Another week, another Republican governor under investigation for corruption and abuses of power. This time it's Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback, who is in a heap of trouble with the FBI over funneling business to his former chief of staff's lobbying company to profit handsomely from the state's Medicaid privitization scam.
The Topeka Capital-Journal learned the months-long inquiry involves Parallel Strategies, a rapidly expanding Topeka consulting and lobbying firm created in 2013 by a trio of veteran Brownback employees who left government service to work in an environment where coziness with former colleagues could pay dividends.
Of concern to the FBI were behind-the-scenes financial arrangements related to Brownback's privatization of the state's $3 billion Medicaid program. The governor's branding of KanCare handed to three for-profit insurance companies exclusive contracts to provide Medicaid services to 380,000 of Kansas' disabled and poor.
Owners of Parallel Strategies, who also maintain separate individual lobbying firms, declined requests to discuss for this story emergence of their influential joint franchise, which includes on its client list the governor himself.
Parallel Strategies was founded by David Kensinger, Brownback's former chief of staff and campaign manager and current director of the governor's political organization Road Map Solutions; George Stafford, a longtime fundraiser, employee and adviser to Brownback; and Riley Scott, a senior staff member to Brownback while he was in the U.S. Senate and son-in-law of Kansas Senate President Susan Wagle, R-Wichita.
So yeah, looks like in exchange for privitizing Medicaid for the state, Brownback's former staffers made big, big money doing it. What did Brownback get in return, you have to wonder? How about total control of the state?
In 2012, Brownback's red-state overhaul entered an advanced phase when he took a prominent role in a series of contested Republican Senate primary races. In a maneuver rare by Kansas standards, Brownback embraced a slate of GOP challengers and worked against incumbent Republicans opposed to pieces of the governor's agenda. Ten Republicans seeking re-election were ousted.
"They're ruthless," said Steve Morris, a former Senate president who lost re-election to a GOP candidate backed by the Brownback machinery. "I served with (Govs.) Joan Finney, Bill Graves, Kathleen Sebelius and Mark Parkinson. None of them, to my knowledge, did that."
Within days of the August primary, high-ranking members of the Brownback administration began informing political advocates that campaign contributions to moderates or Democrats would no longer be tolerated.
So you're Brownback's friend, he makes life good for you. You oppose him, well...
This road-to-riches boulevard in the U.S. capital was a hub of activity among former government employees eager to exploit revolving-door access and Republicans in government who made it known they were in charge and expected future political investment to mirror that reality.
"That is the sinister part of the Brownback folks," said Rep. Jim Ward, a Wichita Democrat. "They punish. They can make it very cold for you. I think that's bad for democracy. At some point, it's going to blow up."
Loos like it just went kaboom.
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