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JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) — A state janitorial contractor that was fired over allegations it employed illegal immigrants sued the state Thursday, accusing Gov. Matt Blunt of racial discrimination and abuse of power.

Blunt called the lawsuit “ludicrous” and defended his decision to cancel the contract of Sam’s Janitorial Services and bar the company from state work.

About 25 company employees were arrested in a March 6 sting at a Jefferson City state office building by federal and state law enforcement officers, according to the lawsuit.

The owner of Sam’s Janitorial, K. Asamoah-Boadu, claims Blunt exceeded his gubernatorial powers when he terminated the contract and disqualified the company from future state work. Asamoah-Boadu wants nine canceled contracts reinstated, the company’s ban from state work reversed and an unspecified amount of money for damages, according to the lawsuit filed in Cole County Circuit Court.

Asamoah-Boadu, an African-born U.S. citizen, also alleges racial discrimination because the state contract was subsequently given to white-owned B&G Cleaning, which also had been the contractor before Sam’s Janitorial won the bid.

“That’s ludicrous,” Blunt responded when asked about the lawsuit at a Capitol news conference.

Blunt said he didn’t know Asamoah-Boadu when he issued the executive order March 6 to cancel contracts with any companies found to be using illegal immigrants.

Asamoah-Boadu claims he hired only people who appeared to have proper work documents and provided the State Capitol Police and the state Division of Purchasing and Materials Management with copies of Social Security and worker registration cards for each employee who was not a U.S. citizen.

The state “approved each and every employee,” the lawsuit says, and did not notify him of any problems with the proposed workers.

In March, Blunt credited the state’s manager of custodial operations for first noticing inconsistencies in the janitorial employees’ work documents. Capitol Police were notified, and the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency ultimately got involved in the investigation.

On Thursday, Blunt insisted that Sam’s Janitorial Services had employed illegal immigrants “in a very negligent way.”

“This wasn’t one or two people that might have slipped through the cracks of employment verification; this was a large portion of his work force,” Blunt said. “I am confident that we have taken the appropriate action, the sort of action that Missouri taxpayers expect and deserve their government to take.”

Jefferson City attorney David Moen, who represents Asamoah-Boadu, asserted that Blunt was uninformed. Sam’s Janitorial had employed about 60 people to clean Missouri office buildings, only a small fraction of whom were illegal immigrants, Moen said.

“Like much of the stuff Blunt does, he just goes off on hyperbole rather than the actual facts, and I think that’s what happened here,” Moen said. “He saw an opportunity to get some media attention for these 25 people being carted away.”

By DAVID A. LIEB From: The Associated Press

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