Editor’s Note: This report is Part 2 of a Quill investigation into outside political action committee (PAC) spending in local August primary races. The Quill does not endorse candidates; all policy and voting analyses are sourced directly from Missouri House of Representatives roll-call ledgers (house.mo.gov), Missouri Ethics Commission (MEC) contribution disclosures for 'We the People Priorities PAC', and an on-the-record interview with 154th District Rep. Lisa Durnell.
When mailers targeting 154th District Rep. Lisa Durnell’s voting record landed in Howell County mailboxes earlier this month, campaign finance records filed with the Missouri Ethics Commission (MEC) traced the funding back to a $300,000 contribution from St. Louis mega-donor Rex Sinquefield to the We the People Priorities PAC.
Legislative roll-call records reveal a common thread connecting the PAC’s targets: opposition to House Joint Resolution 173, the precursor to Amendment 5, set to go before voters on Tuesday.
Roll-call voting records for HJR 173 — a proposed constitutional measure seeking to eliminate state income tax statewide and replace lost revenue by expanding sales taxes — show that both Durnell and 59th District Rep. Rudy Veit were among a handful of House Republicans who voted against the measure.
Both representatives are among three conservative figures identified early this month by the Quill as targets of We the People Priorities PAC’s attack campaign. While Veit is term-limited out of the House, he has set his sights on the Senate’s 6th District. The third target, Camden County Presiding Commissioner Todd “Ike” Skelton — currently competing in a six-way Republican primary for Senate District 6 — has also publicly campaigned against top-down state tax swaps.
HJR 173 eventually made its way to the August ballot as Amendment 5, backed heavily by a coalition of capital city lobbyists and major statewide political donors — including Sinquefield, who for more than two decades has bankrolled statewide political efforts aimed at replacing income and earnings taxes with sales tax models, according to campaign finance databases and reporting by news outlets including ProPublica.
Because We the People Priorities PAC is registered as a general "Continuing PAC" rather than a candidate committee, ethics laws allow it to operate without pre-declaring which candidates or ballot measures it intends to target.
However, mandatory eight-day pre-primary disclosures filed with the MEC on Monday reveal the full scope of the committee's late-July blitz. According to the state filings, We the People Priorities PAC reported spending $298,518 on direct mail opposition campaigns across Missouri.
In addition to targeting Durnell in the 154th District with $6,848 in itemized mailer expenditures, state filings show that since July 20, the PAC deployed targeted direct mail into several other contested House Republican primaries, including races involving Ryan Hagedorn (District 127), Sandy Karnes (District 139), Tony Harbison (District 144), Tina Goodrick (District 11), Jason Soseman (District 3) and David Robertson (District 97).
While the Quill’s inquiry focuses on the paper trail behind the attack campaign rather than the political claims themselves, the Quill reached out to Durnell for her perspective on the motivation behind the mailers.
For Durnell, the targeted mailers represent an effort by state-level interests to punish independent lawmakers who refuse to toe the party line in Jefferson City.
"I have had the courage to vote for the people of my district and state — not how the corporate lobby wanted me to vote," Durnell wrote in an email response to the Quill. "Unfortunately, representatives who have the ability to stand strong for the citizens come under attack by the lobby during campaign season."
Durnell noted that the claims on the mailers — which accuse her of voting to raise taxes — are directly contradicted by official House Journal records.
"I easily debunked the lies about their claim of me 'raising taxes' by producing a copy of the House Journal proving that I voted no on that bill," Durnell said. "Sadly, not everyone will research or find out if the claims on the mailer were true, so the outside lobby group will have planted the idea in peoples' heads even though it is absolutely false. I think it all comes back to truth.”
Voters wishing to inspect official roll-call records directly can do so online at house.mo.gov.
During her freshman term, Durnell established a reputation among Capitol observers as a holdout on late-session compromise packages. She pointed to recent legislation like Senate Bill 888 and its companion, House Bill 2637 — a 377-page public safety bill delivered late at night and brought to a vote the following morning — as examples of why she scrutinizes legislation before casting a vote.
"That is not ample time to read the bill, much less ask questions or get expert opinion on it," Durnell explained. "This is not good governance. I want better for the people of Missouri. Of course I strongly support measures to improve public safety and support law enforcement! But we need to do a better job as a legislative body by slowing down and passing bills that are well-written, properly vetted and constitutional."
When asked about the influence of outside PACs pouring money into a local rural primary, Durnell called the tactic a serious concern.
"I think it is a serious concern, and I am hopeful that Howell Countians will recognize the special interests who are trying to impact our local decision for this race," Durnell said. "I hope voters do their due diligence and research the voting records of the candidates and send a message to the PACs that they will not be influenced by lies and deception."
The series has been extended; watch for Part 3 of this series in Saturday’s edition of the Quill, featuring an on-the-record interview with primary challenger Travis Smith on campaign ethics, dark money disavowals and local control.
