Michael Rapp is a consumer protection attorney and founder of Rapp Law Firm in Kansas City. His practice focuses on suing large data companies for errors in background checks, credit reports, and pre-employment screenings — and taking on insurance companies for bad faith. He came to this work the way the best lawyers usually do: it happened to him first.
I asked Michael what led him to this area of law.
When he was in the Air Force and deployed overseas, someone moved into his old apartment and restarted utilities in his name. Debt collectors followed him for a decade. Every time, he could prove he wasn't there — he had orders. The debt would clear, recycle to a new collector, and reappear on his credit report just when it mattered most.
"I was like, there's got to be a law against this. And then I was like, funny thing, there is. And so I started suing people under that law."
That became the foundation of everything. He spent fifteen years building a practice alongside a partner before going out on his own, and the niche he found in that early fight is still the core of what he does.
I asked what has shaped how he leads.
His former partner grew up on a farm. Michael came up in the military. Both share the same ethic — nothing is not my job — but they express it differently, and working together for fifteen years taught him something about how different leadership instincts can complement each other.
"Farmers never pass a broken fence post. But military people stay in their lane. So if I see something that's broken more than once, I'm like, we've got to elevate it, figure out why this is broken. My assumption is, if it's not in my lane, then somebody else is probably working on that. And if it's not, then we take that up at the meeting."
That philosophy extended to how they ran cases. Every attorney touched every file. Nobody was siloed. Nobody could be surprised at trial by facts they had never seen.
"We all took almost an assembly line approach where we all do a portion of every single file. So no files get spinning out of control. Everybody always knew everything about every file."
I asked about his decision to keep the firm small and work through partnerships rather than building a larger team.
Michael has one paralegal and a network of attorneys he brings in as partners on cases headed to trial. He described his thinking through a conversation that stuck with him. A friend of his — a doctor — moved to a concierge model but still keeps an office, because he recognized something important: if you don't talk to people, your brain doesn't access its deeper pathways.
"You need to be able to bounce ideas and have a conversation, because that will let you get your best thoughts out."
Michael runs his practice the same way. He would rather work alongside someone who has their own firm. He is actively doing this now — mentoring a friend who just left a national class action firm to go out on his own.
I asked what he thought would be easier by now.
"The biggest balance for me is chasing business and actually working the business I have already chased." He keeps a folder in Outlook labeled "not on fire" — things he genuinely wants to get to, but that have no deadline pressing them forward. He admitted the folder has more in it than he'd like.
He also talked about something that crept up on him after COVID: the peer conversations he used to have regularly — at conferences, with colleagues, over referrals — happen less now, and he feels the difference.
"You forget more than you remember. You've got to cycle around and talk to people, and you remember things."
He made the point himself: a conversation earlier that week with a friend referring a case had surfaced a fact pattern he recognized in a completely separate matter. The conversation did the work that solitary review could not.
Are you dealing with errors on your credit report, a botched background check, or an insurance claim that's being stalled or denied? Connect with Michael Rapp and check out Rapp Law Firm.