MOScout Daily Update: NKC Pursues Stadium - Kelly for Senate 16 - Roberts Sues Accuser - Hawley's Lefty Credit Card Plan and more...
Quick Friday update…
Stadium Watch: Royals and NKC Legislators Huddle
Wednesday night, Royals leadership and community stakeholders discussed the potential of locating the new Royals stadium in North Kansas City. In this photo… Royals President Brooks Sherman and Executive Vice President Sarah Tourville, Republican and Democratic Reps. Chris Brown and Maggie Nurrenbern, as well as, Speaker-designate Jon Patterson.
Kelly Announces for Senate 16 (2026)
Rep. Hannah Kelly announced on the radio yesterday that she is amending her campaign committee to run for state senate. She’ll run in Senate 16 in 2026 – when Sen. Justin Brown is termed. Listen to her announcement here.
· Seems early BUT…. I expect this will be, like all the Republican state senate races this cycle, a contested primary, so it helps to get out and start shaking hands.
Roberts Sues Accuser
Post-Dispatch reports that “Missouri Sen. Steve Roberts Jr. is suing a woman who he says violated a confidential settlement in a lawsuit she filed in 2017 that accused him of sexual assault at a downtown bar.”
· In the lawsuit filed Tuesday against Amy Harms, Roberts, D-St. Louis, said her accusations that he assaulted her were untrue and violated a settlement agreement the two reached in 2019. Harms made posts on social media and spoke to the press about her assault allegation last year while Roberts made an unsuccessful run for Congresswoman Cori Bush's seat.
· The lawsuit also names Harms' attorney, Matthew Ghio, as a defendant. It accuses Ghio of violating the agreement by making statements to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch in April 2022 disclosing terms of the settlement. In that article, Ghio claimed that Roberts had breached the agreement first and forced Harms to defend herself publicly.
What It Means
If Roberts had hoped that the confidential settlement would enabled him to move pass the allegations as he plotted his future political career, those hopes have likely faded by now.
Hawley’s Economic Populist Agenda
Politico’s Influence reports on pushback from industry on Senator Josh Hawley’s proposal to cap credit card rates. Read it here.
[M]ore than half a dozen banking trade groups also issued a warning to Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) Wednesday over a different credit card bill they say he’s pushing for an amendment vote on. Hawley’s bill, introduced last week, would cap the annual percentage rate for credit cards at 18 percent, and bar card providers from imposing fees to get around that cap. It’s similar to a 2019 proposal from Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) that would have capped interest rates at 15 percent, but financial institutions lambasted the idea in a letter to Hawley sent yesterday, contending it would “significantly limit consumers’ access to credit cards.”
Situational Awareness: Recession Risk Rising
As resilient as the economy has been, the risk of recession remains…
Lobbyists Registrations
Ashley Lawson added Onyx Aesthetics, Purgatory Tattoos, and The https://www.facebook.com/VaultBeautyCoVault.
$5K+ Contributions
American Dream PAC (pro-Kehoe) - $15,000 from Nodaway Valley Bank.
American Dream PAC - $15,000 from Blue Cross Blue Shield of Kansas City PAC.
Committee for Liberty (pro-Ashcroft) - $15,000 from John Tlapek (Englewood, CO).
Independence PAC (pro-McMullen) - $10,000 from Quality Schools Coalition.
Conservative Solutions for Missouri PAC (pro-ME Coleman) - $10,000 from Quality Schools Coalition.
Conservative Solutions for Missouri PAC - $10,000 from Mo Coalition for Video Lottery PAC.
The Rowdy PAC - $30,000 from J & J Ventures Gaming of MO LLC.
Janet Thompson for Boone County - $10,000 from Janet Thompson.
Birthdays
Happy birthdays to David Willis, and Bruce Franks.