Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
One of the most interesting, controversial, important ballot measures that
we're going to be seeing as Colorado voters this year
is now called Proposition one thirty one. And I'm not
going to spend a lot of time at this moment
describing it. We'll get into that in a second, because
it's not something I can describe in fifteen seconds. But
(00:21):
it would significantly change how we elect people to many,
but not all, offices in.
Speaker 2 (00:27):
The state of Colorado.
Speaker 1 (00:29):
And the main guy behind Prop one thirty one in
terms of championing the idea and also putting some a
lot of his own personal money into this project is
Kent Theory, who was a fortune five hundred CEO at Davida.
Has been very involved in political reform in Colorado in
(00:53):
what I will describe, and Kent can correct me if
I'm wrong, efforts to get system to not favor the fringes.
Speaker 2 (01:03):
So much so, Kent was a big proponent and supporter and.
Speaker 1 (01:07):
Backer of the ballot measures that opened primaries in Colorado
to un affiliated voters for example. Okay, so with that
long introduction, Kent, welcome back to Kowa.
Speaker 2 (01:17):
It's good to see you.
Speaker 3 (01:19):
Yeah, thank you, Ross, good to see well.
Speaker 4 (01:21):
So So give us the shortest, still essentially complete description
of what Proposition one thirty one will do if it passes.
Speaker 5 (01:33):
And what it will do is give the majority in
the middle their voice and choice back. Elections should belong
to voters, not parties, and in particular when the taxpayers are.
Speaker 3 (01:47):
Paying for the elections. So we have two court principles.
Speaker 5 (01:50):
One that every Colorado voter should be able to vote
for any candidate they want, independent of party, and number
two that to become an elected offishial in Colorado.
Speaker 3 (02:01):
You got to earn a majority of support.
Speaker 5 (02:03):
You can't get by with getting the fifteen percent on
one side or the other.
Speaker 2 (02:08):
So how does it?
Speaker 1 (02:09):
So those are the values, tell us about the actual
moving parts.
Speaker 2 (02:14):
What does it do?
Speaker 3 (02:17):
Got it?
Speaker 5 (02:17):
So, it's a tidy, integrated three step process. Step number
one and all candidate primary, all candidates on the same ballot.
Every voter gets that ballot that's number one of three.
Number two of three is the top four advance. This
creates wonderful diversity. You know, just get the far left
(02:38):
and the far right, you also get the center left
and the center right or the center and you're giving
the general election voters a real choice. Step number three
of three is requiring majority support, which we achieved through
doing rank voting. So step one, all candidate primary, Step two,
(03:00):
top four advance. Step three you got to get a
Missouri to win. We do it with ranked voting.
Speaker 1 (03:06):
Okay, So let's go through the primary and the general
election things, just to make sure people understand what we're
talking about, and let's not assume knowledge of the people
by the people who are listening to us. So the primary,
rather than having a Democratic primary and a Republican primary,
everybody's in the primary, no matter what your party, and
(03:29):
then the top four finishers in that primary go to
the general election.
Speaker 2 (03:33):
Are those the key points about the primary?
Speaker 3 (03:36):
It's exactly correct.
Speaker 5 (03:38):
Everybody gets to see the same ballot, they vote for
one person, and the top four advance to the general
to the people to decide.
Speaker 1 (03:47):
Okay, So I think that part's pretty easy to understand.
So the next part, I think is a little bit
more complicated and maybe a little bit more controversial, and
that is ranked choice voting to decide the outcome of
the general election.
Speaker 2 (04:00):
Please describe how ranked choice voting works.
Speaker 3 (04:04):
Yeah, it's actually very simple.
Speaker 5 (04:06):
It's just like asking someone between the rockies Broncos, Abbs,
and whomever else. What's your favorite team, your second favorite,
your third favorite. Everybody does that sort of thing all
the time when they go to a restaurant or they
think about what sports are going to watch, and so
what we do is just apply that.
Speaker 3 (04:25):
Same simple principle.
Speaker 5 (04:26):
So I'll say that my number one choice is Ross Kominski,
but my number two choice is somebody else. It couldn't
be a person from the other party. And the way
it works is that you rank one, two, three, four.
