ST. LOUIS — Elad Gross, a Missouri-based attorney who filed lawsuits against the governor's office and a nonprofit organization alleging they were withholding information that should be accessible to the public, says he will be running for attorney general.
Gross filed a lawsuit against A New Missouri alleging the nonprofit, linked to former Gov. Eric Gritens, funneled "dark money" into political campaigns and failed to supply information to Gross that he alleged was well within his rights of viewing as a Missouri citizen.
"All nonprofit organizations in Missouri are supposed to release some records to folks when they have good cause to request them," Gross told the St. Louis Record. The suit against the nonprofit was dismissed on Nov. 6 in Cole County Circuit Court, according to a posting on newstribune.com.
"I submitted the issues for appeals…and I also declared that I'm running for attorney general," Gross said. "I just got fed up and decided that it was time to run."
On Gross' campaign website, he outlines what he hopes to bring to the position of attorney general if elected.
"We need a chief law enforcement officer who will enforce the law, who won't favor big-money out-of-state donors over the people of our state," Gross said. "We need a government that cares less about a few wealthy people's pet projects and more about hospital closures in rural Missouri, poor kids going to poor schools and the many folks in our state whose voices have been ignored for far too long."
Now that the appeal has been filed in the lawsuit against A New Missouri, Gross said it would be a somewhat lengthy process as he waits for the arguments to be scheduled.
Gross is optimistic about the future of the lawsuit. He said he has all of the research he needs and what he considers to be a tight argument, as well as affidavits from the state legislators, as he seeks increased transparency from what he calls "dark money organizations."
Gross estimates that it will likely be early to mid-2019 before the arguments are made.