Topic: Kansas Leadership Center
Interview of Mike Matson and Mike Swenson, August 18, 2025
Interviewed by Jim McLean
In this 2025 oral history interview, Mike Matson and Mike Swenson described how they transitioned from being members of the Statehouse press corps to serving as press secretaries for governors Graves and Carlin, respectively. In the role of press secretary, they served as spokesperson for the governor and worked to get his message out, but they describe their role as including serving the public interest as a credible source of information. They understood the importance of working with the press to share their governor’s policy agenda and to get their message out to the Show Morepublic. Swenson explained how Governor Carlin was able to bring the leadership of both parties and cabinet members together to ‘hammer’ things out. Matson described how the Graves administration was faced with the challenge of a “conservative Republican in charge of the House…[that] was not interested in having the conversations that we’re talking about.” Governor Graves had to form coalitions with moderate members of both parties “in order to enact policy they felt most Kansans supported.”
Highlights -- short excerpts from the interview
- Transitions
- Getting the Word Out
- Balancing Demands
- The Editorial Filter
- Softball
- Just Have the Conversation
- Doing What Needs to Be Done