If you only want to pick one, you can, If
you only want to rank two, you can. It's totally
your choice as a voter. And if nobody gets over
(04:49):
fifty percent in that first ballot one, two, three four,
then the number four person gets dropped out and their
number two votes get re allocated.
Speaker 3 (04:58):
So it's very very simple.
Speaker 5 (05:00):
It's like being told, you know, we're out of prime
rib at the restaurant, and so therefore you go to
your next choice and you get New York Strip instead.
Speaker 3 (05:09):
Right.
Speaker 1 (05:09):
So, again, I think what Kent said was pretty clear,
but I'm going to say it again one more time.
So imagine that there are four candidates for whatever race,
and imagine that Ross Kaminsky is one of them, and
John Doe is another.
Speaker 2 (05:23):
One of them.
Speaker 1 (05:23):
And imagine Ross Kaminsky is a terrible candidate and John
Doe is a pretty good candidate.
Speaker 2 (05:28):
For whatever weird reason, Kent theory.
Speaker 1 (05:31):
Likes Ross Kominsky in the race, but he also likes
John Doe. So Kent ranks Ross first, John Doe second,
and whoever the others are third and fourth. And then
imagine the rest of the voters are smarter than Kenton,
know that Ross Kiminski doesn't belong in that office. I
come in last in that first round of voting, and
(05:53):
nobody got fifty percent, and I was last.
Speaker 2 (05:56):
So now I'm out. Kent, who's who had me as
his first choice?
Speaker 1 (06:02):
Now his first choice is gone, so his vote, his
vote now goes to his second choice for John Doe.
So now his vote gets allocated to John Doe. And
then it gets recounted, and if somebody has over fifty
percent there in that second round, then it and then
it ends. And if nobody does, you do it one
more time, but by the because and only one more time,
(06:25):
because by the time you get down to two candidates,
somebody's going to have fifty percent what did I miss?
Speaker 3 (06:33):
Yeah, that's good enough.
Speaker 5 (06:34):
I can give a real world example. So we'll use
a presidential one because everyone will know the names that
So let's go back a few years when you've got
someone from the far left like Bernie Sanders, but you've
also got Amy Klovischer, the Minnesota senator, who's just moderate left,
and then you've got Donald Trump, who's far right on
(06:54):
that side, but you had Jeff Bush, who's center right,
more moderate right, and so in our system, as opposed
to having the Sanders and Trump people play to the
fringes and make it through the primaries on that basis,
getting a very small percentage of the votes first top
four means you've also still got Amy and Jeb there
for the voters to choose between. And now you go
(07:16):
to rank voting, Well, it turns out a whole lot
of Amy Klobacher voters, for example, their number two choice,
even though their Democrats is not going to be Burning,
it would be Jeb. Similarly, a whole bunch of Jeb
Bush voters their number two choice would not be Donald Trump,
it would be Amy Klobchuer. So we put the sixty
five percent back in the driver's seat.
Speaker 2 (07:38):
That makes a lot of sense.
Speaker 1 (07:39):
And I will just note though, when you tell me
if I'm wrong on this, I don't believe the Proposition
one thirty one would actually apply to the office of President.
Speaker 3 (07:49):
Correct.
Speaker 5 (07:50):
That is something that we hope to do downstream. But
you know, I want to bite off more than you
can chew.
Speaker 1 (07:54):
Right, So Prop one thirty one would apply to the
Federal House, federal and most state offices. It would not
apply to district attorneys, and it would not apply to
city and county offices unless they imploy They can implement
their own ranked choice voting if they want to, but
Prop one thirty one wouldn't do that for those just
(08:15):
joining we're talking with Kent theory. He is the key
backer of Proposition one thirty one, which would implement ranked
choice voting.
Speaker 2 (08:25):
What is that, Shannon? Are you hearing that?
Speaker 3 (08:29):
All right?
Speaker 2 (08:30):
Sorry about that, Kent.
Speaker 1 (08:31):
So, and this would implement ranked choice voting here in
the state of Colorado. So a couple of things I
want to go through with you now, Kent. Rank choice
voting was implemented in Alaska, and some Republicans think that
that's the reason that Alaska elected a Democrat when normally
it would elect a Republican, and there seems to be
(08:53):
a move afoot in Alaska to try to overturn ranked
choice voting there. So how do you give people comfort
when at least some headline will make it look like, hey,
this was just tried and they're rejecting it now.
