Lawsuit takes issue with ad in Missouri governor's race

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. -- A supporter of Republican gubernatorial candidate Sarah Steelman has sued to halt a TV ad that criticizes Steelman while praising her rival, Kenny Hulshof.

The ad running in southwest Missouri is paid for by a new group calling itself Americans for a Better America. It was placed by media buyer John Thompson, who also works for Hulshof's campaign.

Kansas lawyer Caleb Stegall was involved in the lawsuit filed late Wednesday in Jackson County on behalf of Knob Noster resident Matt Cleveland. He claimed Thursday that the new organization is "a front group for Kenny Hulshof" that failed to comply with campaign finance law by filing its state paperwork too late.

The lawsuit seeks a restraining order stopping the group's ad from running and requiring it to make public its donors and expenditures. The lawsuit also asks the court to make the group pay to the state an amount generally equivalent to what it has spent seeking to influence the Republican gubernatorial primary.

Under state law, independent groups can run ads supporting or opposing candidates so long as there is no coordination with the candidate's campaign.

"We have not consulted with the Hulshof campaign at all," said Art Fillmore, a Kansas City lawyer who is president of Americans for a Better America.

Fillmore also asserted that the group's paperwork was properly filed with the Missouri Ethics Commission.

"I think their allegation is just flat wrong and uninformed," he said.

The ad is a response to one Steelman ran against Hulshof, highlighting that as a congressman he has supported thousands of spending earmarks for special projects and questioning his fiscal conservative credentials.

The Americans for a Better America ad says Steelman "is in full attack-and-mislead mode" while adding that Hulshof can be trusted as governor.

Fillmore said he was asked by "a couple of people who were interested in getting involved" in the governor's race to serve as president for the new group. But Fillmore said the behind-the-scenes organizers asked him not to identify them, nor to identify the contributors. Those donors will, however, be revealed when the group files its required quarterly campaign finance report by July 15, Fillmore said.

Americans for a Better America filed its paperwork as a political action committee Thursday with the Missouri Ethics Commission.

State law requires such documentation to be filed within 20 days after the committee formed.

The lawsuit contends the paperwork was late, because Americans for a Better America was incorporated as a not-for-profit organization by the Missouri secretary of state's office May 22.

But Fillmore contends that clock didn't start ticking until it received federal Internal Revenue Service approval as a political tax-exempt organization June 12.

Steelman spokesman Spence Jackson said her campaign was not financing the lawsuit but does support it. He accused the Hulshof campaign of trying "to skirt the law" on campaign finance issues.

"Kenny Hulshof thinks the rules don't apply to him, and that's wrong," Jackson said. "There are very stringent policies in place that regulate the conduct of campaigns in Missouri, and he's trying to bypass all of them."

Hulshof campaign spokesman Scott Baker called the charge of collaboration with the new committee "nonsense." He noted the Ethics Commission dismissed as unsubstantiated a similar allegation of coordination raised in the 2004 Democratic gubernatorial primary because of a TV ad run by an independent group.

"What this is is an attempt to talk about the means not the message -- they'll do anything to distract from the message of that ad," Baker said.