ST. LOUIS– Missouri Governor Mike Parson took care of one statewide office appointment before the Thanksgiving holiday, naming his General Counsel Andrew Bailey as the state’s next Attorney General on Wednesday. Bailey will take over the office for Eric Schmitt, who is now U.S. Senator-Elect and will be sworn into that office in January.

Parson praised Bailey’s work behind the scenes on issues ranging from second amendment protections and opposition to statewide mask and vaccine mandates during the COVID pandemic, to drawing down the backlog of clemency petitions and weighing judicial appointments.

Missouri House Democrats quickly issued a statement Wednesday calling on Bailey to rescind Schmitt lawsuits, which were seen by critics as elevating his political profile with attention-grabbing filings. “This is an essential step to restoring the integrity of the office and demonstrating that, for the first time in years, Missouri has an attorney general who will put the legal interests of all Missourians ahead of the political ambitions of one,” Minority Leader Crystal Quade D-Springfield said.

Bailey did not necessarily commit to continuing several of the Schmitt-era lawsuits which will outlive the current Attorney General’s tenure, including one accusing government officials of conspiring with social media companies to censor dissent. Bailey said the office’s resources, staffing and other factors will determine next steps, but the language he used Wednesday sounded like that of someone in step with the posture Schmitt has articulated. 

“When Missourians who value liberty want someone to stand in the gap against federal overreach, I’m going to be the Attorney General who does precisely that,” he said.

Now the focus shifts to the next Parson appointment, for State Treasurer, to succeed Scott Fitzpatrick, who will be sworn in as the next State Auditor in January. Parson told Spectrum News Wednesday that he asked the finalists for the Attorney General post to commit to running in 2024 and serving a full term, as a way of promoting stability in an office that will have seen plenty of turnover since Josh Hawley won election in 2016, then successfully ran for the Senate in 2018, leading to Schmitt’s time in the post since January 2019.

It’s unclear if Parson will ask the same of the next Treasurer, which has seen the same kind of turnover as a result of the domino effect of Schmitt’s first move to succeed Hawley as the state’s top law enforcer.

Parson told Spectrum News interviews with potential Treasurer candidates would begin after Thanksgiving, with the goal of naming an appointee by the middle of December.

November elections certified; Spring races loom

The results of the Nov. 8 election have been certified in the city of St. Louis and St. Louis County ahead of the Nov. deadline Megan Green has already been sworn in as President of the St. Louis Board of Aldermen following her win over Jack Coatar. Green will celebrate with an inauguration event at City Hall Monday morning.

Coatar surprised some by announcing this week he would not seek re-election to the Board of Aldermen in the spring. Filing for the March 7 primary for what will now be a reduced number of board seats at 14 as well as the Aldermanic president’s office, opens Monday morning at 8 am. Green has already said she plans to run to seek the full term.

The first day to file for other municipal races on the April ballot is December 6.

Legislative filing begins Dec. 1

We’ll start to get our first look at the pieces of legislation which will occupy the attention of Missouri state lawmakers in the 2023 session on Thursday, when bills can start getting pre-filed. After a 2022 session that was dominated by the debate over congressional redistricting, 2023 could see legislative fault lines drawn over issues like parental rights in K-12 classroom instruction, transgender athletes, sports gambling, and moves to further cut tax rates following this fall’s special session.

Shadow primaries

If the general public may be more focused on preparing for the holidays over the next few weeks, politicians are likely spending that time deciding what their next move will be as the 2024 election cycle starts spinning. The GOP primary for governor has already begun in Missouri, with Lt. Gov. Mike Kehoe, Secretary of State Jay Ashcroft and State Sen. Bill Eigel all either already collecting endorsements or weighing their prospects. 

Will Gov. Parson’s pledge to get behind Bailey’s election bid for Attorney General ward off a primary? 

Democrats, who will find themselves without a single statewide officeholder once Nicole Galloway’s term as Auditor ends in January, face a choice as the cycle unfolds. Without much of a bench of well-known candidates, will there be a push behind closed doors to avoid primaries in statewide and congressional races, or will the perceived lack of established brand-names actually encourage more competition?

And don’t forget there are always the unknowns. At this stage of the 2022 cycle, we were roughly three months from learning that U.S. Sen Roy Blunt would not seek re-election, which set off a chain of events which impacted multiple U.S. House seats, and as we’ve now seen, the Attorney General’s office.