Missouri’s former director of election integrity filed a lawsuit against Secretary of State Denny Hoskins, alleging he was fired for having “too much integrity” after raising concerns about Hoskins’s conduct.
Nick La Strada has served as the Show-Me State’s election integrity director for 15 months before he alleges he was fired after being slowly stripped of access to the tools needed to perform his job. La Strada, a Republican, was appointed by Hoskins in January 2025 and was praised for his “compliance with the law.”
“Unfortunately, Secretary of State Denny Hoskins wanted a lapdog instead who would look the other way while Defendants engaged in conduct that violated the law,” the court filing said, adding that La Strada was wrongfully terminated “because he had too much integrity and insisted on reporting illegal conduct.”
According to the lawsuit filed in Cole County, La Strada was first stripped of access to the state’s voter registration system after he reported “improper use of public funds for political mail.” In another instance, Hoskins allegedly attempted to change a certified election result, to which La Strada intervened.
La Strada also claims that senior staff in Hoskins’s office attempted a “fabricated whistleblower submission” using an “IP scrambler” and burner phone to submit false evidence in a federal Help America Vote Act lawsuit.
The lawsuit, Kramer v. Hoskins, began after Constance Kramer, a private citizen, filed a complaint alleging the state failed to properly maintain its voter database in compliance with HAVA. A federal judge later ruled in favor of Kramer, granting a preliminary injunction and ordering Hoskins to hold a hearing on Kramer’s complaint.
La Strada claims in the filing on Monday that he was ordered to appear as a witness in the Kramer lawsuit, but alleges senior staff deactivated his access card in order to prevent his testimony. La Strada ultimately gained access to the building and testified, but was fired four days later.
“In Missouri, no one is above the law – not even the Secretary of State,” counsel for La Strada, Emily Vernon, said. “A unanimous Missouri Supreme Court told the Secretary of State and his office that last week. We’re here to ask a Cole County jury to say the same thing, and to hold the Secretary and his office accountable.”
HOW MISSOURI REDISTRICTING TURNED INTO A LEGAL MESS
Vernon is referring to a recent decision from the state’s highest court that found Hoskins in contempt last week for telling officials to use a new congressional map for the November election. Hoskins had claimed he “purged” himself of the contempt by backpedaling the decision later in the day.
The contempt finding stems from a weeklong legal battle over whether a map drawn by the state legislature in 2022 or a map drawn in 2025 will be used for the midterm elections, even though the 2025 map was used for the August primaries. The 2022 map, used for the 2022 and 2024 elections, has produced a 6-2 Republican-Democratic split for Missouri’s congressional delegation, while the map passed by state lawmakers in 2025 would likely shift the delegation to a 7-1 Republican-Democratic split.
Hoskins’s office declined to comment pending litigation.