What to make of the Colorado vote?
Centennial State voters this season showed liberal preference in easily picking Hillary Clinton for president. But they voted for the business-friendly, Big Oil-backed Amendment 71: the “Raise the Bar” measure that will make passing future amendments to the Colorado Constitution nearly impossible.
With control of the U.S. Senate in play, they backed Michael Bennet, the Democratic incumbent. But they voted against the nanny-state-style sin tax on cigarettes meant to fuel a raft of the kind of health care programs progressive usually support.
They kept all the Congressional incumbents, but voted for Propositions 107 and 108, measures that return a proper presidential primary to the state and allow unaffiliated voters to participate in all primaries — a move that helps open elections to newcomer candidates. Lawmakers during the 2016 legislative session failed to act on those two measures, despite a bipartisan outcry from members of their own parties after the caucus night debacle. Colorado voters took matters into their own hands and took care of the issue themselves.
Among those incumbents they retained, voters overwhelmingly backed Republicans Mike Coffman and Scott Tipton over Democrats Morgan Carroll and Gail Schwartz. But voters also easily passed the progressive love child that is a statewide $12 minimum wage. (Note to Democrats: Coffman has made the 6th Congressional District where Democratic challengers go to die. A caveat: Given Coffman’s rejection of Donald Trump during the campaign, it will be interesting to see if he draws a primary challenger in 2018.)
In picking Heidi Ganahl, statewide voters managed to keep an at-large seat on the University of Colorado Board of Regents, a move that retains a conservative leadership of the state’s flagship university system. But they voted against Amendment U, which would have removed a tax owed by farmers and ranchers who lease land from the federal government.
Colorado voters clobbered, picked up and clobbered again Amendment 69, which would have set up a state-run health insurance program antithetical to conservatives. Despite the fact that Sen. Bernie Sanders — who performed well in Colorado — championed ColoradoCare, there didn’t seem to be any real fear that Colorado’s informed electorate would sign the state up for a wholesale socialist experiment in the health insurance industry.
But voters easily passed Proposition 106, the aid-in-dying measure. Social conservatives at the statehouse had rejected similar bills for two years over the objections of Democrats, and voters overrode concerns of a slippery ethical slope in favor of individual liberty.
In races for control of the state legislature, voters appeared to be on the way to keeping Democrats in control of the House — 37-28 — and Republicans in control of the Senate — 18-17.
We like to view such split-the-ticket behavior as evidence of the kind of independent thinking we support. Independent-minded voters represent the best of checks to power that bring balance and interest to our lives.
And we thank those who took the time to work through this season’s unusually robust ballot. Democracy works because you chose to make it so.
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