Speaker 3 (09:08):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (09:08):
Well, first, Alaska, I think it has been a very
substantial and demonstrable success. If people think of Alaska as
a purely Republican state, only eight twenty eight percent of
registered voters in Alaska are Republican. Now that's twice as
many as the Democrats at fourteen. But the real story
(09:29):
of Alaska is the fifty five percent that are independent.
And so the Republicans have always dominated the state because
they had closed primaries, and so the Republicans would nominate
their person and they would always beat them. They would
always beat the Democrats because the independents were out of
the game. Our reform put them back in the game.
(09:50):
And literally fifty two percent of Alaska voters voter split ticket,
which means that I'm going to pick a Republican for
governor but a Democrat for senator. So the American people
are crying out for the right to vote for person
over party when they think it's appropriate. You might have
someone who votes Democratic eighty percent of the time, but boy,
there are some Republicans that they want or some Democrats
(10:12):
that don't like.
Speaker 3 (10:13):
They should have the right to make that vote.
Speaker 5 (10:16):
And so Alaska, in our mind was a beautiful reflection
of the entire Alaska population, and the Republican ran too
much focused on just going to their base, whereas the
Democrat ran and tried to appeal to those fifty five
percent that were independent. And yes, the Republicans there are
(10:36):
spending a lot of money trying to repeal it because
they didn't like losing.
Speaker 3 (10:42):
However, they can win.
Speaker 5 (10:43):
Just by focusing on the entire electorate and not just
the members of their own party.
Speaker 1 (10:48):
I will say, as kind of a macro comment, I mean,
I'm not a Republican, I'm onun affiliated, but it's been
kind of frustrating to see how terrible Republicans have been
at adapting to any changes in the way the game
was played.
Speaker 2 (11:05):
Right for ballot harvesting.
Speaker 3 (11:06):
Right.
Speaker 2 (11:07):
Ballot harvesting is legal in.
Speaker 1 (11:08):
Some places and illegal in some places, and in the
places where it's legal, like Colorado, but only legal for
ten ten ballots per person.
Speaker 2 (11:17):
Who would be collecting them, but it's legal to a
certain degree.
Speaker 1 (11:20):
In Colorado, Republicans did nothing and they just let the Democrats.
Speaker 2 (11:24):
Say, well, if this is the new rule, I'm gonna
play the game by the new rule.
Speaker 1 (11:27):
And then and you get the early voting, and then
you had Trump saying don't early vote because then your
vote won't count. So then his people didn't vote at all.
And Republicans are just terrible and they need to figure
out how to play whatever the game is, right, it's
it's not that that part is not is not difficult
to understand.
Speaker 2 (11:46):
Let me get you give me some quick answers.
Speaker 1 (11:48):
Kent to some listener questions that are coming through on
the text line, will in the primary will the candidate's
party affiliations be listed on the ballot and in the
general election?
Speaker 3 (11:59):
I guess yes, absolutely, yes.
Speaker 5 (12:03):
We did a lot of pulling and that's what Colorado
voters want, and absolutely they're going to know the party
affiliation from each candidate.
Speaker 2 (12:11):
In a one party state like Colorado.
Speaker 1 (12:13):
Is there a danger in this system of having only
Dems make it to the general election in lots of places.
Speaker 3 (12:22):
Because of gerrymandering?
Speaker 5 (12:24):
You could have some districts that would theoretically send four
ds or four Urs. That would mean that it's a
district which has a lot more DS than ours or
a lot more Ours than D's, and so it is
a legitimate reflection of the district.
Speaker 3 (12:40):
However, those instances will be very very rare.
Speaker 5 (12:44):
In general, your top four are going to reflect who
the people are interested in. And of course, partisan membership
is one of the filters that a lot of voters use,
and so in a dominantly democratic district, you're going to
get more Democratic candidates, and a dominantly republic district, you're
going to get more Republican candidates, and that's how democracy
should work.
Speaker 1 (13:06):
A few listeners want to know if you're a secret
Democrat proposing this because you want Democrats to do better
in Colorado.
Speaker 2 (13:13):
I got that more than once, you know.
