Missouri governor hopeful Ashcroft knocked off balance by complaint about use of ‘engineer’

Secretary of State Jay Ashcroft, a candidate for governor, speaks on Feb. 29 at the Boone County Republican Lincoln Days dinner in Columbia (Rudi Keller/Missouri Independent).

The first words of Jay Ashcroft’s opening message for visitors to his gubernatorial campaign website jump out in bold: “I am an engineer.”

Ashcroft earned a law degree from St. Louis University and bachelor and master’s degrees in engineering management from Missouri University of Science and Technology.

The Missouri secretary of state is licensed as an attorney and last year officially joined the legal team defending his ballot language for a reproductive rights initiative to restore legal abortion in Missouri. He has never been licensed as a professional engineer.

It’s his training in the engineering field, however, that he’s selling hard in his campaign .

But Ashcroft’s use of the title, and whether he is using it honestly, or even perhaps illegally, has become a flash point for the campaign just weeks before the Aug. 6 primary. A complaint to the state licensing board for engineers, from a supporter of one of his opponents, objects to his use of the term and cites a state law limiting use of the word.

It is also the newest attack line being used to chew away at Ashcroft’s once-impressive polling lead in the eight-way Republican primary for governor.

“It’s silly politics,” Ashcroft said in an interview with The Independent.

But with three weeks to go before the primary, Ashcroft is explaining why he can call himself an engineer, not his policy plans. At least 11 times during the Republican gubernatorial debate last week with two of his rivals, Ashcroft used the title engineer to describe himself and the quality of his plans for Missouri.

And Ashcroft calls his policy plan a “Red Print,” wordplay that substitutes the shorthand for the Republican Party in the word “blueprint” with its inclusion of the shorthand reference to the Democratic Party.

“I am a typical engineer,” Ashcroft said during the debate. “I’m not your typical politician. I don’t want to talk to people, I want to get stuff done. I want to act in the best interest of the people. I don’t want to just talk about it when I’m running for election. I want to do it when it matters and move conservative policy forward.”

The complaint, filed June 27 and first reported by KSDK-TV in St. Louis, was by a Rolla engineer who contributed $520 in March to Lt. Gov. Mike Kehoe’s campaign. The engineer did not respond to telephone messages and emails to discuss the complaint.

Mike Hafner, an adviser to Kehoe’s campaign, said the campaign did not contact the engineer or ask for the complaint to be filed.

After graduating from Missouri S&T, Ashcroft worked for four years at Systems & Electronics Inc., now Leonardo DRS, and was enrolled with the licensing board as an engineering intern at that time.

Later, he taught mechanical engineering and engineering technology at St. Louis Community College.

“I am not a licensed, professional engineer,” Ashcroft said, but said he has both the resume and legal right to use the term.

Under revisions to the licensing law made in 2007, no one without a license can call themselves an engineer while offering to design “buildings, structures, products, machines, processes, and systems that can affect the health, safety, and welfare of the public.”

But the licensing board will not discipline someone referring to themself as an engineer as long as that is “clearly not indicating or implying that such person is holding himself or herself out as being a professional engineer.”

The undergraduate engineering management program Ashcroft completed at Missouri S&T is accredited by the Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology .

“If a person graduates from a program accredited by the Engineering Accreditation Commission (EAC) of ABET, then yes, this person typically uses the title of engineer,” said Amanda Grace Taylor, director of communications for the board.

The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers issued a position paper on the question of titles in 2022. Titles like professional engineer should be protected and used only by licensed individuals, the paper states.

But the title engineer has a broader meaning as well, which the public understands to be someone ”who has acquired special knowledge and ability” in the engineering field. Someone who graduated from a board-accredited program, the paper states, “should not be prohibited from using the title ‘Engineer.’”

Regardless of whether he is licensed or not, Ashcroft said his use of the title for his campaign is legal.

“if you actually look at the statute,” he said, “the statute specifically says that I made the requirements.”

End licensing?

As Ashcroft became more strident in defending his use of the title “engineer,” during the debate last week , he aimed his response in a new direction, questioning the need for the state licensing board that received a complaint he is using the title illegally.

Ashcroft suggested that all professional licensing was government overreach when asked “are you an engineer” by the debate moderator.

He listed his education and employment, then went further:

“Why in the world are Republicans asking whether or not the government has to give us permission to go out and work legally?” Ashcroft said. “I’m an engineer, but it’s none of the government’s business. We need to get rid of this red tape. We need to allow people to live their lives the way they see fit, instead of kowtowing to faceless bureaucrats.”

The statement drew a quick rebuke from the Democratic Governors Association, which called it “a completely dangerous suggestion that could potentially create countless unsafe hazards.”

Hafner, the adviser to Kehoe, also said Ashcroft’s statement is a dangerous idea. Kehoe, who is leading the latest polls, did not attend the debate at Parkway West High School.

“As a fake engineer I’m sure Jay Ashcroft would like to use crayons and an etch-a-sketch to design our roads, bridges and buildings, but we believe there should be some level of oversight when it comes to keeping Missourians safe,” Hafner said.

Missouri has regulated the engineering profession since 1941 and the Board for Architects, Professional Engineers, Professional Land Surveyors and Professional Landscape Architects is one of 39 licensing boards housed in the Division of Professional Registration .

The boards examine the skills of professionals from accountants and barbers to tattoo artists and veterinarians. Each has the ability to discipline licensed professionals and prosecute people who offer services without a license.

Professional licensing is essential to protecting the safety and health of Missourians, said state Rep. Jeff Coleman, a Republican from Grain Valley who chairs the House Professional Registration and Licensing Committee. Coleman has not endorsed any candidate in the GOP primary for governor.

There may be some unnecessary regulations and lawmakers watch for that, Coleman said.

“We have to have licensing in order to make sure that the people that are dealing with our folks, regardless of whether it’s engineering or medical or financial, that you have to have a license to prove that you are qualified to be able to do those things, to make sure that you are not hurting those citizens,” said Coleman, who is a licensed financial adviser. “That’s what the licensing process is all about, to make sure that you have the knowledge and the ability to take care of who you’re trying to help.”

One of Missouri’s most deadly disasters was an engineering failure, Coleman said, recalling the 1981 collapse of two skywalks at the Hyatt Regency Hotel in Kansas City that killed 114 people and injured scores of others.

Then-Attorney General John Ashcroft, Jay Ashcroft’s father and later U.S. attorney general during the George W. Bush administration, accused the engineers of gross negligence in a license action in 1984 as the elder Ashcroft was running for governor.

“That was an engineering problem, and we can’t have those types of issues happening because you didn’t get your license and can’t prove to us that you know what you’re doing,” Coleman said.

In a statement to The Independent on Friday, Ashcroft’s campaign said he didn’t propose abolishing professional licensing.

“The regulatory regime in Missouri stifles economic growth and as governor, Jay will take a close look at all regulatory and bureaucratic policies and consider ways of modernizing them to grow our economy,” said Jason Roe, a consultant working for Ashcroft’s campaign.

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