BY FREDA MIKLIN
GOVERNMENTAL REPORTER
Elections in our state are governed by Colorado Revised Statutes Title One Elections. Article Four of Title One includes the highly detailed process by which candidates for all county, district, statewide and national offices, who run with an R or a D after their name, can get on the ballot.
On March 19, the Democrats and the Republicans will hold their county assemblies, at which the parties will choose candidates for county offices who will appear on their party’s primary ballots, along with candidates who successfully petition onto those ballots (more later about that). Primary ballots will be mailed to registered voters of each of the two parties, along with all unaffiliated voters, during the week of June 6 and are due back by June 28. Unaffiliated voters in the state have been permitted to vote in one, but not both, of the major party primaries since 2018.
During the county assemblies for each of the parties, delegates will break into individual district groups in the county for which there is more than one candidate. For example, Republican Arapahoe County assembly delegates who are residents of county commissioner district two will meet together to consider the two candidates from their party for that position. Democratic Arapahoe County assembly delegates who are residents of commissioner district four will get together to consider the two candidates from their party for that position. In both cases, each candidate will get the opportunity to address the group from their district, after which a vote will be taken. To win a spot on the June primary ballot, a candidate must get at least 30% of the votes cast by the group from that district. Any candidate who does not garner that total is eliminated from running for the position.
Delegates to attend the next levels of assembly for each party are selected at and from county assembly delegates. Then the same process is repeated in subsequent higher-level assemblies. At the congressional district assemblies, which will be held after the county assemblies but before the state assembly, candidates earn the right to appear on their party’s primary ballot by getting at least 30% of the votes cast for congressional district representatives to Congress, the State Board of Education, and the C.U. Board of Regents.
The big prize awarded at county assembly is being selected as a candidate to the state assembly. The state assemblies of the two major political parties, which will occur on April 9, are where candidates for statewide offices, including, in 2022, governor, attorney general, state treasurer, secretary of state and United States Senator, will earn a position on the primary ballot by garnering at least 30% of the votes cast by state assembly delegates.
State law allows any candidate for office in Colorado who wants to get on their party’s primary ballot without taking a chance of failing to garner at least 30% of the votes of county, district, or state assembly delegates, to petition their way onto the ballot. It is a cumbersome process that can be very expensive and has a number of pitfalls. Of course, the candidate must verify that a person who signs his or her petition is a member of the party. There is also a rule that a party member can only sign one petition for a particular office. If a candidate for the new U.S. Congressional District 8, for example, (the Republicans and Democrats each currently have four candidates who have received approval of their petition format from the Secretary of State) gets the signature of an in-district party member on his or her petition, that candidate has no way of knowing whether that signer has already signed or will subsequently sign another petition. Only the first signature of that party member that is submitted to the Secretary of State on a candidate’s petition will be counted. All candidates for all offices throughout the state who are seeking to get onto their party’s primary ballot must submit their petitions to the Secretary of State by March 15. That office then reviews the signatures on the petitions and issues a determination of sufficiency or non-sufficiency.
As of March 11, the last date the data was updated, there were 64 net (five withdrew before they submitted petitions) candidates for all offices throughout the state who had received approval of their petition forms from the Secretary of State to gather signatures to get on the primary ballot. Of that total, only nine had already submitted their petitions ahead of the March 15 deadline. Three of the nine had been deemed to have a sufficient number of valid signatures, two had been deemed to have not turned in a sufficient number of valid signatures, and the petitions of four candidates were still being reviewed. The 55 remaining candidates for offices from U.S. Senator down to State House were apparently not being turned in until the deadline or very close to it.
The number of valid party-member signatures needed to get on the primary ballot using the petition process varies by office being sought. Candidates for U.S. Senate and governor must collect at least 12,000 valid signatures of party members from every area of the state. A candidate for Attorney General, Secretary of State, or State Treasurer must gather at least 8,000 votes from around the state. Candidates for U.S. House need at least 10% of the number of people who voted in the last primary election, or, if there was no primary, the last general election (which will be a much larger number). State senate and house candidates need 30% of the number of votes cast in the last primary for the office they are seeking. If there was no primary, they need 30% of the number of votes in the last general election, capped at 1,000.
The race that many people are watching most closely is for the Republican primary for U.S. Senate. There are nine candidates who have raised their hands for the nomination to try to unseat incumbent Democratic U.S. Senator Michael Bennet. (Bennet has a nominal challenger for the Democratic nomination but he is expected to win it handily.) Of the nine Republican candidates, only two have indicated they will try to get on the primary ballot by petition. That leaves seven candidates each trying to garner at least 30% of the vote of Republican state assembly delegates on April 9 in Colorado Springs. Simple math tells us that the maximum number who can accomplish that is three and that result would be unusual based on the history of the process.
As of this writing, there are some races that appear to be effectively set for November. For State Attorney General, it appears that Republican John Kellner will challenge incumbent Democrat Phil Weiser. Incumbent State Treasurer Democrat Dave Young will likely face Republican Lang Sias. In Arapahoe County, Republican John C. Lamb will challenge incumbent Democratic County Clerk Joan Lopez, Republican Kevin Edling will challenge incumbent Democratic Sheriff Tyler Brown, Republican Robert Andrews will challenge incumbent Democratic Assessor P.K. Kaiser, and Democrat Michael Westerberg will face Republican Marsha Berzins for County Treasurer, where there is no incumbent. House District 37, which includes Greenwood Village after redistricting, and where there is also no incumbent, will apparently be a race between Democrat Ruby Dickson and Republican Paul Archer. House District 38, which includes a large part of Centennial, looks like it will be a race between Democratic incumbent David Ortiz and newcomer Republican Jaylen Mosquiera.
Stay tuned. Much is yet to unfold.
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