Denny Hoskins denies whistleblower lawsuit allegations from former employee

Missouri Secretary of State Denny Hoskins has responded a lawsuit filed by his former director of election integrity alleging he was fired after reporting illegal and unethical conduct.

The secretary denied many of the accusations from former director Nicholas La Strada, a Republican who was hired by Hoskins, according to court documents filed last week.

In his lawsuit, La Strada claims Hoskins’ staff conspired to create a false whistleblower submission to use as evidence in a federal trial.

He also alleged Hoskins ordered a retabulation of write-in votes in Marshall after a complaint about this year’s April election.

Hoskins’ response states that La Strada’s disclosures are “materially false and a reasonable person would know they are false.”

He said La Strada had his administrative rights revoked to the Missouri Centralized Voter Registration system because he was allegedly making changes to voter audit logs.

Further, he said La Strada’s concerns about an affidavit in a federal trial were unprompted, as it was materially accurate and the plaintiff had no way of knowing what was inside it before he was terminated.

Former elections official accuses Missouri secretary of state of altering results, misleading judge

Hoskins said La Strada was terminated after he was told to meet with the deputy general counsel to prepare for the hearing and allegedly refused, among other reasons.

“Plaintiff by then had a history of not showing up to work, poor communication, unprofessional conduct, insubordination, and other misconduct to include refusing to go to meetings when he had disagreements with senior staff and Secretary Hoskins,” lawyers for Hoskins said in their response to the lawsuit.

The Secretary of State also disagreed with La Strada’s naming of him and the state of Missouri as defendants. Hoskins’ lawsuit claims only the Office of the Secretary of State is the correct party to sue.

His lawyers moved to strike his name from the litigation, according to court documents.

This story originally appeared on KOMU. It can be republished in print or online.