Kelly Sues Kobach Seeking Quo Warranto

Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly sued Attorney General Kris Kobach in the state Supreme Court, alleging he improperly refused to defend Kansans against what she calls the Trump administration’s unlawful federal overreach and intruded on the governor’s constitutional “supreme executive” authority. Kelly asked the court for a quo warranto order to bar Kobach from interfering and to clarify that the governor may retain outside counsel or join lawsuits when the attorney general declines to act. She has already joined multistate suits seeking emergency USDA SNAP funds (which proponents say affect about 188,000 Kansans) and to block cuts to public health and safety program funding. Kobach responded that Kansas law and precedent make the attorney general the state’s chief legal officer who “appears for the state” and controls litigation, called Kelly’s action unprecedented, and said she was attempting to seize control of the state’s litigation agenda. The dispute, a partisan clash between the Democratic governor and Republican attorney general, raises immediate stakes for food and program funding and could determine who sets Kansas’s legal positions in federal and state courts.