Kleinjans adds Ottawa County Commission chair to MSU Extension lawsuit
Michigan’s U.S. Western District Court in Lansing | Sarah Leach
An Ottawa County commissioner who claims Michigan State University Extension fired him for his political activity has added a new defendant to his lawsuit: the chair of his own board.
On Tuesday, Commissioner Chris Kleinjans filed an amended complaint in Michigan’s U.S. Western District Court claiming that Ottawa Board Chair Joe Moss threatened the school’s contract with the county in order to retaliate against Kleinjans’ criticisms of Ottawa Impact (OI) majority on the board and involvement in a recall election against former OI Commissioner Lucy Ebel.
Moss is the founder and president of Ottawa Impact, a far-right political action committee that ran a slate of candidates in 2022 who were motivated over frustrations with the county and state over COVID-19 mitigation measures. They went on to achieve a controlling majority of the county’s top governmental body.
Since taking office in January 2023, OI commissioners pushed through a series of controversial decisions, resulting in several lawsuits against the county.
After being seated, “they immediately began making … charitably speaking … aggressive decisions,” Kleinjans said in testimony Aug. 9 during an evidentiary hearing in the Western District’s courthouse in Lansing. “It was a different interpretation of freedom than what we were operating under before.”
Once Kleinjans became the candidate running against Ebel, Moss targeted the Democrat’s employer, where he had been working as a nutrition instructor for more than a dozen years.
Kleinjans’ attorney, Sarah Riley-Howard, said Moss violated Kleinjans’ First Amendment rights when he “retaliated against [Kleinjans] for his protected speech by refusing to adopt the renewal contract” with MSU Extension, according to the new court filing Tuesday.
The contract, often referred to as a “memorandum of understanding” or MOU, obligates the county to pay $272,572 to Extension for the fiscal year — which is Oct. 1 through Sept. 30 — and to provide office space, utilities, clerical support and funding for an Extension educator, which covers a 4-H programming coordinator.
Despite receiving unanimous approval from the county’s Finance & Administration committee in November, the MOU was removed from full board consideration after Kleinjans appeared in media interviews as a member of the Ottawa Food nonprofit collective’s advisory board.
“Moss’ decision to remove the contract from the consent agenda and hold up the adoption of the contract for several months was made in an effort to retaliate against [Kleinjans] for his political speech by withholding funds from [Kleinjans’] employer,” Howard wrote in the new filing.
Federal Judge Hala Y. Jarbou ruled on Thursday that Kleinjans was not entitled to a preliminary injunction that requested he be immediately restored to his Extension position and awarded back pay. The ruling only applied to Howard’s request for a preliminary injunction for her client to be reinstated to his position as well as back pay dating from his June 4 termination date. The lawsuit will now continue to move forward.
In her ruling, Jarbou noted that Moss “began to exert pressure on MSU Extension to terminate or relocate Kleinjans” in order to “threaten the approval” of the MOU with the school.
Moss has not returned several requests from the Advance for comment on the lawsuit.
Where the lawsuit is at
Jarbou said it is “undisputed that the OI majority sought political retribution against Kleinjans” because of his comments about OI and involvement in the recall effort of Ebel, who he ultimately defeated in May by a 20% margin.
However, MSU refused to grant Moss’ requests, meaning there was no clear connection yet that proved Kleinjans was fired over his political activity, which Jarbou said she required for her to order the school to restore Kleinjans to his position.
“Had OI been successful, Kleinjans would likely have a clear-cut case for First Amendment retaliation,” Jarbou wrote. “He would certainly have shown a sufficient likelihood of success on the merits to obtain a preliminary injunction. But OI was not successful — Defendants rebuffed OI’s retaliatory effort. In other words, Defendants protected Kleinjans’s First Amendment rights in the face of pressure from OI. And Kleinjans does not show what, if anything, changed for Defendants between January and May.”
Testimony about Moss’ actions
Kleinjans filed the lawsuit on June 21 claiming Extension violated his First Amendment rights after giving him an ultimatum after he was elected: Take an unpaid leave through the remainder of the year or face termination.
An Aug. 9 evidentiary hearing featured testimony from Kleinjans and two of three MSU Extension supervisors who had several conversations with Kleinjans from before he was a commissioner candidate to after he was elected.
M. Scott Korpak, the new District 7 director, testified that during a Dec. 7 meeting he had with then-interim director James Kelly as well as Moss and OI Commissioner Allison Miedema “threatened” the MOU.
