CAPITOL OFFICE

201 West Capitol Avenue Room 204 Jefferson City, MO 65101-6806 Telephone: (573) 751-0438 Email Address : Jake.hummel@house.mo.gov

COMMITTEES
Ex Officio Member: All House Committees

Jacob W. Hummel
Minority Floor Leader Missouri House of Representatives

Sept. 9, 2013 The Honorable Tim Jones Speaker of the House Missouri Capitol, Room 308 Jefferson City, MO 65101 Dear Speaker Jones: The Sept. 7 story in The Kansas City Star regarding your side business, Missouri Freedom Alliance, and the secrecy surrounding it raises troubling issues about whether the private work you perform for compensation is in conflict with your public duties as a state legislator and speaker of the Missouri House of Representatives. If no impropriety exists, then it is within your power to immediately put to rest any perceptions to the contrary. To date, however, your public comments regarding Missouri Freedom Alliance have instead served to increase suspicion rather than to allay it. Although you initially told The Star that Missouri Freedom Alliance performs legal consulting on the legislative process, you later retracted that statement and said the firm only does legal work unrelated to legislative or governmental matters. That may be true, but your shifting explanation coupled with your refusal to divulge your clients or any information regarding the work performed makes it difficult for Missourians to take you at your word. It also may be true, as you told The Star, that attorney-client privilege ethically bars you from discussing the specifics of your work. That hurdle, however, can easily be cleared by asking your clients to waive privilege, perhaps on a limited basis, to allow you more openly discuss the work performed by Missouri Freedom Alliance.

Fairly or unfairly, until such time as you are able to demonstrate that no conflict of interest exists between Missouri Freedom Alliance and your official duties, the public perception that you have something to hide will persist. For the good of the House of Representatives, we ask that you take all necessary steps to publicly clear the air regarding this matter. Sincerely,

House Minority Leader Jake Hummel

Assistant House Minority Leader Gail McCann Beatty