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OLATHE, Kan. (AP) — The Associated Press sued a Kansas county Thursday, alleging it has wrongly withheld public records involving alleged fiscal misconduct by the county's former elections chief who later took a top U.S. elections job.
The lawsuit names Johnson County's governing board as defendants and seeks under the state's open-records law emails related to Brian Newby's role as county election commissioner before he took a job in November as the U.S. Election Assistance Commission's executive director.
An audit released after Newby left the Kansas job alleged that he misused of thousands of dollars in public funds and raised questions about his management of the elections office.
The county's top prosecutor, Stephen Howe, has said his office is reviewing the allegations. Newby has called the audit findings "inaccurate, incomplete and misleading."
A spokeswoman for the county, Sharon Watson, declined to comment Thursday, citing the pending litigation, which was filed in district court.
In his federal job, Newby angered voting rights advocates when he decided without public notice or review from his agency's commissioners that residents of Alabama, Kansas and Georgia no longer can register to vote using a federal form without providing documentary proof of U.S. citizenship. The federal commission was created in part to help make voting easier.
The Kansas audit, released in March, alleged that during his time at the local elections office, Newby intentionally skirted oversight of government credit card expenses, improperly claimed mileage and travel expenses and wasted taxpayer funds. Auditors found Newby used the government card of the assistant commissioner, in effect allowing him to approve most of his own expenditures rather than submit them to the county manager.
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