Thank you for your support and goodbye... for now

Announcement

In April of 2022, I started The Kansas Constitutional as a 26-year-old who had not been too politically engaged… ever. I had written for local newspapers, mostly doing fluff pieces as I didn’t enjoy writing about politics. This was partly because my government schooling made me hate learning about the subject and partly because whenever I did have to write a political piece my editor (at whatever news source I was writing at) would make me regret writing the piece either by editing it to fit their bias or by writing an unhinged opinion piece on the subject I had written on to accompany the article. At one point, I was writing for a leftist newspaper that ended up docking my pay $40 because I didn’t put a spin on an article, only for them to later give me $60 and a thank you note after I quit because of the incident.

Even local media has a left- or right-wing bias due to whoever owns the news source, and I’ve written for both sides, and I’ve hated writing for both sides.

Having been educating myself through political podcasts and YouTube channels due to the government tyranny that began in 2020, I really dove into learning about different political issues. I began listening to people on the far-left, far-right, and people somewhere in between. The people I found to enjoy the most were a lot like me. They were people who, ten years ago, would have likely described themselves as Democrats, but, due to the extremism that current Democrats regularly uphold, they ended up finding themselves a little more right leaning in current times. I further learned about the Libertarian party which, though I’m not registered as one, does seem to align most closely to my views.

After a couple years of educating myself on certain policies, I decided I wanted to rejoin the news industry with the intention of focusing on politics. There was just one major problem: Kansas media loves big government and terrible Democratic policies that make people poorer and worse off. Being in the Lawrence area at the time, I read articles from a number of news sources including Lawrence Journal-World, Lawrence Times, Kansas Reflector, Topeka Capital-Journal, and the Kansas City Star. The left-wing bias was extremely obvious in many of the articles these places produced, and I knew immediately I would not be well-liked at any of these places and I would not enjoy my time at these places. I branched out to find other sources, and I did find a couple right-leaning news sources in Kansas, though very small and with extreme views I did not agree with.

Having found no news source I believed suitable for me, I decided to start “my own thing.” I wanted something physical as I love being able to hold the publications my work appears in. So, I came out with an 8-page pamphlet with three short articles and a poem inside. After having printed the pamphlet, I immediately realized it was not feasible. It was a lot of money and work to produce the pamphlet which at best would have been able to come out once a month. I decided to try Substack out, and as I’ve continued on for the past two years, I have adjusted the amount I write, tried different podcast ideas, and ultimately experimented with new things to see what worked best with my limited time and income.

My ultimate goal for The Kansas Constitutional was to be the first freedom-focused media outlet in Kansas—shilling for policies over politicians and parties. I started out with absolutely no one knowing who I was, as I hadn’t held a consistent journalism gig in Kansas since 2015 when I was 20 years old writing fluff pieces on the weekend at the Emporia Gazette. I was actually probably better known in Missouri at the time as I had been writing for the Branson Globe in 2019, regularly making frontpage headlines for things like veterans events and new happenings at Silver Dollar City.

Regardless of my optimism, The Kansas Constitutional’s growth has been extremely slow. We are now two years in with very little to show for it. I’ve written things that have made people on the left mad and I’ve written things that have made people on the right mad. I can honestly say, I’m not sorry for any of that. Subscriptions have been stagnant for a while and paid subscriptions have been stagnant for a long time. It’s very clear that this business model is not working, and as the price of things continues to rise, it has become apparent to me and my wallet that it’s time to call it quits for The Kansas Constitutional.

I don’t think many people have realized that this outlet has been a side gig for me these past two years. I originally started out at a full-time job with this newsletter being something I did in my free-time. When I started seeing significant positive growth, I decided to take a chance and got a more flexible part-time job so I could focus more on The Kansas Constitutional. Unfortunately, I can’t do that anymore. I will be going back to full-time work here shortly and pausing all paid subscriptions—partial refunds will occur in the coming days.

Ending this outlet is bittersweet for me. Bitter because for the past two years I have worked hard on this only to watch it end. Sweet because this isn’t goodbye, this is goodbye… for now. It would be so easy to quit now and just work a full-time job and have that be it. However, politics are important. It is literally the thing that dictates polite society. Due to that, I’m not leaving politics, but rather, I’m changing my approach to how I do things and what I focus on.

Over the next couple of months I’m going to be spending time with family and friends as graduations and birthdays are coming up. I will also be preparing for the next step in my political journalism “career”, with plans on launching some time in late June or early July.

For those who have subscribed, paid or not, I hope you will continue on with me on this journey. I will be taking the email list that I have and moving it forward to this next new adventure.

I appreciate everyone’s support, and I want to humbly say thank you for following.

Much love and gratitude,

Ian Brannan