In ‘purple’ Legislative District 12, swing-vote Riepe faces Democrat challenger Knorr

LINCOLN — State Sen. Merv Riepe has racked up eight years of service in the Nebraska Legislature, but he is eligible for reelection because his two terms were not consecutive.

The retired hospital administrator was first elected in 2014 to represent District 12, encompassing Ralston and a portion of western Omaha. In 2018, he lost reelection to Democrat Steve Lathrop and returned to the Legislature in 2022 after Lathrop decided not to seek reelection.

This year, he faces another Democrat challenger, hospice nurse Christy Knorr, in one of the most politically diverse legislative districts in the state.

Riepe has consistently described District 12 as purple. The latest voter registration statistics posted on the Nebraska Secretary of State’s website show about 8,600 registered Republicans, 7,800 Democrats and 6,500 nonpartisan voters in the district.

This translates to a wide range of political opinions among voters in the area. Riepe said some constituents have expressed a desire for Nebraska to fully ban abortion, while Knorr said several voters have shared frustration with state officials’ resisting pleas to expand access to medical cannabis.

“People are angry about it,” Knorr said.

Riepe said he has been trying to appeal to Democratic voters by showing that he is not a platform Republican. He is known as a swing vote in the current Legislature. During his second term, he cast deciding votes to halt progress on a bill that would have returned Nebraska to a “winner-take-all” system for presidential elections and a bill that would have banned abortions at about six weeks of pregnancy. The latter earned him a censure from the Nebraska GOP.

“They know that I’m a little bit of a rebel,” Riepe said.

Proposed 12-week abortion cutoff hits sooner than Riepe’s, with no exception for fetal anomalies

In the Legislature’s 2023 abortion debate, Riepe said, he felt a six-week ban was too strict and instead proposed a 12-week ban to replace the 20-week ban in place at the time. His fellow Republicans eventually acquiesced to his request and passed a version of the 12-week ban.

However, it was this legislation that spurred Knorr to challenge Riepe. Knorr said that during the 2023 session, Riepe promised he would not support a 12-week ban if it didn’t include protections for medical providers. Despite this, Riepe ultimately did vote “yes” on the bill without protections, allowing the measure to pass. Though he introduced a bill in 2024 to add protections, it did not make it out of committee.

“That was the day when I let him know that I was coming to take his seat the next cycle,” Knorr said.

Both Riepe and Knorr said they largely have gone door-to-door to have conversations with District 12 voters during their campaigns. Knorr said she did so much walking in the primary that she had total knee replacement surgery in June, and has been going door-to-door using a four-wheeled scooter since August.

Though party registrations among District 12 are mixed, Riepe and Knorr each said they have agreed more often than disagreed with voters they have spoken to on the campaign trail.

Riepe said he’s aware that some Republican voters in District 12 won’t vote in the November election because they disagree with his decisions. However, he said, a bigger fear is large Democratic turnout in the race because voters want to see a Democrat representing the district.

Assuming no other seats flip, if Knorr defeats Riepe, Republicans would have 32 of the 49 seats in the Legislature, just shy of the 33-vote threshold to overcome filibusters.

Riepe has argued that Knorr lacks the experience to get stuff done in the Legislature, while Knorr has said Riepe’s voting record does not align with his constituents. Voters want a representative who understands the current economic situation, she said, and Riepe was educated and worked under a different socioeconomic system.

“He got to retire with a pension, and that’s something that a lot of us don’t have these days,” Knorr said.

Both Riepe and Knorr have backgrounds in the medical field, but the two hold differing views on specific healthcare issues. For example, Knorr noted that she supports Medicaid expansion while Riepe has been hesitant.

On the debate about medical cannabis, Knorr said she has seen the benefits firsthand as a hospice nurse. She said it’s sometimes the only form of pain relief that works for her patients, and Nebraskans deserve the choice to use medical cannabis if they want.

Knorr said medical cannabis is an issue that unites voters across the political spectrum in Nebraska. She criticized Gov. Jim Pillen, U.S. Sen. Pete Ricketts and Nebraska Attorney General Mike Hilgers for their attempts to restrict access to medical cannabis, saying this was “a hill I am willing to die on.”

“Somewhere along the line, we have lost our humanity and our empathy,” she said.

Riepe said he doesn’t support legalizing recreational marijuana, but supports medical cannabis with restrictions. He said he believes it would be a mistake to open too many distribution centers across the state, but acknowledged that excessive red tape would open the door for black-market distributors.

From his conversations with voters, Riepe said he believes their biggest issues are property taxes and Nebraska’s budget, which isn’t a surprise. He predicted that taxes will always be a major issue for voters, citing a 1975 political cartoon that depicted Uncle Sam throwing money at various government programs while a taxpayer looks on with empty pockets.

“People feel like their whole standard of living … is (in) quicksand,” Riepe said. “It’s just kind of slowly but surely escaping them, and they don’t know what the future is going to bring.”

Riepe said he is open to the controversial idea of increasing sales taxes — particularly on pop and candy — to make room to lower property taxes, though he also said he doesn’t believe voters want increased sales taxes. He said he is interested in ideas to reduce property taxes without shifting the burden somewhere else.

On property taxes, Knorr said she is honest with voters and won’t promise anything, though she wants to deliver on the issue. She noted that lawmakers are expected to face a budget deficit for the third year in a row when they enter the 2027 session.

If he’s reelected, Riepe predicted that 2027 might be “one of the least fun sessions” he’ll have taken part in, because the state budget will take precedence over all other issues. He said he hasn’t planned for specific legislation outside of budget-related issues because of this, though he would like to work on proposals for economic development.

Knorr said she also wants to focus on the budget. If elected, she said, she wants to go through the budget line-by-line to see exactly what the state is spending on. She said she suspects there are several areas of needless spending that could be cut, citing expenses for the governor’s mansion outside the state Capitol as one example.