Amendment on Kansas ballot this fall would provide pretext for voter suppression laws

Kansas Reflector · Amii Castle · September 9, 2026

Rep. Pat Proctor appears at an Aug. 27, 2026, candidate forum in Olathe. He supported a constitutional amendment that would make it more difficult for women to vote, columnist Amii Castle writes. (Photo by Anna Kaminski/Kansas Reflector) On Nov. 3, Kansans will vote on whether to amend our state constitution, again. This time, we’ll be voting on whether to make it harder for many American citizens who live in Kansas to vote in future elections.

The proposal would amend Section 1 of Article 5 of the Kansas Constitution to state that no person can vote unless they are a United States citizen. To most of us, that sounds reasonable — people who are not citizens should not be voting. However, the proposed amendment is a solution in search of a problem that is statistically nonexistent. Noncitizens are not voting in Kansas elections (or any other state elections, for that matter).

The Kansas Constitution already grants every citizen (and only citizens) the right to vote. So why propose this repetitive and unnecessary amendment? It would be used by certain lawmakers as a pretext to pass laws that supposedly bar noncitizens from voting.

The goal is to require proof of citizenship to register to vote. The proposed amendment will make it more difficult, costly and sometimes impossible for many Kansans to vote. Rep. Pat Proctor, R-Leavenworth, proposed the amendment with near-unanimous Republican support. Proctor is currently running for Kansas secretary of state, the office that oversees our elections.

Proctor has a documented legislative history of introducing bills making it harder for citizens to vote — prohibiting voter registration efforts and restricting advance and mail-in voting.

Requiring documentary proof of citizenship means that, to register to vote or to change your voter registration (you moved, got married or divorced), you’ll have to provide either your passport, your birth certificate or your naturalization papers (if you became a citizen but were not born here).

A Real ID in Kansas is not proof of your citizenship, so that won’t work to register.

About 62% of Kansans do not have passports — those documents take time to obtain and cost around $150. As such, Kansans without them will have to provide their birth certificate to register to vote. For some, that’s easy. For others who might not have ready access to their birth certificate or can’t afford to get one (getting a birth certificate copy costs money), a barrier to voting has been created.

It’s a poll tax and would disproportionately impact low-income, young and elderly voters. Another group disproportionately affected by proof-of-citizenship requirements? Women who changed their last name through marriage or divorce.

Proof of citizenship requires that a person’s name on their birth certificate be identical to the name on their ID. This is a huge problem for women voters who have changed their name, because in addition to providing her birth certificate to register, they also will have to provide “proving documents” — papers that prove her name change(s).

Women will have to obtain their marriage licenses or divorce decrees tracking name changes over the years to prove the women presenting their IDs are the same women presenting their birth certificates. Easy peasy for some women. For others, tracking down and paying for official marriage certificates and divorce papers will be a barrier to vote.

Fewer women voting seems to be a feature, not a bug, of Proctor’s plan.

In response to the defeat of the 2022 anti-abortion amendment, Proctor complained that women — specifically 20- to 30-year-old women — “stole” that election by voting. Proctor complained that the very people who would be most affected by an anti-abortion amendment chose to vote for their reproductive freedom. That is not stealing an election. Women tend to vote against Proctor’s far-right ideology, so the more women who can’t locate or afford the proper documentation to register to vote, the better for Proctor and his party.

Voting is a fundamental right, and every barrier to voting, such as requiring proof of citizenship, means fewer people get to exercise that right. Illegal voting is not occurring, and the Kansas Constitution already adequately specifies voter requirements that protect fair elections. The proposed constitutional amendment is a pretext to require proof of citizenship to register to vote and will be used to justify voter suppression.

Amii Castle is a professor at the University of Kansas, where she teaches at the law and business schools. Through its opinion section, the Kansas Reflector works to amplify the voices of people who are affected by public policies or excluded from public debate. Find information, including how to submit your own commentary, here .

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