Expansive changes to Kansas’ emergency management laws, which allow citizens to sue over public health measures, are unconstitutional and promote “the equivalent of legal anarchy,” a Johnson County judge said in a scathing ruling Thursday. As COVID-19 cases rise again, driven by the highly contagious delta variant, the ruling restores, for the moment, at least, the ability of local health officials to unilaterally issue orders requiring masks and restricting gatherings. It also allows Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly to issue new emergency orders without approval from Legislative leaders. Attorney General Derek Schmidt, a Republican who is a running for governor and who advised the GOP-controlled Legislature as it drafted the bill, already plans to appeal the ruling.
Source: Kansas City Star
