GOP attorney general candidate starts race

State Sen. Mike Gibbons isn't quite sure who his opponent will be in the November election for Missouri attorney general, but he said Friday that he's not going to slow down and wait for the answer.

Gibbons, of Kirkwood, was unopposed in Tuesday's Republican primary. His likely fall opponent, state Sen. Chris Koster of Harrisonville, Mo., leads state Rep. Margaret Donnelly of St. Louis in complete, unofficial tallies by 786 votes. Donnelly has not decided whether she will ask for a recount.

Gibbons had $340,000 in the bank as of July 24, while the Democrats spent their campaign cash in advance of the primary. Gibbons said he will work to lay out his vision for the office regardless of who is his eventual opponent.

"As the campaign moves forward and we get deeper into it, we will be laying out our ideas on how we can do things differently, and hopefully better, and I am looking forward to it," Gibbons said in an interview with the Southeast Missourian.

Gibbons hopes to replace Jay Nixon, a Democrat who is giving up the office to run for governor. Nixon has held the job since 1993, when he took over after 24 years with Republicans in charge.

One area where Gibbons said he hopes to draw a contrast with Nixon is in the use of private attorneys in complex litigation. The deal Nixon struck with private attorneys during the multistate lawsuit against tobacco companies repeatedly has been used by GOP lawmakers as an attack point.

New York, Texas and Massachusetts this week announced major settlements with securities firms who sold billions of dollars worth of securities to private and public investors. The firms promised the "auction-based securities" could be converted quickly to cash, but investors found them impossible to sell when credit markets tightened this year. Missouri was not directly involved in the actions, and Gibbons said that a decision to intervene in such cases, and whether to use private attorneys, would be examples of how he would change the office.

When Missourians are harmed in such deals, he said, Missouri should be in the lead taking action, not jumping on at the end of a legal process. Nixon joined the tobacco lawsuit after the case had been initiated by other states. "The first question is should we be involved in this," Gibbons said. "If the answer is yes, I would rather be involved at the beginning because you can shape it more. If you come in at the end, it is all laid out."

And the selection of private lawyers would be made after advertising for proposals and scrutinizing both the fees and the qualifications of the competing law firms. "Really, what you want to be able to say is here, this is who we selected and why, and here are the other people who were interested in it."

The office needs a thorough review to ensure it is operating efficiently, Gibbons said.

He also intends to create a cybercrime task force that would be available to communities across the state, providing the expertise needed to combat electronic theft, fraud and Internet sex predators.

"I want to provide a level of expertise that would be hard for most counties in Missouri to maintain on a regular basis," he said.

rkeller@semissourian.com

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