Democrats and Republicans Gather for State Assemblies

There was plenty of political drama at this weekend’s state nominating assemblies. It’s where party delegates from around the state make their choices for who they’d like to see running for state treasurer or governor. While candidate pool in the gubernatorial race narrowed it’s still anyone’s guess who will be on the November ballot.

Listen to Bente Birkeland’s report on both assemblies:

At the Democratic meeting in Broomfield, Cary Kennedy won more than 60 percent of the delegate vote to gain top line designation in her party’s primary for Governor.  Jared Polis was second with about 33 percent.  Two others, Mike Johnston and Donna Lynne are petitioning to make the democratic ballot, with Johnston already submitting enough signatures.

KGNU’s Miriam Schiff and Karen Raforth were at the Democratic assembly and heard from delegates and attendees.

Kiera Jackson with Colorado Black Women for Political Action told KGNU’s Karen Raforth that the organization seeks to educate members to be informed on what’s going on in communities and nationwide, “not just to educate but then also to give them the information and tools that they need to be able to go out and be leaders in their own communities, whether that’s at a very grass roots level, which I’m a grass roots kind of girl, so that’s my level, or taking it to a higher level and running for office.”

Democratic US congress member Dianna Degette of Denver will face a primary challenge from Saira Rao who gained close to 40% of the delegate vote.

Two contenders seeking the Democratic nomination for Colorado’s next Attorney General made the primary ballot: former dean of the University of Colorado Law School Phil Weiser received 53 percent of delegate votes and state Rep. Joe Salazar got 37 percent.

At the Republican assembly in Boulder, state Treasurer Walker Stapleton won top line designation, as Attorney General Cynthia Coffman received only 6 percent of the vote and did not qualify for the primary.  Greg Lopez the former mayor of Parker qualified, and two others, Doug Robinson and Victor Mitchell still may get on the Republican ballot through petitions. Joe Richey reports that 3,000 Republicans from around the state gathered at the Coors Event Center on the CU Boulder campus with praise for Donald Trump, criticism of efforts to enact gun control and vows to uphold TABOR emanating from the podium.

The next step in the elections is the primaries happening on June 26th. New rules have opened up the primaries to non-affiliated voters.:

• Voters affiliated with a major party: may cast a ballot for candidates of the party they are affiliated with.
• Voters affiliated with a minor party: if there is a minor party contest those affiliated with that minor party may cast a ballot for those candidates.
• Unaffiliated voters: An unaffiliated voter may cast a ballot for any one political party. If an unaffiliated voter returns a ballot with more than one major political party, the ballot will be rejected and none of the votes will be counted.

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