A Pennsylvania city that followed Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach’s advice in enacting tough laws against illegal immigrants has been ordered to pay $1.4 million in attorney fees and court costs for the plaintiffs who successfully challenged those laws in federal court.

A federal judge in Scranton, Penn., ruled last week that the town of Hazleton, Penn., must pay $1,379,089.51 in attorney fees and $47,594 in court costs to the American Civil Liberties Union and several private attorneys who challenged a 2006 ordinance aimed at cracking down on illegal immigration.

Attorneys for the plaintiffs had asked for nearly double the amount awarded, but the judge reduced the award to account for time and expenses related to additional claims the plaintiffs did not win in court.

The city had asked the court for special consideration, arguing that it was in dire financial straits and on the verge of bankruptcy. But the court declined to give any.

“The court is sympathetic to the defendant’s financial condition,” Judge James Munley wrote. “Congress, however, did not include language in (the law allowing plaintiffs to recover attorney fees in civil rights cases) to suggest that courts consider a municipality’s financial condition and budgetary concerns when fashioning an attorney’s fee award.”

“Municipalities, regardless of their financial health, have no discretion to enact improper laws,” he wrote.

The ordinance, which Kobach helped draft, penalized businesses that hired undocumented immigrants and landlords who leased houses and apartments to them. Kobach also represented the city as an attorney during trial of the case.

In 2008, the court struck down those laws, saying the city “overstepped its authority and entered an area of immigration preempted by federal law.” An appellate court upheld that ruling, but the U.S. Supreme Court sent the case back for reconsideration.

The appeals court reaffirmed its decision, and in 2014 the Supreme Court declined to hear further arguments in the matter.

Kobach was elected Secretary of State in Kansas in 2010.

That same year, however, the court also let stand a lower court ruling that upheld a similar ordinance in Fremont, Neb., that prohibited renting housing to undocumented immigrants. Kobach also helped draft that ordinance and represented that city in court.

Plaintiffs in the Fremont case, however, had challenged that ordinance for being in conflict with the federal Fair Housing Act. The Hazleton plaintiffs challenged on the basis of federal preemption in immigration law.

In an interview with the Journal-World that year, Kobach said he had won more cases than he’d lost in the immigration arena, adding: “I’ll take a winning record.”

Kobach’s office declined to comment on last week’s decision to award the plaintiffs attorney fees.