Speaker 3 (13:16):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (13:16):
One of the reasons that we think we're getting it
right is that both major parties oppose this, and a
bunch of the Democrat Democratic party leaders think I'm a
closet Republican and a bunch of the Republican party leaders
think I'm a closet Democrat. So we think we got
it pretty much right, because both sides seem equally suspicious.
Speaker 3 (13:36):
And what matters is I'm talking about what party leaders think.
Speaker 5 (13:40):
The members of their parties are strongly in favor of
this change.
Speaker 1 (13:47):
Would this system potentially push Colorado towards having more third parties?
And if so, could that risk us having at our
state level, in particular, more something that starts looking more
like a like a parliamentary system with small parties, you know,
having more weight than they should because of coalitions.
Speaker 5 (14:09):
Yeah, and let me just go backward to a second.
I am just to answer the question the other way.
I am a fierce nonpartisan. I've been an independent most
of my life. I've given to candidates on each side
of the aisle for twenty five years because I'm a.
Speaker 3 (14:24):
Firm believer in the person over the party. But not,
let me go back. What was the next question?
Speaker 1 (14:31):
The next question is that I have a listener to
asked you a question I hadn't really thought about.
Speaker 2 (14:35):
Could this result in.
Speaker 1 (14:38):
More success for very small third parties? And then you know,
we end up with a kind of chaotic situation like
you get in Israeli government or German government and so on.
Speaker 3 (14:47):
Yes, Yeah, first of all, I believe in the two
party system.
Speaker 5 (14:51):
And for some people who think I'm going after it,
I'm trying to save it. There's forty eight percent of
Conrado voters are now independent. Business lost half their customers.
They would be asking some serious questions. That forty eight
has been growing. It was thirty three ten years ago,
now it's forty eight. It's continuing to go up. Sixty
(15:12):
four percent of our voters under age thirty four are independent.
Eighty five percent of Generation Z thinks neither party has
anything to offer them. So the two party system is
driving itself over a cliff, and it's measures like this
that will restore the credibility of those parties.
Speaker 3 (15:28):
And save them. If they don't do anything, then I
do think.
Speaker 5 (15:32):
It's inevitable that a third party could emerge because you're
having an increasing percentage. Soon a majority of people are
saying I can't relate to either party and so and so.
We believe that what we're doing will help save the
two party system. And right now, ross people don't realize
minor parties can go straight to the general election ballot
(15:52):
with a very small number of signatures, and in our measure,
everyone hasked to go through the primary, and so it's
a playing field because what happens when you get minor
parties jumped straight to the general election ballot, you get spoilers.
This is another cancer that our proposal will fix.
Speaker 3 (16:10):
Right now, we have two or three.
Speaker 5 (16:12):
Elections last cycle in Colorado or the winner wasn't the
person who would have gotten a majority of the vote.
It was determined by whether or not the libertarian that
the Democrats put up to run got more votes to
take away from the Republican than the Green candidate that
the Republican has put up to run against the Democrat.
And we're literally having elections determined by who does better
(16:34):
the libertarian or the Green as opposed to between the
two major party candidates, which one a majority of people
would prefer.
Speaker 1 (16:42):
Okay, I've got time for one more question for you
can't so. Near the end of the legislative session, Emily Serrata,
one of the worst members of state legislature, jammed into
Senate Bill two ten, kind of secretly some stuff that
appears designed to thwart your plan.
Speaker 2 (17:03):
If it were to pass the voters.
Speaker 1 (17:06):
I encouraged Governor Polus to veto that bill because of
those provisions that Serota stuck in there, but he didn't.
Speaker 2 (17:14):
So, and again we only have about a minute here, but.
Speaker 1 (17:18):
Just tell us whatever you want to tell us about
these hurdles that have been put up in front of
rank choice voting if it were to pass the voters,
and whether you.
Speaker 2 (17:26):
Think they can be overcome in a timely way.
Speaker 3 (17:29):
Now.
Speaker 5 (17:30):
Number one, what's Serota and a very small number of
legislators secretly did was unethical and anti democratic disgusting. Number
two plus Governor Polis appropriately condemned it, but had to
sign the bill because the session was over and there
was some important stuff in there. Number three, the governor
(17:51):
has said, if we win, he's going to call an
he's going to issue an executive order. There will be
a qualified task force, and he said he's not even
going to pay attention to what Serota and that small
group snuff their weight through with that. That's not even
going to be a starting point for negotiations because it
was illegitimately.
Speaker 1 (18:11):
Done right, But that doesn't mean it won't end up
in court. If rank choice voting passes and they try
to implement it, someone's going to go to court and say, here,
look at this law.
Speaker 2 (18:19):
They can't do this.
Speaker 5 (18:22):
Yeah, we are going to pass enabling legislation, and because
we want a very thoughtful implementation plan as well, so
we'll be working very closely with the clerks to come
up with a rational plan and also push that other
legislation out of existence.
Speaker 1 (18:40):
Folks, I think you can understand why I started the
segment by saying, this is going to be a very
interesting issue, potentially.
Speaker 2 (18:46):
The single most important thing.
Speaker 1 (18:48):
On your ballot this year, and we're going to keep
talking about it repeatedly from today all the way through
election day. We're going to have Kimp back, We'll have
other folks on who are ford.
Speaker 2 (18:59):
And against it.
Speaker 1 (19:00):
At the moment, I'm leaning in favor of it because
of Einstein's definition of insanity, Like we have such bad
results in this state and have had for so long,
I'm willing to try almost anything. And I do think
the fact that Dave Williams hates this and the fact
that the chair of the Democratic Party hates this makes
me like it.
Speaker 2 (19:20):
But we're going to keep talking about it as time passes.
Speaker 1 (19:22):
Kent theory is the key backer of Proposition one point
thirty one. You can read more about it on my
website that has links to all of this stuff Kent.
Speaker 2 (19:30):
Thanks for your time, we'll have you back.
Speaker 3 (19:33):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (19:33):
Thank you Ross for shining a light on this issue.
It's so important.
Speaker 2 (19:37):
Glad to do it.
One of the most interesting, controversial, important ballot measures that
we're going to be seeing as Colorado voters this year
is now called Proposition one thirty one. And I'm not
going to spend a lot of time at this moment
describing it. We'll get into that in a second, because
it's not something I can describe in fifteen seconds. But
(00:21):
it would significantly change how we elect people to many,
but not all, offices in.
Speaker 2 (00:27):
The state of Colorado.
Speaker 1 (00:29):
And the main guy behind Prop one thirty one in
terms of championing the idea and also putting some a
lot of his own personal money into this project is
Kent Theory, who was a fortune five hundred CEO at Davida.
Has been very involved in political reform in Colorado in
(00:53):
what I will describe, and Kent can correct me if
I'm wrong, efforts to get system to not favor the fringes.
Speaker 2 (01:03):
So much so, Kent was a big proponent and supporter and.
Speaker 1 (01:07):
Backer of the ballot measures that opened primaries in Colorado
to un affiliated voters for example. Okay, so with that
long introduction, Kent, welcome back to Kowa.
Speaker 2 (01:17):
It's good to see you.
Speaker 3 (01:19):
Yeah, thank you, Ross, good to see well.
Speaker 4 (01:21):
So So give us the shortest, still essentially complete description
of what Proposition one thirty one will do if it passes.
Speaker 5 (01:33):
And what it will do is give the majority in
the middle their voice and choice back. Elections should belong
to voters, not parties, and in particular when the taxpayers are.
Speaker 3 (01:47):
Paying for the elections. So we have two court principles.
Speaker 5 (01:50):
One that every Colorado voter should be able to vote
for any candidate they want, independent of party, and number
two that to become an elected offishial in Colorado.
Speaker 3 (02:01):
You got to earn a majority of support.
Speaker 5 (02:03):
You can't get by with getting the fifteen percent on
one side or the other.
Speaker 2 (02:08):
So how does it?
Speaker 1 (02:09):
So those are the values, tell us about the actual
moving parts.
Speaker 2 (02:14):
What does it do?
Speaker 3 (02:17):
Got it?
Speaker 5 (02:17):
So, it's a tidy, integrated three step process. Step number
one and all candidate primary, all candidates on the same ballot.
Every voter gets that ballot that's number one of three.
Number two of three is the top four advance. This
creates wonderful diversity. You know, just get the far left
(02:38):
and the far right, you also get the center left
and the center right or the center and you're giving
the general election voters a real choice. Step number three
of three is requiring majority support, which we achieved through
doing rank voting. So step one, all candidate primary, Step two,
(03:00):
top four advance. Step three you got to get a
Missouri to win. We do it with ranked voting.
Speaker 1 (03:06):
Okay, So let's go through the primary and the general
election things, just to make sure people understand what we're
talking about, and let's not assume knowledge of the people
by the people who are listening to us. So the primary,
rather than having a Democratic primary and a Republican primary,
everybody's in the primary, no matter what your party, and
(03:29):
then the top four finishers in that primary go to
the general election.
Speaker 2 (03:33):
Are those the key points about the primary?
Speaker 3 (03:36):
It's exactly correct.
Speaker 5 (03:38):
Everybody gets to see the same ballot, they vote for
one person, and the top four advance to the general
to the people to decide.
Speaker 1 (03:47):
Okay, So I think that part's pretty easy to understand.
So the next part, I think is a little bit
more complicated and maybe a little bit more controversial, and
that is ranked choice voting to decide the outcome of
the general election.
Speaker 2 (04:00):
Please describe how ranked choice voting works.
Speaker 3 (04:04):
Yeah, it's actually very simple.
Speaker 5 (04:06):
It's just like asking someone between the rockies Broncos, Abbs,
and whomever else. What's your favorite team, your second favorite,
your third favorite. Everybody does that sort of thing all
the time when they go to a restaurant or they
think about what sports are going to watch, and so
what we do is just apply that.
Speaker 3 (04:25):
Same simple principle.
Speaker 5 (04:26):
So I'll say that my number one choice is Ross Kominski,
but my number two choice is somebody else. It couldn't
be a person from the other party. And the way
it works is that you rank one, two, three, four.
If you only want to pick one, you can, If
you only want to rank two, you can. It's totally
your choice as a voter. And if nobody gets over
(04:49):
fifty percent in that first ballot one, two, three four,
then the number four person gets dropped out and their
number two votes get re allocated.
Speaker 3 (04:58):
So it's very very simple.
Speaker 5 (05:00):
It's like being told, you know, we're out of prime
rib at the restaurant, and so therefore you go to
your next choice and you get New York Strip instead.
Speaker 3 (05:09):
Right.
Speaker 1 (05:09):
So, again, I think what Kent said was pretty clear,
but I'm going to say it again one more time.
So imagine that there are four candidates for whatever race,
and imagine that Ross Kaminsky is one of them, and
John Doe is another.
Speaker 2 (05:23):
One of them.
Speaker 1 (05:23):
And imagine Ross Kaminsky is a terrible candidate and John
Doe is a pretty good candidate.
Speaker 2 (05:28):
For whatever weird reason, Kent theory.
Speaker 1 (05:31):
Likes Ross Kominsky in the race, but he also likes
John Doe. So Kent ranks Ross first, John Doe second,
and whoever the others are third and fourth. And then
imagine the rest of the voters are smarter than Kenton,
know that Ross Kiminski doesn't belong in that office. I
come in last in that first round of voting, and
(05:53):
nobody got fifty percent, and I was last.
Speaker 2 (05:56):
So now I'm out. Kent, who's who had me as
his first choice?
Speaker 1 (06:02):
Now his first choice is gone, so his vote, his
vote now goes to his second choice for John Doe.
So now his vote gets allocated to John Doe. And
then it gets recounted, and if somebody has over fifty
percent there in that second round, then it and then
it ends. And if nobody does, you do it one
more time, but by the because and only one more time,
(06:25):
because by the time you get down to two candidates,
somebody's going to have fifty percent what did I miss?
Speaker 3 (06:33):
Yeah, that's good enough.
Speaker 5 (06:34):
I can give a real world example. So we'll use
a presidential one because everyone will know the names that
So let's go back a few years when you've got
someone from the far left like Bernie Sanders, but you've
also got Amy Klovischer, the Minnesota senator, who's just moderate left,
and then you've got Donald Trump, who's far right on
(06:54):
that side, but you had Jeff Bush, who's center right,
more moderate right, and so in our system, as opposed
to having the Sanders and Trump people play to the
fringes and make it through the primaries on that basis,
getting a very small percentage of the votes first top
four means you've also still got Amy and Jeb there
for the voters to choose between. And now you go
(07:16):
to rank voting, Well, it turns out a whole lot
of Amy Klobacher voters, for example, their number two choice,
even though their Democrats is not going to be Burning,
it would be Jeb. Similarly, a whole bunch of Jeb
Bush voters their number two choice would not be Donald Trump,
it would be Amy Klobchuer. So we put the sixty
five percent back in the driver's seat.
Speaker 2 (07:38):
That makes a lot of sense.
Speaker 1 (07:39):
And I will just note though, when you tell me
if I'm wrong on this, I don't believe the Proposition
one thirty one would actually apply to the office of President.
Speaker 3 (07:49):
Correct.
Speaker 5 (07:50):
That is something that we hope to do downstream. But
you know, I want to bite off more than you
can chew.
Speaker 1 (07:54):
Right, So Prop one thirty one would apply to the
Federal House, federal and most state offices. It would not
apply to district attorneys, and it would not apply to
city and county offices unless they imploy They can implement
their own ranked choice voting if they want to, but
Prop one thirty one wouldn't do that for those just
(08:15):
joining we're talking with Kent theory. He is the key
backer of Proposition one thirty one, which would implement ranked
choice voting.
Speaker 2 (08:25):
What is that, Shannon? Are you hearing that?
Speaker 3 (08:29):
All right?
Speaker 2 (08:30):
Sorry about that, Kent.
Speaker 1 (08:31):
So, and this would implement ranked choice voting here in
the state of Colorado. So a couple of things I
want to go through with you now, Kent. Rank choice
voting was implemented in Alaska, and some Republicans think that
that's the reason that Alaska elected a Democrat when normally
it would elect a Republican, and there seems to be
(08:53):
a move afoot in Alaska to try to overturn ranked
choice voting there. So how do you give people comfort
when at least some headline will make it look like, hey,
this was just tried and they're rejecting it now.
Speaker 3 (09:08):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (09:08):
Well, first, Alaska, I think it has been a very
substantial and demonstrable success. If people think of Alaska as
a purely Republican state, only eight twenty eight percent of
registered voters in Alaska are Republican. Now that's twice as
many as the Democrats at fourteen. But the real story
(09:29):
of Alaska is the fifty five percent that are independent.
And so the Republicans have always dominated the state because
they had closed primaries, and so the Republicans would nominate
their person and they would always beat them. They would
always beat the Democrats because the independents were out of
the game. Our reform put them back in the game.
(09:50):
And literally fifty two percent of Alaska voters voter split ticket,
which means that I'm going to pick a Republican for
governor but a Democrat for senator. So the American people
are crying out for the right to vote for person
over party when they think it's appropriate. You might have
someone who votes Democratic eighty percent of the time, but boy,
there are some Republicans that they want or some Democrats
(10:12):
that don't like.
Speaker 3 (10:13):
They should have the right to make that vote.
Speaker 5 (10:16):
And so Alaska, in our mind was a beautiful reflection
of the entire Alaska population, and the Republican ran too
much focused on just going to their base, whereas the
Democrat ran and tried to appeal to those fifty five
percent that were independent. And yes, the Republicans there are
(10:36):
spending a lot of money trying to repeal it because
they didn't like losing.
Speaker 3 (10:42):
However, they can win.
Speaker 5 (10:43):
Just by focusing on the entire electorate and not just
the members of their own party.
Speaker 1 (10:48):
I will say, as kind of a macro comment, I mean,
I'm not a Republican, I'm onun affiliated, but it's been
kind of frustrating to see how terrible Republicans have been
at adapting to any changes in the way the game
was played.
Speaker 2 (11:05):
Right for ballot harvesting.
Speaker 3 (11:06):
Right.
Speaker 2 (11:07):
Ballot harvesting is legal in.
Speaker 1 (11:08):
Some places and illegal in some places, and in the
places where it's legal, like Colorado, but only legal for
ten ten ballots per person.
Speaker 2 (11:17):
Who would be collecting them, but it's legal to a
certain degree.
Speaker 1 (11:20):
In Colorado, Republicans did nothing and they just let the Democrats.
Speaker 2 (11:24):
Say, well, if this is the new rule, I'm gonna
play the game by the new rule.
Speaker 1 (11:27):
And then and you get the early voting, and then
you had Trump saying don't early vote because then your
vote won't count. So then his people didn't vote at all.
And Republicans are just terrible and they need to figure
out how to play whatever the game is, right, it's
it's not that that part is not is not difficult
to understand.
