Kris Kobach Fires Law Firm That Donated To Democrats... Clumsily Backpedals After Realizing Legal Ramifications Of 'Retaliation'

(Photo by Christopher Smith/ For the Washington Post)

Kansas Attorney General Kris Kobach's shambolic efforts to play act as a real lawyer have now placed Kansas without competent legal representation at a critical juncture in an ongoing case. This detestable little scamp can't help but leave a mess wherever he goes, can he? His past attempts at "lawyertude" earned Kobach a court order to take remedial legal education courses and also resulted in him personally costing taxpayers $1.9 million pursuing cockamamie legal claims. And while those events might have sunk another career, because we're talking about Kansas, voters elected him to be the state's top lawyer after all of that was public knowledge.

Lately, in its role as the state's legal advocate, Kobach's office launched an investigation into alleged natural gas price gouging during a February 2021 storm that left Kansas starved for heat. Understanding that a consumer protection claim against a major energy supplier might be beyond the powers of a lawyer ordered by a federal court to go back to baby lawyer school, the AG's office hired plaintiff-side heavyweight Morgan & Morgan to get to the bottom of things.

At least until Kobach realized that Morgan & Morgan occasionally donates to Democrats. More to the point, Morgan & Morgan recently became the right-wing punching bag of the day after feuding with Ron DeSantis over a policy aimed at frustrating plaintiff-side attorneys. The move would ultimately result in the firm publicly announcing that it would no longer grant courtesy extensions beyond those mandated by law, kicking up even more outrage in right-wing media. Likely hoping to seize some of the initial national attention, Kobach threw out there that he would be firing Morgan & Morgan.

Good luck finding a firm willing to take this case on contingency -- as Morgan & Morgan had -- that doesn't donate to Democratic politicians! Maybe he'll hire Jones Day to do it on an hourly basis and rack up millions in fees for taxpayers to shoulder.

Alas, the bid for attention worked out for him, with the Wall Street Journal editorial board blowing him kisses for using the state agency to pursue tangential political vendettas. "One mystery of modern politics is why so many Republican-led states employ trial lawyers who file junk lawsuits and donate to their political opponents." The paper defended the retaliatory action as a response to wealthy trial lawyers using their largesse to buy Democrats and secure state government contracts, glossing over the fact that Kansas hasn't had a Democratic attorney general in over a decade.

But then, someone must have explained to Kobach that breaching a contract because the vendor is feuding with another Republican in another state might look bad, because he quickly and clumsily started running away from the WSJ's praise:

Kobach told reporters Monday that he did have political considerations in mind, but they did not factor into the decision to cancel the contract.

"It is of interest that yeah this firm does have, you know, heavy leanings in the Democrat direction in terms of their own politics," he said. "But no, if they had been performing satisfactorily, then we would not have terminated."

Wait, what? "It is of interest that yeah"? Kobach's really trying to have his conservative media cake and eat it too, realizing that he needs to keep banging the drum that Morgan & Morgan is a "Democrat" firm, while trying to keep up appearances that he didn't fire the firm as an act of political retaliation. But he tripped on his own contractual obligations.

You'd be forgiven for assuming that when Kobach claims that the firm was not "performing satisfactorily," he was firing them "for cause." But since he couldn't really articulate one, he instead fired the firm "for convenience." So Kobach is going to publicly bad mouth the firm's work as if he fired them for cause while trying to avoid having to actually prove it.

That... probably isn't going to work. Because John Morgan has already sussed out what "convenience" means in this story, telling the Topeka Capital-Journal:

"This is all about politics, and the people and taxpayers have suffered," he said in a statement. "You should not care what political party your surgeon is a member of. The same should apply to your legal representation. But politicians are often petty people who hurt their own constituents by playing games."

Which creates yet another problem for Kansas entirely of Kobach's making. His chief deputy attorney general -- who presumably has not had his legal acumen scolded by federal judges -- seemingly understood the severity of the move, only saying, "I don't want to prejudice the state's position in any litigation that may result from it." Unfortunately, Kobach's blustering about political donations being "of interest" will drown out the more circumspect attorneys on his staff.

Morgan & Morgan now rests on solid ground to pursue a share of whatever award the state ultimately secures. Though, since this is Kris Kobach, he's probably going to simply kill the investigation and leave Kansans with no redress for the price-gouging complaint. That's some galaxy brain thinking! Can't share an award if there's no award in the first place.

It's honestly like the Wizard of Oz down there, except it's all Scarecrows all the time.

Kris Kobach to rebid contract after canceling deal with law firm that donated to Democrats [Topeka Capital-Journal]

Earlier: Massive Plaintiffs Law Firm Decides To Play Hardball With Insurance Industry
Kris Kobach Might Be The Next Attorney General Of Kansas So Let's All Remember That He's So Bad At Law A Judge Ordered Him To Take Remedial Classes
After Kris Kobach's Incompetence Costs Kansas $1.9M, Voters Choose Him As State's Top Lawyer

Joe Patrice is a senior editor at Above the Law and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. Feel free to email any tips, questions, or comments. Follow him on Twitter if you're interested in law, politics, and a healthy dose of college sports news. Joe also serves as a Managing Director at RPN Executive Search.