Kansas attorney general Kris Kobach has hired more lawyers but is still short on staff

While Kris Kobach has brought on more lawyers and other employees, the Kansas Attorney General's Office continues to struggle with understaffing.

Kobach told lawmakers this week that when he started as attorney general, the office was short 25 attorneys.

"We hired a total of 18 new attorneys, and we lost seven through natural attrition," he said.

After that net gain of 11 lawyers, 14 vacancies remain. Kobach said he is "hopeful that we will be able to finally get to full staffing with our attorneys."

In the past year, shortages of both attorneys and non-attorney staff have been cited as reason to delay hearings and filing deadlines in state and federal courts.

Staffing was a point of emphasis as Kobach presented his office's budget request to legislative committees. First was a subcommittee of the Senate Ways and Means Committee on Monday, then came the House General Government Budget Committee on Tuesday.

Kobach thanked legislators for increased funding last session intended to make salaries at the attorney general's office more competitive to help stem the tide of lawyers leaving for better-paid jobs. Last year's funding request was not without political division, as Democrats had an alternative theory that staff left because they didn't want to work for Kobach.

"I'm also happy to report that the approximately $600,000 that this committee gave us that we requested in order to retain our attorneys that we were losing and hire more attorneys has been largely successful," Kobach said. "We're not all the way to where we need to be, but it has achieved its objective, and we're very appreciative of that."

Even with pay increases, some of the attrition is due to attorneys leaving for better pay at counties, Kobach said.

"Because they're able to offer more than the state does, they're still able to poach our attorneys from time to time," he said. "But we're in a much better position that we were. Our salaries are closer to competitive; there are still some counties that can can offer more."

Kobach said his office has also hired a net of 13 non-attorney staff. As a whole, the office has about 29 vacancies out of 196 full-time equivalent positions. That's compared to 33 vacancies out of 179 FTEs a year ago. He wants to add to the budget five full-time equivalent positions, none of which would be attorneys.

More: Why is Kris Kobach using a private email account for work as Kansas attorney general?

Kobach says suing Biden doesn't take attorneys away from criminal cases

Kobach touted the work of his office's various divisions, but he put a particular emphasis on the new special litigation division. That's the three-attorney unit tasked with fulfilling Kobach's election campaign promise to "sue Joe Biden."

"Special litigation is the division designed to protect Kansans from federal overreach and protect the Constitution," he said.

That has meant co-leading a lawsuit with Texas against the Biden administration over lesser prairie chicken protections while supporting other states in a challenge to a gun regulation on pistol braces, among other legal action and letters.

The division is expected to take on more work, as Kobach is anticipating another lawsuit against the Biden administration over "ObamaCare benefits to certain aliens who are not legally present in the United States."

"It is likely that Kansas would be leading that lawsuit," he said.

More: Do you want to sue Joe Biden? Kansas AG Kris Kobach will pay an attorney up to $120,000.

In addition to suing Biden's administration, the division has taken on the role of suing Gov. Laura Kelly's administration. The attorneys in special litigation, with courtroom assistance from Kobach, took on the role of defending anti-transgender law Senate Bill 180 and Kobach's interpretation that it bans gender marker changes on driver's licenses.

Sen. Jeff Pittman, D-Leavenworth, suggested Kobach should put less focus on that division's efforts.

"Just one negative I'll say is for me personally is I hope we can focus more on our victims inside of the state of Kansas and the criminal (division) and the crimes versus some of this special litigation that are more ideological," Pittman said.

"We have vacancies in every division," Kobach said. "At this stage of the game, if there's a good attorney who's willing to work for us and has the right experience and is in criminal, we'll hire him for criminal, or if it's in civil fraud we'll hire him there, or if it's in special litigation we'll hire him there. We're hiring everywhere.

"Special litigation hasn't taken attorneys from elsewhere or taken potential attorneys from elsewhere. Criminal is where we really demand experience in criminal prosecution, and that remains where the shortages are hitting us the hardest. So I just want to reassure you that our work in these constitutional cases is not in any way pulling attorneys from the other divisions where this important work is done."

"For me personally," Pittman said, "and it is a personal point of view, I feel like our time is better spent on our citizens here and a little less on the ideological front. But I understand that might be a little different than your folks."

Of the 18 new hires, two or three work on criminal appeals while two or three work on criminal trial court prosecutions, Kobach told the House committee. But there are still five or six vacancies in the criminal division.

More attorneys would allow the attorney general's office to provide more assistance to county prosecutors during criminal trials.

"We have been able to step up our work in the criminal area; we still aren't able to say yes to every county request," Kobach said.

On appeals, "Our attorneys are overworked and they're handling a large number of cases, but nothing is being left on the table."

More: Kris Kobach tells Nebraska town he can still work for it while Kansas attorney general

Kobach and Kelly split on budget request

The attorney general's office is requesting a revised fiscal year 2024 budget of $82 million. Part of the revision is due to eight supplemental requests.

Kelly supported some of those requests, like using $300,000 on the Victim Information and Notification Everyday system and using $1 million from the state general fund for natural gas price gouging litigation tied to Winter Storm Uri.

Kobach previously lost the case on a technicality after firing the outside counsel hired by former Attorney General Derek Schmidt, but he has since brought on Hilgers Graben and refiled the case. The Nebraska law firm is charging hourly rates and will also be entitled to a contingency fee if the litigation is successful.

"We brought in new outside counsel to help with this," Kobach said. "This $1 million is money that we fully expect to recover, assuming we prevail in the litigation. So this is money up front to pay for various costs in the litigation."

But the governor did not recommend adopting the reorganization of the civil division, along with its two new FTE positions, or providing $200,000 from the state general fund to cover a shortage in the court cost fund. She also did not recommend the reorganization funding in fiscal year 2025, or the $900,000 for the court cost fund.

"We didn't get a clear signal as to why not," Kobach said.

The court cost fund is largely funded by large legal settlements and has been used in recent years to cover some basic operations.

"Before I came in as attorney general, the administration of the attorney general's office had been using court cost funds to sort of backfill things that had previously been funded by the SGF and didn't request SGF funding for those things," Kobach said. "Now, because the court cost fund is being depleted, we want to restore the situation where the SGF was being used.

"I don't think we should get in the habit of taking money out of the court costs fund to fund things that are really part of the every year business of the attorney general's office. I'd rather see the settlements go to SGF and then the Legislature keep funding our agency with the things we would normally assume are going to happen every year."

Jason Alatidd is a Statehouse reporter for the Topeka Capital-Journal. He can be reached by email at jalatidd@gannett.com. Follow him on X @Jason_Alatidd.

This article originally appeared on Topeka Capital-Journal: Staff struggles continue for Kansas AG Kris Kobach despite more money