Governor Laura Kelly appointed Commerce Secretary David Toland to fill the position of Lt. Governor after appointing her previous Lt. Governor, Lynn Rogers, State Treasurer. Kansans should be troubled that the Governor, who supports unlimited abortion, appointed allies of the abortion industry to high positions, especially without public vetting.
“First it was Lynn Rogers as State Treasurer, now it is David Toland as Lt. Governor. Laura Kelly handpicks two allies of the abortion industry,” said Jeanne Gawdun, KFL Director of Government Relations. “It is high time that anyone appointed to statewide office should be subject to Senate confirmation.”
Under current law, when statewide positions are vacated, the Governor has the authority to make appointments to those positions. Legislation could be passed to ensure vacant statewide positions are filled with candidates who have withstood vetting by the Kansas Senate.
Kansans deserve to know that Lynn Rogers has a voting record that includes opposition to giving women information about abortionists—including whether they have ever been sanctioned by the Kansas Board of Healing Arts (SB 98, 2017).
While previously heading a local economic development fund, David Toland accepted $20,000 in grants from the “Dr. George Tiller Fund.” Additionally, he posted the Tiller Fund as a partner and gave the “Tiller Funds” logo the same billing as legitimate corporate sponsors, national associations and the Kansas Department of Health and Environment, among others.
This attempt to legitimize and honor the legacy of the state’s, and perhaps the nation’s, most infamous late-term abortionist shows a total disregard for pro-life Kansas citizens—the thousands of late-term, preborn babies whose lives were brutally ended, and countless women harmed at Tiller’s Wichita abortion clinic. Kansans deserve better.