JOHN,

The “Chaos Caucus.”

That’s the new term for a rogue group of extreme conservative state senators in Missouri. But I didn’t come up with this nickname: this comes from the Republican leader of the Missouri Senate, Senate Pro Tem Caleb Rowden.

The Missouri Senate has been in session since the first week of January, and nearly three weeks into a 5 month-long session, they have failed to do even the most basic procedural tasks. The Chaos Caucus has held up all official business with pointless filibusters and media fights to force every other senator to give in to their ridiculous demands.

Their demands? Put an end to the initiative petition (IP) process through which Missouri citizens get to decide important policy by simple majority vote; and privatize education with a destructive and wide-ranging taxpayer-funded voucher program.

“The beginning of the 2024 legislative session in the Missouri Senate has been nothing short of an embarrassment,” Rowden said. “A chamber designed to be occupied by civil, principled statesmen and women, has been overtaken by a small group of swamp creatures who all too often remind me more of my children than my colleagues.”

And now that four of the six members of the Chaos Caucus—one of which is outgoing-Senator Andrew Koenig from my district, who I am seeking to replace—have been punished by having their committee assignments taken away from them, they’ve spent most of their time complaining that they lost their prime parking spots.

Senator Rowden is right: this is embarrassing. And it illustrates just how extreme so many of today’s elected Republicans really are. What do they really want? Simple. They want to raise their political fortunes while destroying democracy and the future of our state.

The stakes do not get much higher than that.

It’s time to end the dysfunction, quit the petty name-calling, and get down to the business of making Missouri and our region a great place to call home—because we can do better.

I am running this campaign to flip a state senate seat because we all deserve better than the Chaos Caucus. And when we win, we will finally be able to deliver on the issues that matter to Missourians instead of wasting the taxpayers’ time and money on nonsense.