JEFFERSON CITY — Newly released state records show Missouri officials have paid out more than $250,000 as a result of an open records law violation by Republican Josh Hawley.
The payment, which was listed on the state’s latest legal expense fund report released Wednesday, came in response to a Cole County judge’s determination last year that the U.S. senator violated the state’s Sunshine Law when he was attorney general.
The total amount paid in November was $256,238, records show.
In addition, Judge Jon Beetem also fined the office $12,000 for “knowingly and purposefully” violating public records laws when officials failed to release emails between Hawley’s taxpayer-funded staff and his political consultants during his 2018 campaign for U.S. Senate.
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Beetem said the records were concealed out of a concern that their release might affect Hawley’s bid to move up the political ladder.
The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, which brought the lawsuit in 2019, had sought $306,000 in attorney fees.
The Democrats asked in September 2017 and March 2018 for emails between staffers in Hawley’s office and paid campaign operatives.
Hawley’s office told the DSCC there were no responsive records.
But, in the closing days of the November 2018 election, the Kansas City Star reported that political consultants Gail Gitcho and Timmy Teepell directed taxpayer-paid staff in Hawley’s office.
The article confirmed that there were, in fact, records of communications between political consultants and the attorney general’s office. The attorney general’s office also produced documents to Secretary of State Jay Ashcroft’s office in December that prove there were responsive records, the lawsuit says.
“It is now clear that the AG’s Office not only possessed the requested documents, but it purposely and knowingly withheld them from DSCC, and it has advanced no argument — nor could it — that the documents are properly closed under the Sunshine Law,” the lawsuit says.
Hawley, a Republican, defeated incumbent U.S. Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo., in the November 2018 election. At the time, a spokeswoman for Hawley called the lawsuit a “joke” and “yet another frivolous political suit.”
Hawley is running for a second term in the 2024 election.
Attorney Mark Pedroli, who represented the DSCC, earlier called the decision a “big win for transparency, election fairness, and the rule of law.”
This is the inaugural episode of Josh and Erin Hawley’s podcast, in which they discuss how they met, their career choices and other subjects.