When Associate Director of the Extension’s field operations Matt Shane met with Kleinjans Dec. 14 to summarize the meeting between commissioners and Korpak and Kelly, he said Moss “asked that MSU Extension officials pull [Kleinjans] out of work in Ottawa County even during his campaign for office in the recall election, and that MSU Extension move (Kleinjans) to another county, another location, or some other work,” according to the amended complaint.
Shane also told Kleinjans that Miedema and Moss “said that the MSU Extension contract renewal would not be approved by the commission or on the agenda until MSU Extension removed (Kleinjans) from work in Ottawa County,” according to the new filing.
When asked at the Aug. 9 hearing how he interpreted Moss addressing Kleinjans’ employment, Korpak said: “You could characterize it as a veiled threat … of concern with Christian’s involvement in the recall process. … They were unhappy about his political activity.”
Korpak also testified that it was the second instance that Moss brought up “concerns” about Kleinjans, the first being in the lobby of the county’s administration building in West Olive prior to the board’s Nov. 21 meeting.
“He shared his concerns about Christian’s efforts against Ms. Ebel,” Korpak said of the Nov. 21 conversation.
“Because he’s a Democrat?” Howard asked.
“Yes, among other concerns,” Korpak replied.
Office space possibly at risk
Shane told Kleinjans on Dec. 14 that Miedema and Moss “insinuated” that Extension’s office space provided by Ottawa County “would be in jeopardy,” according to the amended complaint.
“There was also some mention in that meeting about how highly desirable our Ottawa County MSU Extension space is in that building, and that there are other departments that certainly would benefit from having access to that space as they look at restructuring some of their other departments and forming other departments and offices within the county,” Shane said in the Dec. 14 recording.
At the Aug 9 evidentiary hearing, Korpak said Extension currently is evaluating its space needs at the county’s request, which is due by the end of August.
What wasn’t addressed in testimony during the hearing, but is included in the new amended complaint, is the allegation that sometime after the May 7 recall election, Interim County Administrator Jon Anderson visited the office of MSU Extension in Ottawa County “made a public display of coming to examine the office for the purpose of moving another county department into it and MSU Extension out of it.”
Anderson was appointed by the OI majority in April after previous administrator John Gibbs was fired in February. The appointment was controversial because Anderson didn’t have any prior experience as a county administrator, already was a declared OI-backed candidate for county sheriff, prompting critics to claim at several public meetings that the decision was intended to elevate Anderson’s profile to better his election chances.
Anderson lost to Undersheriff Eric DeBoer in the Aug. 6 primary by 20 points.
Howard said Anderson’s comments to the Extension staff were “intended to be a threat of retaliation” to Kleinjans’ employer.
“Anderson declared — in front of MSU Extension employees — that the county would need at least some, if not all, of the office space currently inhabited by MSU Extension for new county departments that the OI majority intended to create or to make room for an office shuffle,” according to the amended complaint.
According to the amended complaint, Anderson said that “‘maybe’ the county would move the MSU Extension Office to the basement of the building housing the MDHHS’s Ottawa County location” on James Street in Holland. The MDHHS building is located at the edge of the County in Holland.”
Howard argued that Anderson’s “visit to the office space and threat that MSU Extension would be relocated by the county was a continuation of the original, overt threat voiced by Moss in the Dec. 7 meeting,” according to the amended complaint.
Howard cited an additional communication — this time an email sent to from Anderson to Kleinjans on June 6, which was two days after Kleinjans’ last day with Extension — as evidence that the OI majority intended continue to interfere with Kleinjans’ employment.
Anderson’s email said: “Hi Chris – hope all is well and you’re settling in. I had a reminder from my notes to check with you about your position with MSU. I do not have any personal knowledge about a potential conflict of interest, but I recall there was a question about a potential conflict of interest when you were elected. If there is anything you need, please reach out.”
Howard said the timing and substance of the communication was odd because there had been no previous mention in public meetings about a conflict of interest with Kleinjans’ board service and his job with Extension.
“The most likely reason that Anderson would have raised this issue with [Kleinjans] is because of private direction from the OI majority related to [Kleinjans’] job,” Howard wrote in the amended complaint.
According to Cornell Law School’s Legal Information Institute, a plaintiff is allowed to amend their complaint, but because the lawsuit has now passed certain milestones, the plaintiff must seek consent of the court or consent from the defendant to amend the original complaint.
The court has not yet scheduled additional court dates.
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