About three in five Kansas adults support legalizing adult-use marijuana—and an even greater majority backs legalizing cannabis for medical use—according to a new poll.
Fort Hays State University Docking Institute of Public Affairs conducted the “Kansas Speaks Survey”, an annual survey that asks residents to express their opinions on a variety of issues.
The poll, as in previous years, showed that there is strong support to end prohibition. 59 percent of the respondents supported recreational marijuana legalization, and 70 percent were in favour of medical cannabis.
Democrat and independents showed the greatest support for the legalization of adult use at 64 per cent. Republicans were 49 percent in favour of reform.
The policy shift was supported by a bipartisan majority, including 78 percent independents, 75% of Democrats, and 59% of Republicans.
According to another question, 65 percent Kansans support the legalization of adult-use marijuana in order for it to be a source of new revenue to the state.
Meanwhile, 65 per cent said they are either “highly probable” or at least “somewhat certain” that they will vote for a candidate who is in favor of medical marijuana.
From September 26 to October 10, 488 Kansas adult residents were interviewed.
Kansans, in surveys conducted over time, have repeatedly expressed their dissatisfaction at the cannabis prohibition. But reforms in the conservative-led legislature are stymied. This is despite Governor Brownback’s repeated calls for legalizing medical marijuana and his willingness to create an adult-use cannabis market.
Gov. Laura Kelly (D), who renewed her call to action in April, said that lawmakers should finally legalize the medical use of marijuana.
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Notably, lawmakers earlier this year considered but ultimately rejected an amendment that would have added cannabis to a right-to-try bill that took effect without the governor’s signature. Senator Cindy Holscher, a Democrat, said that her goal was not to establish a medical marijuana public system.
The House of Representatives passed a medical cannabis bill in 2021, for example, but it stalled out in the Senate. And after numerous hearings on the issue, the Senate Federal and State Affairs Committee voted last March to table a limited medical marijuana pilot program bill.
A later effort to revive the medical cannabis bill on the Senate floor ultimately fell short.
That measure was filed about a month after the House rejected a Democratic lawmaker’s amendment to a broader drug scheduling bill that would have removed marijuana entirely from the state’s controlled substances law, effectively legalizing it.
After the Senate committee shelved the limited medical marijuana bill, Kelly issued a statement urging the public to contact their representatives to demand that they take the legislation back up for action, but that did not happen before the end of the legislative session.
Senate President Ty Masterson (R) said in 2023 that was open to a discussion about a limited medical marijuana program. But in January, he appeared less welcoming to the idea, calling medical legalization a “nonstarter,” suggesting the policy change would lead to a surge in “gang activity” and put kids at risk.
The voter’s ignorance of medical marijuana was also implied by him. When people hear the word medical they often think of palliative medicine and similar things.
Masterson, who helped kill the House-passed medical marijuana bill in 2021, has also downplayed popular support for broader adult-use cannabis legalization and suggested voters don’t fully understand the policy change.
In the meantime, last year, an entire state legislature voted to reject a recommendation for lawmakers to legalize medicinal cannabis by 2025.
The legislature’s Special Committee on Medical Marijuana, charged with consideration of possible pathways for medical cannabis reform, said legalizing medical marijuana was premature and that lawmakers should first wait to see how federal rescheduling and other reform efforts unfold.
Philip Steffan is the photographer.
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