Tony Mattivi

On February 18, 2026, President Trump nominated Tony Mattivi to the United States District Court for the District of Kansas. 

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Biography

Mattivi grew up in Colorado. He earned a B.S. in Aviation Management from Metropolitan State College of Denver and a J.D. from Washburn University School of Law in 1994.

Legal Experience

Mattivi began his legal career as an assistant district attorney at the Shawnee County District Attorney’s Office before joining the Kansas Attorney General’s Office, where he served as an assistant Kansas attorney general for two years. He then served as an attorney advisor for the Regime Crimes Liaison Office in Iraq on detail from the Department of Justice. Mattivi later joined the Office of Military Commissions, where he served for four years as trial counsel. He spent the bulk of his career as an assistant United States attorney at the U.S. Department of Justice for 22 years, while also working as an adjunct trial advocacy professor at his law school alma mater, Washburn University School of Law. Mattivi later worked as vice president and assistant general counsel at Medcor before being nominated as the 13th director of the Kansas Bureau of Investigation, a position he currently holds.

Key Facts & Context

• When Mattivi ran for Kansas Attorney General, he explicitly campaigned as the pro-life choice.

• Mattivi has led the Kansas Bureau of Investigation since 2023. Under Mattivi’s leadership, Kansas was one of the first states to sign an agreement with ICE to help enforce their outlandish immigration policies, promising to identify the citizenship status of residents who were on offender registries.

• Under Mattivi’s leadership, KBI led a raid against a local newspaper, in a supposed investigation of whether a reporter at the newspaper had committed a crime by verifying information received from a confidential source. The raid disrupted the newspaper, made it less likely the public would submit confidential and anonymous tips, and caused such stress that it contributed to the death of the newspaper owner’s 98-year-old mother.

• Under Mattivi’s leadership, KBI passed on a tap that launched an inappropriate, unfounded, and harmful investigation into a city council member’s citizenship status, on the basis of an unfounded and baseless tip from the public.