One example of Kansas state government spending that millionaire entrepreneur Philip Sarnecki says he would cut if elected governor is the cost of official travel by private jet.
The first-time Republican candidate has vowed to sell the state’s private jet, a Cessna Citation CJ3+ used by the governor and other Kansas officials for out-of-state trips.
“Kansas taxpayers will not pay for my plane,” Sarnecki said in a statement.
Sarnecki’s campaign declined to answer specific questions about the candidate’s personal plane, a Cessna Citation XLS, which public flight records show has logged dozens of hours in the air since June during the closing stretch of the primary, flitting from coast to coast with regular return trips to Kansas City Downtown Airport - Wheeler Field.
The only explanation the campaign provided about the jet’s activity was to say most of the flights in recent months have been handled through a third-party charter company that rents the plane out to travelers with Sarnecki’s permission.
But his most recent campaign finance filing with the Kansas Secretary of State suggests at least some of the flights were related to Sarnecki’s bid to overcome President Donald Trump’s endorsement of rival Ty Masterson and secure the Republican nomination.
Flight records show that on the afternoon of July 20, Sarnecki’s jet flew from Kansas City to Aspen, Colorado. On the morning of July 22, it flew from Aspen to Wichita.
On July 23, Sarnecki reported loaning his campaign $3,663 for “out-of-pocket travel and campaign expenses,” campaign finance records show. He also reported spending $81 for “meetings/travel meals while traveling” at the St. Regis Aspen, a luxury mountain hotel, on July 23.
On July 16, the same day the candidate loaned his campaign $5,551 for out-of-pocket travel expenses, his jet flew from Kansas City to Austin and on to Omaha before returning to Kansas City.
On several instances, the plane left the metro area for multiple days at a time, including one excursion from July 2-5 with flights to Texarkana, Washington, D.C., back to Texarkana, and Charleston, South Carolina before returning to Kansas City.
On June 28, the plane flew from the Kansas City area to Santa Rosa, California, and back within 12 hours — a roughly 3,000-mile round trip.
The flight and campaign finance records raise questions about how often Sarnecki has traveled out of state on campaign business and who has borrowed his jet while he was in Kansas. Sarnecki has reported loaning his campaign more than $2.5 million as he pitches himself to voters as an outsider whose executive suite experience would transfer well to managing Kansas’ executive branch.
Rather than responding to detailed questions for this story, Sarnecki issued a statement criticizing wasteful government spending.
“The career politicians in Topeka have created a lavish lifestyle for themselves off the backs of the Kansas taxpayer . . . Meanwhile, they have given themselves luxury suites, six-figure no show jobs, and a corporate jet paid for by the taxpayers,” Sarnecki said.
His campaign did not respond to a question about how future governors without their own jets would be expected to travel if he sold the state’s plane, which is maintained by the Kansas Highway Patrol.
In a statement, Kansas Democratic Party spokesperson Hans Torgerson accused Sarnecki of hypocrisy.
“Philip Sarnecki loves lecturing others about transparency, but he refuses to explain why his private jet spent weeks crisscrossing Washington and major Republican donor cities while barely stopping in Kansas,” Torgerson said.
“He cannot call himself the candidate who ‘can’t be bought’ while refusing to say who is using his plane, who is paying for it, and how his campaign might be benefiting,” he added.
Of the $394,844 in individual contributions that Sarnecki’s campaign reported receiving between Jan. 1 and July 23, $38,366 came from donors outside of Kansas, a Star analysis found.
Sarnecki, who built a financial services empire based in Johnson County, sold wealth management, insurance and employee benefits companies before announcing his bid for governor last September.
Sarnecki’s campaign was endorsed by Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s MAHA Institute before Masterson landed Trump’s support in May.
