Take heart, Colorado COS Volunteers. There is opportunity, more than just hope, to turn our state back towards a state more representative of all its constituent groups—not a single party rule.
A simple online search identifies Colorado as Democrat leaning, and therefore, “blue.” As the saying goes, the devil is in the details.
Fun fact: the terms red and blue came from color television. To represent election results, the networks used colors to depict a state’s popular vote results. CBS first color-coded electoral college vote results in 1972. However, at that time, blue represented the states won by the Republican incumbent Richard Nixon, and red stood in for those taken by challenger George McGovern.
Our Legislative Liaison Team recently completed an in-depth study of Colorado’s House of Representatives. Frank Vaughn, Sal Celauro, and Christina Morley, are led by John Graboski, State Legislative Liaison.
In their exercise, they determined 16 Representatives who are “vulnerable,” meaning, they do not have a stronghold on their district. The Representatives won their seat by less than 5% of the vote in 2022. Additionally, the voter registration in their districts show very close percentages between Republican and Democrat, and a dominant percentage of voters registered unaffiliated. The intention behind the exercise was to determine which Representatives may be more open to supporting a Convention of States to help attract votes.
Their analysis continued and led to even more insightful information: the Colorado electorate is largely Unaffiliated. According to the Colorado Secretary of State's website in August 2023, the makeup of Colorado voters is 24% Republican, 27% Democrat and 47% Unaffiliated, also known as Independent Voters. The remaining 2% are registered outside of those categories.
Unaffiliated voters are an important study. To get a sense of their political power, consider the fact that in Colorado, more Republicans voted in the 2012 elections than Democrats. Republican Mitt Romney should have been the favorite, "but as it was, the unaffiliated probably washed out that difference and then created the winning margin for Obama," said Judd Choate, who runs the elections division for the Colorado secretary of state's office.
Nationwide, independent voters are growing rapidly. Colorado follows the trend. Consultants and party studies break the group into three parts: 1) those who don’t support any party affiliation or believe we need three parties, 2) those who feel disassociated by the Democratic party but lean liberal, 3) those who don’t support the Republican party but lean conservative.
Millennials, defined as “those under 35” are the fastest growing voter segment.
Overwhelmingly, polls show that dissatisfaction with parties and political divisiveness are driving their lack of party affiliation. For younger people especially, being shut out of a social group is also driving their affiliation, or lack thereof. Simply being affiliated with a party may drive away dating potential, friends and even job opportunities.
This is great information for our Convention of States movement, but we must be sensitive to delivering our message. If divisiveness is driving a lack of affiliation, we must be inclusive, neutral, and positive. We must stick to our message: term limits, fiscal responsibility and limiting federal overreach-all non-partisan issues. We must stick to facts and point to where we are going, leaving the past grievances behind.
If we can avoid the pitfalls of negativity, attacking, and high emotions, we have an opportunity to attract a whole new, young, and energetic segment who may have never seen how government is supposed to work. That’s exciting.
Over 2.5 million citizens have signed the Convention of States petition. Consider asking your neighbors and friends to do the same. Let's invite the Millennials and everyone else looking positive change to help us send the message that we want change to the federal government.
