Chris Steineger fined $5,000 for ethics violation

Kansas state Sen. Chris Steineger wasn’t talking about his former campaign finance director, Mike Sager, last week. But the Kansas City, Kansas, Democrat dropped Sager’s name a lot during a Kansas Governmental Ethics Commission hearing on Tuesday.

Steineger blamed Sager for not purging lobbyists names from his campaign donor lists, leading to lobbyists getting hit up for donations during the legislative session, a campaign violation. You can see it all thanks to Kansas Watchdog reporter Earl Glynn, who put together a highlight

reel of the hearing.

The ethics commission ruled there was “insufficient evidence” that

Steineger had knowingly solicited lobbyists (because, to paraphrase

Steineger, it was all Mike Sager’s fault), but they did ding him $5,000

for paying for polling for his secretary of state/gubernatorial campaign

with money in his senate campaign fund (another violation of ethics

rules). The Watchdog also points out that chairwoman Sabrina Standifer called out Steineger for his

“multiple explanations” for how he paid for the polling.