Challenged with legal action, the Kansas Ethics Commission today rescinded a fine it levied against an Ozawkie man who filed complaints alleging campaign finance abuses by a Kansas senator and then discussed the complaints with media outlets, including Kansas Liberty. The commission's action came after the attorney general's office released a decision that said the commission's $7,500 fine was a violation of free speech rights.

The commission’s finding — that Kristian Van Meteren had violated state statutes in discussing his complaints with the media — also was rescinded, said Caleb Stegall, a lawyer who represented Van Meteren.

“By vacating its prior order after challenge in court, the commission has both tacitly and, through its counsel at the Kansas attorney general’s office, expressly conceded that its actions violated Mr. Van Meteren’s constitutionally guaranteed rights to free speech,” Stegall said in a release issued shortly after the decision was reached. “As such, today’s action is a victory for the liberties of all Kansans.”

Indeed, in a letter to the commission, Deputy Attorney General Michael C. Leitch said the statutes Van Meteren was accused of violating were unconstitutional.

In our opinion,” Leitch wrote, “these statutes — at least as applied to complaining parties — violate the First Amendment and cannot be enforced against those who file complaints with the commission.”

The letter concluded, “We believe that statutes and regulations requiring confidentiality from those who file complaints against public officials are unconstitutional. To the extent that the commission has imposed fines or other sanctions against those who may have violated them, we believe those fines are likewise unconstitutional.”

Stegall said the commission’s actions against Van Meteren demonstrated government abuse of a citizen, and he implied that political favoritism was at the root of that abuse.

“This episode illustrates clearly the abuses that can occur when agents of the state choose to use their power to advance a political agenda, to reward friends and to discourage political opponents,” he said.

Van Meteren filed ethics complaints against Sen. Dwayne Umbarger, R-Thayer, alleging that Umbarger used campaign funds for non-campaign related expenses, including the purchase of a carport erected at his farm. Umbarger said at the time he intended to store campaign and legislative records in the open-sided structure. Van Meteren was a political opponent of Umbarger, organizing his mother's unsuccessful campaign to upset Umbarger in the GOP primary.

Umbarger ultimately reimbursed his campaign account for many of the purchases cited in Van Meteren’s complaints and was not charged with ethics violations by the commission.

But the commission aggressively pursued the case against Van Meteren, even sending investigators to the home of a Kansas Liberty reporter to hand over a subpoena compelling his testimony in the case.

Stegall told Kansas Liberty Wednesday that Van Meteren had suffered public indignities and financial damage from his persecution at the hands of the Ethics Commission, and that “we are looking at all our legal options.”

He added that he also was appealing to the Kansas Legislature to revise the statutes under which Van Meteren was charged.

“Nothing short of a full review and rewrite of those laws will prevent such abuses from occurring in the future,” he said.

The statutes have been rationalized as a means to discourage frivolous complaints that unfairly taint a candidate in advance of an election, before the candidate has had a chance to clear his or her name, Stegall said.

“I think that rationale is flawed,” Stegall told Kansas Liberty. “If someone files frivolous complaints before an election, the press is going to go over those and if it’s determined they’re frivolous, it will backfire. The fact is the government shouldn’t control access to the complaints. Government agents don’t know better than people.”

Stegall is an occasional columnist for Kansas Liberty.

- Phil LaCerte

The Week in Review