God forbid you ever would. But let’s say you drive drunk, at twice the legal blood alcohol limit, and on the wrong side of an interstate, eluding officers and nearly hitting other motorists. As officers escort your falling-down-drunk self away, you insult and threaten them.
How long do you think you’d keep your job?
If Gene Suellentrop were a working person who makes his living stocking grocery shelves or frying up fast food, he’d likely have been tossed out on his stump right away. But he’s the potent and pugilistic Kansas Senate majority leader. So he’s riding out his above alleged behavior to the official end of the legislative session in early May.
How can his colleagues have brooked such a thing? He’s already left a stain on the Kansas Senate these past few inglorious weeks.
State Senate President Ty Masterson Friday finally acknowledged to statehouse reporters that his good friend, business partner and colleague must at least resign his leadership post. The Senate Republican caucus later Friday voted to remove Suellentrop from leadership. Reality thus finally dawned on the Senate president and his GOP caucus, only three weeks late.
Suellentrop, in contrast, has yet to see the light. If he doesn’t all together resign after the release of the disgusting details in the affidavit against him, the Senate should move to oust him from his seat completely. Even if it means his leaving scratch marks on the chamber’s door jambs on the way out.
We now know, for instance, the specific DUI allegations that his blood alcohol was 0.17, just over twice the 0.08 legal limit; that he was hardly able to stand after being removed from his vehicle; that he called an officer “donut boy,” an over-worn slur against law enforcement; and told one officer that as a former high school jock, he could “take” him in a fight.
Who does that? More importantly, who does that and keeps a position of privilege at the highest echelons of state government?
Gene Suellentrop. That’s who.
His Republican leadership colleagues shamefully went along with Suellentrop’s attempt to stall his way through what’s already become a national embarrassment. Ironically, that made the situation even worse. If he’d done the right thing and resigned instantly after his arrest in the wee hours of March 16 in Topeka, no one beyond Suellentrop would have been tarred by the scandal. Instead, the refusal of his GOP colleagues to do anything now defines Kansas Senate leadership in 2021 — and delineates the thick, fluorescent line between the powerful and the peasant.
Nothing that the Kansas Legislature has done in recent memory has so eroded Kansans’ trust and esteem in their state’s leaders as their decision to let Suellentrop slide so long.
Even in the face of the affidavit’s damning allegations, Senate President Masterson and Vice President Rick Wilborn Thursday issued this duck-billed platitude: “While we continue to respect due process, there are many aspects of the alleged behavior that are deeply disappointing, and severe consequences will be unavoidable.”
You think? The truth is, since the moment Suellentrop allegedly tried to dodge officers’ tire-deflating stop sticks to end a 10-minute high-speed pursuit — he allegedly drove at 90 mph — the Senate majority leader has done everything in his considerable power to avoid any consequences, much less severe ones.
And the rest of the Senate leadership has aided and abetted him.
The Senate’s rank and file ultimately had enough of it, with the release of the indelicate details of the incident — leading to what was essentially a mutiny.
Still not good enough. Nothing less than Suellentrop’s resignation or ouster will do. The rest of our jobs would never survive such antisocial acts.
Republicans in the Kansas Senate are now being called on to decide whether they’re truly above us, as the past few weeks have indicated.
