(Updated to include comment from Resner)
A Shawnee County judge has refused to allow the state ethics commission to enforce a second subpoena as part of a lengthy and broad investigation into alleged state campaign finance violations.
Shawnee County District Judge Teresa Watson on Tuesday denied a petition from the ethics commission seeking to enforce the subpoena against Paje Resner, who served as the chief of staff to former House Speaker Ron Ryckman Jr.
Like a similar ruling from last year involving the treasurer of the Lift Up political action committee that donates mostly to Republican candidates, Watson found that the state law used as the basis for enforcing the subpoena was unconstitutionally vague.
It’s the latest setback for the ethics commission, which has been conducting a broad investigation into whether PACs allegedly gave money to county Republican parties that was in turn relayed to the state Republican Party to skirt campaign finance limits.
Resner said in an email that she was grateful for the ruling.
“This has been a long and challenging process, and we have always felt that we were unfairly targeted throughout,” Resner said.
“We’re confident that the Court correctly found that the ethics commission’s novel application of the giving in the name of another statute was unconstitutional.
“This decision is a step toward ensuring fairness in the system, and my sincere hope is that it prevents others from being subject to the same type of unjust and uneven enforcement attempts by the ethics commission in the future.”
The ethics commission has been seeking information about contributions from the Republican State Leadership Committee in Washington, D.C., to the LIFT Up PAC and the Right Way Kansas PAC during the 2020 elections.
The investigation has focused on whether there was a violation of a state law barring someone from making a campaign contribution in the name of another. The law also prohibits someone from knowingly taking a contribution made in the name of another.
Watson rejected the commission’s request to enforce the subpoena under a 2016 law intended to discourage lawsuits aimed at limiting free speech on matters of public interest.
The law required ethics officials to show a likelihood of prevailing in their effort to get the court to enforce the subpoena.
A judge’s approval for the ethics commission to enforce an ethics subpoena was required under a new state law approved by the Legislature in 2023.
Resner argued that the ethics commission could not establish a likelihood of prevailing on its claim because the subpoena required reasonable suspicion of a statutory violation.
She said the law was unconstitutionally vague, and any alleged violation of the statute could not be the basis for a lawful subpoena.
Watson sided with Resner in striking the subpoena.
“The proposed subpoena is unenforceable against Resner because it requires reasonable
suspicion of a violation of (the law), and there can be no such finding because the statute
is unconstitutionally vague as applied,” she wrote.
Watson noted that the statute that bars giving a campaign contribution in the name of another contains not only uncommon words, but too few of them with little explanation of what they mean.
“’In the name of another’ is the sticking point,” Watson wrote.
“This phrase has not been judicially defined in Kansas, as it exists in this statute or any other that would be helpful to this analysis,” she wrote.
“Nor does this phrase have a settled meaning in Kansas law, notably in the context of modern campaign finance,” she ruled.
Court documents that the judge unsealed in a separate case show that ethics officials were looking at contributions that the LIFT Up Kansas PAC and The Right Way PAC for Economic Growth made to Republican parties in Johnson, Sedgwick and Shawnee counties and ended up with the state party.
Ethics officials said in court documents that campaign contributions could be traced from the Republican State Leadership Committee to the Kansas Republican Party.
They allege in those documents that about $54,000 funds were donated directly as well as passed through the LIFT Up Kansas PAC, The Right Way PAC for Economic Growth PAC and the Republican parties in Johnson, Shawnee and Sedgwick counties.
Th ethics commission said in court documents there was “reasonable suspicion” to believe that the LIFT Up Kansas PAC, The Right Way Kansas PAC, and the Republican parties in Johnson, Shawnee and Sedgwick counties made and accepted contributions in excess of legal limits set by state law.
Ethics officials said in court documents that former House Speaker Ryckman and his chief of staff, Resner, organized the contributions from the Republican State Leadership Committee to the Right Way and LIFT Up PACs.
Court documents show that Resner had said that her duties as Ryckman’s chief of staff did not involve providing services for or on behalf of the LIFT Up Kansas PAC, The Right Way Kansas PAC or any other political action committee.
Resner said she volunteered for The Right Way PAC. She said her volunteer service was not related to her professional work as Ryckman’s chief of Staff.
As a volunteer, she “performed purely administrative tasks,” according to Watson’s ruling.
Resner said she had no authority to make decisions on behalf of the PAC, “including but not limited to how much, to whom, or in what manner any contributions were made or received.”
Resner said she was not involved with the LIFT Up Kansas PAC either as a volunteer or in her role as chief of staff.
“There is nothing in the (ethics commission’s) findings of fact or conclusions of law that establishes a reasonable suspicion that a violation of (law) has occurred,” Watson said in her ruling.
The ethics commission’s “findings and conclusions allege that Ryckman was a member of and candidate for the legislature, and he received letters from the RSLC when contributions were made to the PACs,” she said.
“There is nothing articulated in the (ethics commission’s) findings and conclusions that addresses whether Ryckman ‘established’ a political committee,” she wrote.
“The findings and conclusions are insufficient to support an alleged violation…as an independent basis for issuance of the subpoena.”
