The Kansas Highway Patrol will send troopers to Ohio to help with security at the Republican National Convention in Cleveland. The Highway Patrol was contacted through a national system that allows law enforcement agencies to request help from organizations in other states.
KHP Lieutenant Adam Winters says Kansas troopers will be assisting federal and state law enforcement agencies at the convention.
“They’re going to basically be a high-visibility deterrent. They’re going to be there to observe and report if issues arrive and they’re going to be there interacting with the public,” says Winters.
Winters says the troopers will be getting valuable experience managing security at major events.
“Being involved in something that is this large in scale will be great for them to be able to bring back to Kansas and to our agency in the event that we ever have something like this in the state of Kansas,” says Winters.
The Kansas Adjutant General's Department says the state will be reimbursed for the salaries of the troopers providing security.
Winters says the last time Kansas troopers were called up through the Emergency Management Assistance Compact was after Hurricane Katrina.