Colorado GOP Chair Dave Williams is no stranger to blaming Republican election losses on voter fraud without any evidence. An unapologetic 2020 election denier, Williams now claims that his party’s historic losses in last year’s election are also due in part to Democrats intentionally changing rules in order to allow illegal votes.
In an interview with KNUS radio host Peter Boyles last week, Williams said the following:
“The reason why Democrats are finding success is because I think they’re taking advantage of the boundaries and some of the systematic advantages that they’ve put into elections such as ballot harvesting, such as taking advantage of a lack of enforcement of voter rolls being cleaned up, or even signature verification type stuff.”
Williams was speaking about state legislative races. His mention of “boundaries” is a reference to the newly redrawn state House and Senate districts lines, following 2021’s redistricting via independent commission, a process which was generally seen as having been somewhat favorable to Republicans
Williams’ shift from claiming outright fraud (as he still says about 2020) to saying Democrats “took advantage” of dirty voter rolls and “signature-verification type stuff,” marks a rhetorical move from the extremist fringe to only slightly subtler dog-whistle language of more mainstream conservatives. None of the claims have ever been substantiated, but vague allegations of inaccurate voter rolls or insufficiently strict signature verification processes leave enough wiggle room to avoid sounding conspiratorial while still hitting the main talking points to satisfy most of the deniers — and undermine confidence in Colorado’s election process.
Host Boyles stands apart from many of his fellow Colorado conservative talk show hosts in that he’s frequently called out Republicans, including Williams, who have engaged in election denialism. Yet he didn’t object in the least during this May 3 interview. Neither Williams nor Boyles responded to email requests for comment. This article will be updated with any responses received.
Williams’ comments contradicted his statement from just minutes earlier, when Williams ascribed the Republicans’ Statehouse losses primarily to poor messaging, with his unsubstantiated election meddling claims as a secondary reason.
“I think our challenge is that we need to start appealing to folks on the issues they care about,” said Williams. “What you saw in 2022 was the ‘Commitment to Colorado’ that was about an 11-point plan about so many different issues and it ultimately boiled down to three things: crime, inflation/cost of living, and educational choice.
“I think the tough pill to swallow for Republicans is that that didn’t resonate with the voters. The voters for whatever reason said ‘okay thank you for sharing that information but we’re going to go ahead and vote for the Democrats based off their messaging,’ among other things. I mean there’s also the systematic election advantages they have like ballot harvesting and what have you, but ultimately their brand, their messaging beat out our brand and our messaging.”
Williams acknowledged that Republicans won’t retake any legislative majorities next year.
“Our priority for the next election cycle is mainly the state Legislature,” said Williams. “I’m not going to promise the moon to anyone. I’m not going to say that we’re going to get back into the majority because we’re not. This is going to be a multi-election effort in order for us to get back to par… We’re going to focus on gains that we can make in the legislature and we’re going to help supplement the efforts of protecting Congressional District Three and then taking CD8. Those are meaningful gains. They’re reasonable gains and it’s not over-promising and quite frankly we can’t expect to take everything back overnight.”
Boyles also asked Williams about his plan for recruiting candidates. The GOP chair didn’t offer specifics but replied that over the next four years, he expects people will turn up.
“I guarantee you,” promised Williams, “there are people who are going to line up in 2024 and even 2026 that we’re not even aware of, yeah, but they could very well be the Great White Hope, if you will.”
