Missouri lawmakers peddling false choice between public defenders, Medicaid expansion

Missouri lawmakers are taking small steps to rectify the outrageous denial of constitutional rights for thousands of criminal defendants who need a public defender.

Sadly, the steps are too small, and they’re doing it the wrong way.

Tuesday, the House Budget Committee considered a bill adding a little more than $1 million to the public defenders’ budget, allowing the office to hire up to 15 additional lawyers. The director of the Office of the Public Defender, Mary Fox, said the money would allow her to clear up the backlog of some cases in some offices.

That’s incredibly important. As The Star has reported, thousands of indigent defendants have waited months for a public defender to represent their interests before a judge. Some of those defendants have languished in jail, waiting for the lawyer they’re owed by the U.S. Constitution.

In February, Missouri Circuit Court Judge William Hickle said it was likely that plaintiffs who claim an inadequate public defense would prevail in a lawsuit. More than 5,800 defendants were on wait lists in November 2019, the court found, without a public defender or private attorney.

“The State violates the Sixth Amendment (and the Missouri Constitution equivalent in Article I) by charging an indigent defendant with a crime … then delaying for weeks, months, and even more than a year before furnishing the defendant with an attorney,” Hickle wrote.

He gave the legislature until July 1 to rectify the problem.

The 15 additional lawyers won’t get the job done, even when combined with 12 new lawyers approved in an earlier budget measure. By most estimates, the Office of the Public Defender needs 53 more attorneys to adequately represent all clients, and to clean up the wait lists.

That would cost about $3.6 million, a pittance in a state with a $34 billion budget.

But it’s even worse than that, because the $1 million set aside for 15 public defenders is coming from an alternative spending blueprint that assumes Medicaid won’t be expanded in Missouri.

It’s outrageous. This isn’t an either-or situation. Missouri has more than enough cash to pay for expanded Medicaid and a fully-funded public defenders’ office.

And spending that money isn’t optional. The Missouri Constitution requires the state to make Medicaid available to qualified adults. The U.S. Constitution requires Missouri to provide an adequate defense for suspects who can’t afford a lawyer.

The recalcitrance in Jefferson City almost guarantees an ongoing lawsuit over the lack of funding for indigent defense. A lawsuit over the lack of Medicaid expansion is also a certainty if lawmakers don’t change their minds.

It is beyond frustrating to watch legislators continually dodge their legal obligations. And it should anger Missourians that lawmakers want to pit poor defendants against poor workers who lack health insurance.

Republicans have claimed the state lacks the resources to pay for these programs. It simply isn’t true. Tax revenues have exceeded expectations during the pandemic, and the federal government is showering billions on the state to pay for essential services.

Providing a lawyer to a defendant who can’t afford one is just such a service. We urge the Missouri Senate, and legislators in both parties, to fully fund the public defender and expand Medicaid before adjournment in May.