Missouri Republican Party files belated appeal to remove “honorary member of the Ku Klux Klan” from ballot

A lawyer for Darrell McClanahan III says the party’s objection comes too late to deny him a spot in the gubernatorial primary.

By Rudi Keller, Missouri Independent

The Missouri Republican Party is continuing its efforts to bar an “honorary member of the Ku Klux Klan” from the gubernatorial primary, but his lawyer says the move comes too late and the party should be aware of this.

On May 17, District Judge Cotton Walker ruled that Darrell McClanahan III of Milo would remain on the ballot for the Republican nomination for governor. The party’s attorney, Lowell Pearson of Jefferson City, filed an appeal Monday in the Western District Court of Appeals seeking to reverse that decision.

McClanahan, who is first on the ballot among nine candidates, is not running a large-scale campaign. He has not formed a committee to raise and spend money on his behalf. Only three competitors – State Senator Bill Eigel, Secretary of State Jay Ashcroft and Lieutenant Governor Mike Kehoe – are running large-scale campaigns, raising and spending millions and traveling extensively.

The appeal is too late, said David Roland, McClanahan’s attorney. Ashcroft certified the state’s list of candidates and issues on June 11, and under state law, a court cannot “order that a person or issue be placed on the ballot less than eight weeks before the election date.”

Roland filed a motion to dismiss the appeal and impose sanctions for a frivolous action.

“There is literally no chance that their appeal could succeed,” Roland said in an interview with The Independent. “They asked for only one thing in their petition, which was an injunction to prevent his name from being certified for the ballot. That action expired in May when the Secretary of State did exactly what the law required him to do, which was to certify the name for the ballot.”

Pearson declined to comment on the appeal or Roland’s filing.

The state party doesn’t want McClanahan on the ballot because he admitted in a lawsuit against the Anti-Defamation League that he was an “honorary member” of the Ku Klux Klan. McClanahan also faces criminal damage and theft charges in a case being tried in Wright County.

The state Republican Party sued Ashcroft to remove McClanahan, but Walker wrote that by accepting his $500 filing fee, the party was stuck with him. McClanahan was a Republican candidate for U.S. Senate in 2022 and his views were well known, Walker wrote.

The Republican Party is “a highly sophisticated entity, and the record shows that it was not only aware of the power of a party to reject a filing fee offered by a candidate,” Walker wrote, “but that elements of the Missouri Republican Party already had a policy of rejecting filing fees from any candidate who did not go through the required vetting process.”

On June 25, the Western District Court of Appeals is scheduled to hear a Vernon County case that asks whether a political party can reject a filing fee paid to the county clerk’s office to disqualify a candidate from running in the election.

The Vernon County case was decided on May 8, and the appeal began immediately. The appeals court stayed the trial court’s ruling that had disqualified the candidates and set up an expedited process to consider whether the court has the authority to act.

The state Republican Party did not try to speed up proceedings in Cole County and allowed the verdict to become final within the regular trial period, Roland wrote in his brief asking the court to dismiss the appeal.

As a major political party, Roland wrote, the GOP is “a sophisticated party that is well versed in the election laws of this state.”

And Pearson, he wrote, is a “highly respected attorney experienced in litigating under the election laws of this state.”

Since the requested relief could not be granted, Roland said, the appeal was a waste of time for the court.

“An appeal that raises no reasonable question and is obviously unfounded is frivolous,” he wrote.

Because the party has not tried to expedite the case or the appeal, it is unlikely the court will make a decision before the primary, Roland said. No transcript of the district court proceedings has been requested and the docket has not been prepared, he noted.

“If they were serious, they should have had the record ready by now,” Roland said. “They should have filed the complaint today along with their appeal. That was the only way they could have got this case heard before the election.”

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