Kansans elect Democrat Chris Mann attorney general
Archived — this story has rotated out of today’s deck. It is kept here in full.
The gist
Democrat Chris Mann declared victory over Republican incumbent Kris Kobach in the Kansas attorney general race.
The result flips Kansas' top legal office and avenges Mann's narrow 2022 loss.
Background
Chris Mann is a former police officer and prosecutor who worked with the Wyandotte County District Attorney's Office and the Kansas Securities Commission before opening Mann Law Firm, P.A. in 2015. Kris Kobach, a Topeka native and Harvard graduate with a Ph.D from Oxford and a law degree from Yale, has been Kansas attorney general since January 2023 and was twice elected Kansas secretary of state. The race was a rematch: Kobach narrowly beat Mann in 2022 by about 17,000 votes. Kobach is well known and polarizing, which drew attention to the race; Mann outpaced him in fundraising, while much of Kobach's campaign centered on Kansas' record-low crime rates under his leadership.
How it unfolded
- 2022Kobach narrowly defeated Mann in the 2022 attorney general race, 50.8% to 49.2% — a separation of nearly 16,000 votes and the closest result of any statewide race that year.
- Jul 30, 2025Mann's campaign announced he would run for attorney general a second time, aiming to refocus the office on law enforcement.
- Aug 2026Both Kobach and Mann ran unopposed in the primaries; Kobach received 276,314 votes and Mann just under 200,000.
- Oct 6, 2026Mann and Kobach debated legal issues ahead of the Nov. 3 rematch.
- Nov 3, 2026The election was held; as of 1:45 a.m. the Associated Press had Mann leading with 548,047 votes (50.5%) to Kobach's 536,759 (49.5%).
- Nov 4, 2026Mann declared victory as the next Kansas attorney general; Kobach did not concede.
- Nov 7, 2026Kansas' top attorney will be Chris Mann, after voters decided in Tuesday's midterm election to elect the Democrat.
Key terms
- attorney general
- The chief legal advisor and law enforcement officer of a U.S. state government.
- primaries
- An election in which voters of a political party choose that party's candidate for an upcoming general election.
- midterm election
- US general elections held near the midpoint of a president's four-year term, when all House seats and about a third of Senate seats are contested.
Source: Wikipedia
Who’s saying what
- Support
- Mann said he is "proud to have earned the trust of so many Kansans" and will show up every day to keep communities safe and hold bad actors accountable.
- Caution
- Kobach did not concede, and the Associated Press had not called the race, with outstanding ballots potentially deciding the victor.
Still unverified
As of Nov. 4, the Associated Press had not called the race, and Kobach did not concede, with outstanding ballots — which often lean more Democratic — potentially deciding the victor. Mann was also reportedly struck by a drunk driver during a routine traffic stop in 2002.