Topeka ? A Federal Elections Commission audit strongly criticizes former administrators Kris Kobach and Christian Morgan for their financial management of the Kansas Republican Party.

The Topeka Capital-Journal reported Tuesday that an FEC audit found that when the two men led the party, state and federal taxes weren’t paid, illegal contributions were accepted and questionable expenditures were made.

In 2007 and 2008, Morgan was the party’s executive director and Kobach was the chairman. Kobach is running for secretary of state and Morgan works for rival GOP candidate J.R. Claeys, of Salina.

When the two men left the group 2009, it had less than $5,000 in its treasury. And the audit says they spent $788,000 during their two years in charge, nearly $10,000 more than was contributed.

The men blame each other for the organization’s financial problems.

“Kobach was the boss, and he called the shots. He is looking for a scapegoat,” Morgan told the newspaper.

Kobach said Morgan was responsible for keeping track of the party’s daily financial transactions, and that he was unaware the party’s finances were in such bad shape.

“Had I known of his errors when I was chairman, I would have fired him immediately,” Kobach said.

State party officials have until June 26 to respond to the interim FEC report. Amy Blunt, a Kansas City, Mo., attorney hired by the party to consult on the audit, said the FEC could levy fines.

“There’s always a chance,” she said. “Obviously, there were problems with the internal accounting and reporting.”

Current Kansas GOP chairwoman Amanda Adkins said there numerous problems with the party when she took the job, including more than $100,000 in operational debt. The party fell behind for months in its payroll and rent, accumulating unpaid bills for routine office expenses.

“Not only did we have to solve these significant problems, we had to make great strides in core initiatives to get people excited about the party again,” Adkins said.

Johnson County attorney Michael Kuckelman, hired by the GOP to focus on back-due federal taxes, said $18,000 in payroll taxes for office staff wasn’t paid for six months in 2008 while Kobach and Morgan were in charge.

“There was a mix-up. The payments weren’t made,” Kuckelman said.

The party paid close to $22,000 to the Internal Revenue Service for the taxes, plus penalties and interest, in the past two months, Kuckelman said. He said he didn’t know how much in Kansas withholding taxes not paid in 2008 were recently repaid.

The FEC report, completed in May, found that the Kansas GOP also illegally mingled money from state and federal accounts during the two-year period. Auditors say the party accepted $52,000 from corporations in violation of federal campaign law. The funds were used to cover costs associated with the 2008 GOP National Convention in St. Paul, Minn., when they should have been credited to the party’s state account, if used for other purposes other than federal accounts.

FEC auditors also determined the state GOP illegally allocated $104,000 from its state accounts for lodging, printing and get-out-the-vote expenses that should have been covered by the federal accounts.

Kobach said he hadn’t spoken with Morgan in 15 months. He said he left daily financial decisions to Morgan and felt betrayed that Morgan withheld details about the accounting problems, including concealing FEC communications about reports.

“It’s disappointing to see that one individual could do so much accounting damage to the operation of the party,” Kobach said. “It was incredibly sloppy record-keeping by Christian Morgan. It’s dereliction of his duty. I trusted him. I take responsibility for being naive and making the mistake of hiring him.”

Morgan denied he concealed information from the party or FEC. He also said Kobach complicated matters by firing key office staff that had financial oversight duties to give the appearance of being fiscally conservative.

“I disagreed with both firings,” Morgan said. “I recommended to Kobach that we needed to hire more staff, and he refused.”

Morgan said Kobach is trying to deflect responsibility for the FEC problems because of his campaign for secretary of state, adding “he’s willing to say and do anything to anyone to advance his political agenda.”

Kobach said he doubts that the audit will hurt his candidacy.