Four years after Mark Gilstrap left the Democratic Party to join the Republican Party, former Unified Government Commissioner Mike Gilstrap has chosen the same path.
"After spending my entire life as a Democrat, I can no longer with a clear conscience continue to go along with the leaders on the local and national level," Mike Gilstrap said. "Our country has endured a very difficult last 3 and-a-half years and I've yet to see a good and realistic plan from the Democratic Party to correct the problems. There has simply been too much finger pointing from the Democratic Party, instead of owning up to their errors."
Mike Gilstrap had also previously served on the Kansas City Kansas Community College's Board of Trustees.
He joins former Kansas Sen. Mark Gilstrap and current Kansas Sen. Chris Steineger as recent Wyandotte County Democrats to switch parties.
"Switching parties has been one of the more difficult decisions that I have had to make. I had always been a Democrat. My parents were Democrats. But this is not the same Democratic Party that they or I signed up for."
