Elections
Rex Sinquefield drops $250K into GOP primary for Missouri auditor
Republican Scott Fitzpatrick’s campaign for Missouri auditor got a big boost Thursday, with megadonor Rex Sinquefield cutting a $250,000 check to a political action committee supporting him in the GOP primary. Sinquefield, a retired investor from St. Louis, is by far the most prolific donor in recent Missouri political history. Over the last decade, he’s […]
How an election denier’s fan club got its start in the states
WASHINGTON — The suddenly famous election denier behind the circulation of a PowerPoint filled with plans to overturn the 2020 election has a long history of election subversion attempts in multiple states. Retired Army Col. Phil Waldron also has close ties to former President Donald Trump’s legal team and served as one of its key […]
Bipartisan commission moving toward plan for new Missouri House districts
A bipartisan commission drawing a map for 163 Missouri House districts that will be used in the coming decade is “more than 50 percent” in agreement, members said Monday as they worked toward a Dec. 23 deadline. The 20-member House Independent Bipartisan Citizens Commission met for more than three hours Monday, but most of that […]
New redistricting rules reduce county splits in Missouri House map
In Randolph County in central Missouri, there are places where a person can take two steps and move through three state House districts. The county, with 24,716 people, doesn’t have enough population for a single House district, yet after the 2010 census, it was split among four. The same is true for Miller County, with […]
Activists target corporate campaign cash in battle against voting restrictions
Members of the Defend Black Voters Coalition chose Detroit’s Huntington Center as their backdrop earlier this month when they issued a warning about the dangers of “voter suppression legislation” backed by Republican state lawmakers. The building behind them, formerly known as the TCF Center, was a powerful symbol of what could happen if elections indeed are undermined. […]
Democratic governors press U.S. Senate to act on voting rights legislation
WASHINGTON — Seventeen Democratic governors are urging the U.S. Senate to pass two bills that aim to protect voting rights. Both measures need 60 votes to advance under Senate rules but have been stalled by Republican opposition in the evenly divided Senate. “Without decisive action by the federal government this year to protect voters’ access […]
Black Dems say nonpartisan elections in St. Louis County would dilute Black political power
The cheers and ringing bells were deafening at Wesley Bell’s watch party for the August 2018 Democratic primary election in St. Louis County. Shocking the country, Bell had handed a stunning defeat to then-incumbent St. Louis County Prosecutor Robert McCulloch ― the longtime prosecutor who had been sharply criticized by the Black community for his […]
Missouri GOP political consultant gets probation in felony tax fraud case
David Barklage, a veteran lobbyist and political consultant in Missouri, was granted probation by a federal judge Thursday for failing to pay more than $150,000 in taxes over the course of a three-year period. He was also ordered to pay restitution and perform 120 hours of community service. Federal sentencing guidelines called for him to […]
Group hopes to amend Missouri constitution to enact ranked-choice voting
An effort to do away with partisan primaries in Missouri and replace them with a “ranked choice” method got a big boost last week, receiving roughly $670,000 from a Virginia-based nonprofit hoping to put the idea on the 2022 statewide ballot. A group called Better Elections is pushing an initiative petition that would amend Missouri’s […]
‘Exploiting a loophole’: PACs tied to Missouri lobbyist draw new criticism
One day earlier this month, a company called Phoenix Home Care cut $120,000 worth of checks to six different Missouri political action committees. A few months earlier, a pair of companies suing the state to block a crackdown on unregulated slot machines combined to drop $350,000 into the same six PACs. The companies and all […]
Jay Ashcroft touts integrity of Missouri’s 2020 election, but supports an audit
Secretary of State Jay Ashcroft is confident Missouri’s 2020 election was safe and secure. And while he has concerns about things that transpired in other states last year, he dismisses the idea that fraud cost Donald Trump the presidential election. “Under our Constitution, Joe Biden was duly elected by our presidential electors. End of story,” […]
Pro-Parson PAC fined by Missouri Ethics Commission for violation
The political action committee created to advocate for Missouri Gov. Mike Parson accepted an illegal contribution of $150,000 last year from an out-of-state group. In a consent order filed this week, the Missouri Ethics Commission determined that there are reasonable grounds to believe the Oct. 2, 2020, donation to Uniting Missouri PAC from RAGA Action […]