Kansas GOP settles lawsuit, apologizes for mailer accusing JoCo developer of cronyism

The Kansas Republican Party paid a Johnson County couple $15,000 to settle a false light invasion of privacy lawsuit and issued a statement Wednesday apologizing to the couple for the 2020 campaign mailer accusing the couple of political cronyism which prompted the lawsuit.

“The mailer, approved by the previous KSGOP Chairman and distributed during his tenure, was an error in past leadership’s judgement starting an unnecessarily long and expensive legal process,” Mike Brown, the current chair of the Kansas Republican Party, said in a written statement.

“We will never let a situation like this happen again while I am Chairman. This situation should never have reached this point, and we are happy this case has been resolved.”

Shawnee couple Kevin Tubbesing, a developer, and Dawn Tubbesing, a former city councilwoman who unsuccessfully ran for mayor in 2019, sued the Kansas Republican Party at the start of 2021. They said a campaign flier circulated in Shawnee during a state Senate race in the fall of 2020 accused them of “crony corruption.”

The case, which was originally filed in Johnson County District Court, was in the Kansas Court of Appeals when a notice of settlement was filed with the court last week.

A claim of false light invasion of privacy is slightly different from defamation. A false light claim in Kansas must falsely represent someone, be highly offensive to a reasonable person and involve the widespread disclosure of private matters.

The flier involved two $250 campaign contributions Dawn Tubbesing made to Democrat Lindsey Constance, who ran unsuccessfully against Republican Mike Thompson. Thompson, a former TV meteorologist, was appointed to fill an unexpired term in the Kansas Senate and elected to a full four years in 2020.

It suggested that the donations were connected to Kevin Tubbesing’s proposal at the time to build an apartment complex, using tax incentives needing approval by the Shawnee City Council, where Constance served as a Ward 4 member.

The council in December 2019 approved a $3.1 million bundle of tax incentives for the luxury apartment complex, off Nieman Road and Johnson Drive. Constance was among those who voted in favor of it.

The flier, titled “Lindsey Constance is writing love letters to special interests,” said Constance received a $250 contribution from Dawn Tubbesing in October 2019, and another donation months later after the project’s public financing was approved.

The Tubbesings argued the mailer painted them in a false light and accused them of being part of a quid pro quo scheme. In their lawsuit, they say the flier was distributed to more than 5,000 Shawnee homes.

“We’re feeling generally pleased with the settlement acknowledging a total error on the part of the party to have done this in the first place. It was extremely poor judgment on party leadership to allow this to happen to begin with,” Kevin Tubbesing told The Star on Thursday.

“The total apology from party leadership, I think, clearly demonstrates the error in judgment by Kuckelman was a grave mistake and doesn’t reflect whatsoever on Dawn and my service, both on and off the City Council and as well as in numerous institutions in Shawnee and Johnson County,” Tubbesing said.

Tubbesing told The Star the party covered the cost of their legal fees in the settlement. Kansas Republican Party Executive Director Dakotah Parshall said the full settlement was $15,000.

Mike Kuckelman, who led the Kansas Republican Party when the lawsuit was filed, criticized Brown’s decision to settle and suggested the party made the decision because of financial struggles.

Had the party fully litigated the case Kuckleman, a Johnson County attorney, believed it would have won.

“However, in this case, it is short-sighted to settle for economic reasons because the long-term implications of the Kansas Republican Party surrendering its 1st Amendment of free political speech right are quite serious,” Kuckelman said in a written statement.

“Political opponents now realize that under the Kansas Republican Party’s current Chair, the Party will not stand up to political bullying even when Constitutional Rights are at risk.”