KANSAS CITY, Mo — Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt has sued 11 Kansas City-area school districts over mask mandates. Schmitt has argued that the districts do not have the authority to impose public health orders for students.
But, Kansas City lawyer Joseph Hatley, who is representing some of the school districts sued by the AG, said several Missouri statutes broadly give school boards the ability to govern their own affairs.
In fact, he claims Schmitt has no authority granted by the Missouri General Assembly to stop mask mandates from being enforced in schools.
“Missouri law very clearly gives locally-elected Boards of Education the legal authority to run their own affairs as they best see fit,” Hatley said. “He can go into court like he’s doing now and try to say that school districts are breaking the law, but he himself has no authority to do anything like this.”
KSHB 41 asked him which of the three governing bodies supersede the others: Board of Education, local government or the Attorney General’s Office.
“The school districts in the Kansas City, city limits have been following the mask ordinances that the City Council has adopted, and we believe they have the authority to do that,” Hatley said. “We certainly don’t think the attorney general has any legal authority to come in and override a board of education’s decision to follow a city ordinance.”
The attorney general disagrees, and said he is authorized to represent the State of Missouri in court as its Chief Legal Officer.
“We are asking the court to say, ‘Look judge, they have no legal authority to do this. They need to stop.’” Schmitt said.
Contrary to Hatley’s claims, Schmitt said the General Assembly has never delegated any authority to school districts to impose health mandates as there are no prior statutes.
“The law says that you, the general assembly has to specifically delegate this authority — the authority to force healthy kids to wear masks all day long, or force healthy kids to stay home. They’ve never done that,” Schmitt said.
The attorney general has filed a total of 35 lawsuits on Friday against school districts with on-going mask mandates.
