July 22, 2026
As cities and counties across the State of Kansas are being inundated with zoning changes and building applications for data centers, thanks to Kansas SB98 that gave the tax incentives, the public deserves to know just how heavy the hand of the legislature was in this process.
Introduced on January 29, 2025, and referred to the Committee on Transportation, SB98 was originally a bill providing for a distinctive license plate for Route 66.
The link above, gives the original language as introduced, and the photos below are from the legislative website.
To follow the process, and the funny business, be sure to visit this link for the proof.
https://kslegislature.gov/b2025_26/bills/sb98/
This original SB98 was approved by the Senate on February 19 with a vote of 39-1.
It went to the House with one minor amendment changing “statute book” to “Kansas register.”It then passed the House as amended on March 13 with a vote of 105-17.
Remember, this is still a license plate bill at this point.
On the same day, a Senate conference committee was requested because they did not agree with the amendment.
The next day, the House agreed with the Senate to form a conference committee to resolve differences in the bill – over two words “Kansas Register.”
Now watch the inside legislative coordinated effort begin.
We are going to momentarily sit this bill aside and move to SB51.
Senate Bill 51 was originally introduced as an Act concerning sales tax exemptions for data centers – sound familiar?
It was introduced by Brad Smoot, a lobbyist, on January 21, 2025 for NetChoice, one of his clients.
The bill was referred to the Senate Committee on Commerce the next day, and had a hearing the following week.
The Senate Committee on Commerce recommended it be passed out of Committee on February 19th.
It then passed the Senate 34-6 with an Emergency Final Action on the same day, with the following roll call:
Note the only “nays” to the original SB51 data center tax exemption bill were from Senator Francisco, Senator Peck, Senator Shane, Senator Thompson, Senator Titus, and Senator Tyson.
SB51 data center bill was then referred to the House Committee on Taxation, where on March 14th, they recommended it be passed with amendments.
The amended version is here:
What’s important to note is the following: On March 27, 2025, SB51, the original data center tax exemption bill failed to move to emergency final action and was stuck in committee.
Insert the magicians:
Remember SB98, the Route 66 license plate bill that we left off with at March 13, 2025 that had made its way through committees and was ready to be heard and voted on.
On April 11, 2025 – the SB51 data center bill is still stuck in committee and will not make it through to become law in 2025.
So we return to the SB98 committees that were formed on the license plate bill to negotiate two words about the “Kansas register”
Three committee members are replaced on both the House and the Senate committee for the license plate bill… Several of whom have actively promoted data centers at meetings across the State.
Ironically, the very next entry in line for the official order of records shows they’re not actually negotiating two words for a license plate bill, but they are negotiating a 69 page document for data centers on SB98
Full document here: https://kslegislature.gov/b2025_26/bills/download/?apn=b2025_26/year1/ready_for_publication/ccr_2025_sb98_h_2309.pdf
And here:
https://kslegislature.gov/b2025_26/bills/download/?apn=b2025_26/ds_docs_li/ccrb_sb98_01_041112pm.pdf
When did this happen and where is the actual unfolding of amendments for the public eye? How did we get from two words to a complete gut-and-go?
After motions to suspend rules, and stripping the license plate bill completely, and replacing it with the SB51 data center language without any proper public process, it was forced through the House with an approval of 85-37 and immediately forced through the Senate with an approval of 26-8.
Note the Roll Call vote from April 11, 2025 is still coded on the legislative website as a Route 66 license plate bill.
It was then presented to the Governor on April 18, 2025 and approved on April 24, 2025.
But what happened to SB51, the original data center bill
It was revived in March 2026 and moved to the Committee on Legislative Modernization as a completely different bill – almost as if they were trying to erase the original language of it as well.
What happened to the Route 66 license plate?
That might be a question for your legislators or Senator Shallenburger.
One would think for people to be that interested in a license plate bill that they would have been upset when it was one vote away from being passed, before disappearing as if it never existed.
Maybe it was never about a license plate after all, but perhaps an easy placeholder to push through without opposition in order to have a Plan B in place in case SB 51 was blocked.
Especially since legislation introduced in 2026 to try to hold data centers within proper parameters all died immediately in committee, with no hearing.
SB526 introduced by Senator Rose to hold SB98 to only land that was already zoned industrial in order to protect our farm land from getting re-zoned in the mass applications seen across the State.
SB400 introduced by Senator Thompson to help protect water consumption by requiring closed loop systems.
SB266 introduced by Senator Tyson requiring legislative approval to construct high impact electrical transmission lines in order to protect farmers from the eminent domain required with data centers.
There were many other bills introduced in 2026 for water rights, recycling of waste water for humans to drink, etc. that were passed in order to continue to pave the way for the data center agenda, that some Kansas legislators have promoted against the will of the people.
This should be criminal that our legislators are working directly with lobbyists to sell out our state!
Remember, Wichita State University hosted the World Economic Forum Great Reset, wanting to turn Kansas from a food provider to a data provider?
To everyone that asked how they would implement it, Now you see!
Read about it:
