Proposition 131 proposes amending the Colorado statutes to:
- Create an all-candidate primary election for certain state and federal officers where the top four candidates advance to the general election; and
- Allow voters to rank those candidates in the general election, with votes counted over multiple rounds to determine who wins the election.
IndivisibleNOCO recommends voting NO on this proposition.
IndivisibleNOCO supports ranked choice voting. However, the all-candidate primary election included in the measure is a thinly veiled ploy to lend more power to wealthy backers of politically camouflaged candidates.
Proposition 131 adds another level of gamesmanship to the Colorado electoral process. The proposition sets up the system so that candidates with the most money behind them could rise above a crowded field in the primary elections and sustain that momentum through November. This process weakens the party system that many voters rely on to make informed choices.
Both parties oppose the measure because it opens the door to pitting members of a single party against each other in the general election. The purpose of primary elections is to select candidates who reflect different policy priorities and then allow citizens to choose between them in the general election. An argument that all-candidate primaries would increase the participation of unaffiliated voters does not hold weight since unaffiliated voters can already participate in the primary elections.
Practically, the proposed system would be complicated, confusing and expensive to implement. County clerks oppose the measure because of its complexity. They would like to ensure that rank choice voting works at the municipal level before implementing it in county-wide or state-wide races. Additionally, since the proposed law applies to some offices and not others, voters would have to vote in two different systems for each election and may even need two different ballots. The estimated fiscal impact is $6 million per year at the state level and about $9 million per election at the county level.
IndivisibleNOCO follows the money and this money tracks to conservative millionaires and billionaires who have time and time again tried to control election outcomes by bankrolling their preferred candidates and ballot measures. Kent Thiry is the multimillionaire conservative behind Proposition 131, donating $1.4 million to the PAC supporting the proposition. The other backers of Prop. 131 are part of a national network of wealthy people who have bankrolled similar ballot initiatives in other states.
Colorado faces enough fiscal constraints without additional election expenses that might be better spent on education, public services and quality of life issues. Colorado is currently the gold standard for the election process and this proposition is not solving any problems. Rather, it seems like it will create problems. This Let’s show Kent Thiry and his band of millionaires and billionaires that Colorado elections cannot be bought.