Earlier this year a federal court issued a temporary restraining order in a lawsuit challenging part of Kansas campaign finance laws defining a political action committee, or PAC. On January 6, 2025, United States District Judge Daniel D. Crabtree made it permanent.
Fresh Vision OP is a local community organization formed by James Muir and some of his neighbors to advocate for “preserving the quality of life in our unique neighborhoods while supporting the growth of small local businesses, maintaining safe neighborhoods, and promoting responsible development” in the Overland Park area.
Attorneys for the Institute for Free Speech and local counsel Josh Ney and Ryan Kriegshauser filed a lawsuit after state officials demanded Fresh Vision register as a PAC and disclose its donors in the wake of Fresh Vision’s 2021 endorsement of a mayoral candidate. The group suspended operations rather than submit to onerous regulations designed for campaign organizations. Under Kansas law, a PAC must file detailed financial reports and publicly identify their supporters, requirements designed for organizations focused on elections rather than community advocacy.
Fearing further enforcement actions, Fresh Vision suspended its activities about three years ago. However, with local elections looming in 2025, the group wanted to resume its advocacy but feared “that doing so [would] trigger a new threat of hefty fines and jail time and force the disclosure of its donor’s identities.”
According to a release from IFS, Crabtree ruled that Supreme Court and Tenth Circuit precedents “require that a group have the major purpose — not simply a major purpose — of express advocacy before a state may designate the group as a political committee. But [the law’s] definition of a political committee impermissibly allows Kansas to designate Fresh Vision (a group with a major purpose of express advocacy but no more than that) as a political committee. (emp. in original)”
“This ruling protects citizens’ rights to speak about local issues without fear of being mired in complex campaign finance regulations,” said Institute for Free Speech Senior Attorney Charles ‘Chip’ Miller. “Groups like Fresh Vision exist primarily to improve their communities through issue advocacy. The First Amendment doesn’t allow bureaucrats to use arcane regulations to burden these groups’ political speech rights simply because they sometimes express support for candidates who share their values.”
Kriegshauser said he was “pleased” with the decision.
“We are reviewing the Court’s decision but are pleased that the Court made permanent its injunction against the Kansas Governmental Ethics Commission,” Kriegshauser said. “The court’s order protects our clients’ rights and finds them to be prevailing parties in this constitutional litigation, making it possible that their attorney fees will be paid by the agency. However, the opinion makes clear that the legislature has work to do on these issues.”
Ney agreed the PAC definition is something the legislature needs to take up.
“We’ve known since October 2023 that there is bipartisan support for a generational update of campaign finance definitions, including the PAC definition found unconstitutional as applied here,” Ney said. “But continued misapplication or misinterpretation of vague statutes by this agency causes a lack of confidence that future laws will be fairly applied. This is as much of an agency leadership problem as it is a legislation problem. In the course of 10 months, our firm has now successfully challenged two unconstitutional applications of different laws by the ethics commission staff — one in state court and now one in federal court. Enough is enough. The legislature and commission need to provide leadership in establishing clear laws and fair applications of those laws.”
