A court ruling issued last month is raising concerns about judicial independence in Missouri—even as it could cause trouble for a prominent Democrat running for the Missouri Senate.
The ruling was a loss for Gina Mitten, the Richmond Heights Democrat and former assistant minority leader of the Missouri House. She’s now locked in a tough battle for the seat being vacated by the term-limited Karla May, and as the race heats up next year, issues raised in the litigation are likely to become campaign fodder for her opponents.
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In 2021, Mitten had been appointed an administrative law judge for the state of Missouri, a six-figure job hearing appeals made to the Division of Workers’ Compensation. But Mitten was unceremoniously fired by the state three years later. That triggered her lawsuit, which argues that the state can’t just fire administrative law judges without following a process designed to shield them from political whims.
Her attorney, J. Andrew Hirth, says the case has enormous stakes for the future of an independent judiciary in Missouri. “We don’t want you to be able to be fired at the drop of a hat if the governor doesn’t like you, or doesn’t like the way you rule,” he says.
But the case also revealed that, while state officials did not follow the procedure outlined for a judge’s removal, they may well have a good case against Mitten. According to a “notice of unacceptable conduct” sent to her by the chief judge one month before her firing, Mitten flouted performance standards for judges, which decreed that cases should receive a judge’s determination within 90 days of a hearing’s conclusion. At one point, Mitten had cases that were 448 and 460 days late. Even after extensive coaching by more senior judges, the chief judge wrote, she had four cases that were at least 122 days late, one of them by 424 days.
“Writing awards is one of the most, if not the most, important thing that an administrative law judge does,” Chief Judge Jason Tilley wrote. “You were notified of this expectation on your very first day.”
One month later, Mitten had failed to clear any of the cases cited in Tilley’s letter. She was fired.
Mitten declined comment, saying her lawyer would have to speak to the case.
Her lawyer, Hirth, worries about what will happen if the ruling by Cole County Judge Cotton Walker is allowed to stand. Under its precedent, anyone who works for the executive branch could be treated as an at-will employee, even the members of the Missouri Ethics Commission. It’s not hard to see how a member of that commission could get crossways with a governor, which is why they were designed to be protected from interference, he says. “The statute says they can only be fired for good cause and certain things have to happen,” he says. “But this ruling essentially says, nope, under the Constitution, the governor has absolute authority to fire them.”
In the same way, he says, an administrative law judge could anger the powers that be for a ruling that’s sympathetic to workers. That shouldn’t put them in fear of losing their job, Hirth argues.
“That can’t be what the law is,” he adds.
What could prove unfortunate for Mitten’s political career, however, is that there’s no sign she was fired because she angered the state administration with her pro-labor rulings—only that she didn’t do her job. The “notice of unacceptable conduct” letters filed by her supervisors suggest at best incompetence, at worst utter negligence.
Hirth cautions that those facts have not been litigated and were not what the court was considering: Judge Walker looked only at whether the court could, not whether it should. He notes that Mitten has never gotten a vote of no confidence, much less the several he believes are required under state statute. “At the very least, she hasn’t had any kind of due process to defend herself against the allegations,” he says.
Mitten’s race for Senate District 4 looks to be a crowded field, with both state Rep. Steve Butz (D-St. Louis) and former prosecutor Chris Clark vying for the position. It’s not hard to imagine quotes involving “unacceptable conduct” making their way into attack ads.
Butz, for one, believes the case is relevant to Mitten’s candidacy.
“Public officials need to show up for work. Period,” he says. “For me, supporting working people and their families is the very core of what it means to be a Democrat. There is no reason any working person should wait a year to have their worker’s compensation resolved.”
Mitten is appealing the ruling, but she’s not likely to see resolution until next summer, or even fall—potentially at the height of campaign season.
Her case is joined by that of Ryan Asbridge, an administrative law judge who has been on a leave of absence since 2021 as he serves in the military reserves. Asbridge is suing to say he should be paid his full salary despite the long absence. The state is fighting that claim as well, saying that under Asbridge’s argument, they’d have to pay his six-figure salary “indefinitely,” even as he is also being paid full-time elsewhere.
