Bill making officials’ private account e-mails public record stalls

A bill that would have made private e-mails from state officials public records when they deal with official business appears to have stalled in the Kansas Legislature even as Democratic presidential frontrunner Hillary Clinton comes under national scrutiny for her use of private e-mail as secretary of state.

HB 2300, introduced by Wichita Democrat Rep. Jim Ward, would close a loophole that enables government officials to communicate outside of the boundaries of the state’s open records law if they use private e-mail on their personal electronic devices.

The bill did not receive a hearing before turnaround, the deadline for bills to pass their house of origin, and it was not “blessed” by the speaker of the House, a practice that allows bills to stay alive after the deadline.

Rep. John Barker, R-Abilene, chair of the House Judiciary Committee, said he sent a message to House Speaker Ray Merrick’s office on behalf of Ward asking for the bill to be blessed.

The speaker’s office said the hard deadline for bills to be blessed was Friday but did not immediately say why that bill did not receive a blessing.

Ward was under the impression Tuesday morning that his bill would be blessed and still would receive a hearing. He expressed optimism that the controversy over Clinton’s e-mails would show Republican colleagues that the proposal, meant to increase government transparency, should not be dismissed as a partisan attack on Brownback.

The New York Times reported Monday that Clinton exclusively used private e-mails during her tenure as secretary of state, possibly breaking federal rules.

Clinton’s use of private e-mails has been criticized by Republican rival Jeb Bush, who recently released his e-mails as Florida’s governor, and by the Republican National Committee, which accused Clinton of hypocrisy, noting her previous pledges of transparency.

“I think this helps a lot to demonstrate why this is not just an anti-Brownback bill. It’s really for transparency. Clinton should not have run her business through a private e-mail account as a secretary of state,” Ward said.

Ward’s bill was introduced after The Eagle reported in January that Brownback administration officials had communicated with lobbyists about the governor’s proposed budget on private e-mails weeks before it was unveiled to lawmakers.

“The fact that both Democrats and Republicans use private e-mail accounts to do public business is bad … and we should fix that,” Ward said.

Although the controversy over Clinton’s use of private e-mails helps draw attention to the issue, Ward’s bill won’t be headed to the floor – at least not on its own – this session. In a second interview, he said this was part of a pattern.

“It’s a pattern by the leadership of the Republican Party in the House to restrict debate. … I mean it’s a pattern of behavior here that it becomes real clear what they’re trying to do.”

“They don’t want to talk about issues they don’t want to talk about as if you don’t talk about them, they just go away. They don’t. They just fester,” Ward added.

Rep. John Barker, R-Abilene, said that Ward’s legislation might still survive because the Senate has recently passed several bills dealing with the open records act and Ward’s legislation could be tacked on as an amendment.

“It may be a moot issue whether it’s blessed or not,” Barker said.

“Nothing dies in Topeka,” he said. “I can’t imagine Ward giving up. He doesn’t give up very easily. So Jim will find some vehicle out there that might be good for him.”

Barker said he was following the story over Clinton’s e-mails and called it relevant to Kansas, but he would not say whether that would make him more likely to support closing the loophole as 26 other states have done.

Ward initially offered the legislation as an amendment on the floor earlier in the session and was chastised by Barker and other Republicans for not going through the committee process.

This story was originally published March 3, 2015 at 4:27 PM with the headline "Bill making officials’ private account e-mails public record stalls."