1/7 From me, @HunterMw, @BryanLowry3, @BlakePater: Kobach prides himself as a defender of hardline immigration ordinances. He said the ACLU would lose, & he'd win. The towns spent $9.5m & aren’t enforcing their laws. Kobach, meanwhile, rocketed to fame. propublica.org/article/kris-k…
2/ That’s a lot of bylines, but that’s bc this was a ton of work. We traveled to 2 of the towns, sent more than 30 records requests, did dozens of interviews - all to answer a lot of qs. How much did Kobach make? How much did the towns spend? What impact did his work have?
3/ We answered them. We know Kobach made at least $800,000 on his immigration work. It’s almost certainly an undercount, & we'll never know exactly how much he did make. He doesn’t release his tax returns, and, as you’ll read in our story, his financial disclosures are incomplete
4/ The towns spent nearly $10 million combined. One, already millions in debt when Kobach began defending it, took on $1.4m in additional loans to pay the ACLU’s attorneys fees when they lost. Read about the town that spent $7m in our story.
5/ His work, ultimately, didn’t have the impact he hoped it would. None of the towns are enforcing the ordinances. In one of the towns, Kobach helped recraft the ordinance. It’s now seen as toothless, even tho it’s still on the books.
6/ Kobach denies that these towns helped his national profile and that his financial disclosures are incomplete. He says the towns knew what they were getting into, and calls one of the towns a “victory.”
7/7 Read about all this (and more!) in our piece. Really proud of the work that collaborative journalism can produce when national orgs like @ProPublica and local orgs like @KCStar work together. propublica.org/article/kris-k…
