Colorado voters are no strangers to ballot initiatives: every two years, at least a handful of them appear on our ballots, giving voters a direct say in changing the state’s laws. It’s the process that gave us things like paid family and medical leave – which came from an initiative created and championed by former Rep. Matt Gray and the late Sen. Faith Winter – and recreational cannabis, and it’s the reason our November ballots are usually about eight pages long.
The Colorado Times Recorder will host an online panel and fundraiser on Tuesday, May 12, to discuss its recent investigation (and new website) that illuminates how wealthy conservative donors, like GOP billionaire Phil Anschutz, have poured millions of dollars into a network of dark-money groups focused on public relations and ballot measures.
The biggest stars in the world are currently either bound for or departing from the small city of Indio, California, where the Coachella Valley Music & Arts Festival kicked off over the weekend and will continue through next Sunday. The festival, better known simply as ‘Coachella,’ draws annual crowds in the hundreds of thousands and gross revenues greater than $100 million, making it one of the highest-profile and most successful live music events in the world.
The year is 2024 and your Colorado ballot has just arrived in the mail. The envelope is thick, another year’s ballot loaded not just with candidates, but with state and local initiatives. You fill in the bubbles next to the candidates you like, take a deep breath, then turn to the page where the initiatives start.
Last year, paid signature gatherers were found to be misleading voters in left-leaning areas of Colorado while canvassing for Initiative 95, a proposed constitutional amendment that would force local law enforcement to work more closely with ICE. Now, a leader of the conservative dark money group that created Initiative 95 is citing those deceptively gathered signatures as an indicator of support from the left.
Signature gatherers outside of grocery stores and other public spaces are a common sight in the year before an election — but can you trust what circulators tell you?
Of the 87 ballot initiatives listed on the website for the Colorado Title Board, which manages the state's ballot initiative process, Advance Colorado president Michael Fields is listed as a proponent for 61 of them.
Last week, we published a first-of-its-kind investigation into the right-wing dark money network exerting immense influence over Colorado politics. Called “The Redprint: How Advance Colorado and Anonymous Donors Shape the Political Landscape,” the piece looked at Advance Colorado’s opaque funding and tightly knit cluster of organizations which, together, allow it to drive dominant political narratives in ways which benefit their donors’ agendas.
The Republican Party wields no official power at the state level in Colorado. Since 2020, the GOP has been shut out of every statewide office and control of either chamber of the state Legislature. Despite the party’s ouster from official authority, though, one group of Colorado Republicans has figured out how to work within the new reality, and has succeeded in driving conservative issues forward at the state level without a governor, attorney general, or state Legislature on their side.
About 2,500 years ago, the Greek philosopher Heraclitus noted that the only constant in life is change. In all the time which has passed since that observation, some people still haven’t gotten the message – something which was proven again last week when the conservatives at Advance Colorado took a break from being the sole remaining political threat faced by Colorado Democrats and indulged one of American conservatism’s least serious impulses: kneejerk rage at a minor change.
