don’t you LIVE here though?
Roberts: Well, when you live here, it isn’t where you are. I don’t measure my competency or my record or the results – and I do get results – on where I put my head on a pillow. There reason that -- I’ve always been in Dodge City. I’ve rented, I’ve owned and I’ve rented and I’ve owned, we bought a unit there some time ago, probably 30 years ago. It’s open sometimes and then sometimes there is a renter. There’s a captain in the army who wanted a place and said nothing was available, so we rented it. At any rate, That’s the case, so we simply went with our friends …
Knapp: No, I understand that, I’m just saying that the average person says if you’re a representative of the state, you would live in the state more than you would live in DC if the last 11 years the Senate’s been in session an average of 162 days, that means 203 days you’re not, and you would think the person would spend more time in their state than in the district. And that’s just you know something that the average person is asking, that’s all.
Roberts: Well I think that everybody should understand that if you’re in Dodge City and you stay in Dodge City, it’s a very difficult task to get around all over the state. You know, you could move to Topeka, you could move to Kansas City, you could move to where Milton is which is two blocks from Missouri. You know, we had declared Dodge our residency, our kids went to school there. Every time I get an opponent – I mean, every time I get a chance, I’m home. I don’t measure my, what, my record with regards as a senator as how many times I sleep wherever it is.
And in more Wingnut-on-Wingnut crime, right wing media has hyped this later-deleted tweet by the Roberts campaign accusing Milton Wolf of being racist:
If you thought the Thad Cochran/Chris McDaniel contest in Mississippi was a mess, these two are about to upstage the Mississippi candidates!
By the way, the leading Democratic candidate for Roberts' Senate seat is Chad Taylor, the current D.A. of Shawnee County. Kansas has closed primaries, so I hope the right wingers in Kansas vote for Wolf.
= new reply since forum marked as read
Here is the house he rents in Dodge City, so he can vote in Kansas--
Here is the house he owns in Virginia--
“He calls it home,” said Jerald Miller, a retiree. “But I’ve been here since ’77, and I’ve only seen him twice.”
The 77-year-old senator went to Congress in 1981 and became a fixture: a member of the elite Alfalfa Club and the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, which made him a regular on the Sunday talk shows. His wife became a real estate broker in Alexandria, Va., the suburb where the couple live, boasting of her “extensive knowledge” of the area.
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/08/us/senator-races-to-show-ties-including-an-address-in-kansas.html
I don't understand it, but then, I'm not a "native Kansan" --