Speaker 2 (11:46):
Let me get you give me some quick answers.
Speaker 1 (11:48):
Kent to some listener questions that are coming through on
the text line, will in the primary will the candidate's
party affiliations be listed on the ballot and in the
general election?
Speaker 3 (11:59):
I guess yes, absolutely, yes.
Speaker 5 (12:03):
We did a lot of pulling and that's what Colorado
voters want, and absolutely they're going to know the party
affiliation from each candidate.
Speaker 2 (12:11):
In a one party state like Colorado.
Speaker 1 (12:13):
Is there a danger in this system of having only
Dems make it to the general election in lots of places.
Speaker 3 (12:22):
Because of gerrymandering?
Speaker 5 (12:24):
You could have some districts that would theoretically send four
ds or four Urs. That would mean that it's a
district which has a lot more DS than ours or
a lot more Ours than D's, and so it is
a legitimate reflection of the district.
Speaker 3 (12:40):
However, those instances will be very very rare.
Speaker 5 (12:44):
In general, your top four are going to reflect who
the people are interested in. And of course, partisan membership
is one of the filters that a lot of voters use,
and so in a dominantly democratic district, you're going to
get more Democratic candidates, and a dominantly republic district, you're
going to get more Republican candidates, and that's how democracy
should work.
Speaker 1 (13:06):
A few listeners want to know if you're a secret
Democrat proposing this because you want Democrats to do better
in Colorado.
Speaker 2 (13:13):
I got that more than once, you know.
Speaker 3 (13:16):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (13:16):
One of the reasons that we think we're getting it
right is that both major parties oppose this, and a
bunch of the Democrat Democratic party leaders think I'm a
closet Republican and a bunch of the Republican party leaders
think I'm a closet Democrat. So we think we got
it pretty much right, because both sides seem equally suspicious.
Speaker 3 (13:36):
And what matters is I'm talking about what party leaders think.
Speaker 5 (13:40):
The members of their parties are strongly in favor of
this change.
Speaker 1 (13:47):
Would this system potentially push Colorado towards having more third parties?
And if so, could that risk us having at our
state level, in particular, more something that starts looking more
like a like a parliamentary system with small parties, you know,
having more weight than they should because of coalitions.
Speaker 5 (14:09):
Yeah, and let me just go backward to a second.
I am just to answer the question the other way.
I am a fierce nonpartisan. I've been an independent most
of my life. I've given to candidates on each side
of the aisle for twenty five years because I'm a.
Speaker 3 (14:24):
Firm believer in the person over the party. But not,
let me go back. What was the next question?
Speaker 1 (14:31):
The next question is that I have a listener to
asked you a question I hadn't really thought about.
Speaker 2 (14:35):
Could this result in.
Speaker 1 (14:38):
More success for very small third parties? And then you know,
we end up with a kind of chaotic situation like
you get in Israeli government or German government and so on.
Speaker 3 (14:47):
Yes, Yeah, first of all, I believe in the two
party system.
Speaker 5 (14:51):
And for some people who think I'm going after it,
I'm trying to save it. There's forty eight percent of
Conrado voters are now independent. Business lost half their customers.
They would be asking some serious questions. That forty eight
has been growing. It was thirty three ten years ago,
now it's forty eight. It's continuing to go up. Sixty
(15:12):
four percent of our voters under age thirty four are independent.
Eighty five percent of Generation Z thinks neither party has
anything to offer them. So the two party system is
driving itself over a cliff, and it's measures like this
that will restore the credibility of those parties.
Speaker 3 (15:28):
And save them. If they don't do anything, then I
do think.
Speaker 5 (15:32):
It's inevitable that a third party could emerge because you're
having an increasing percentage. Soon a majority of people are
saying I can't relate to either party and so and so.
We believe that what we're doing will help save the
two party system. And right now, ross people don't realize
minor parties can go straight to the general election ballot
(15:52):
with a very small number of signatures, and in our measure,
everyone hasked to go through the primary, and so it's
a playing field because what happens when you get minor
parties jumped straight to the general election ballot, you get spoilers.
This is another cancer that our proposal will fix.
Speaker 3 (16:10):
Right now, we have two or three.
Speaker 5 (16:12):
Elections last cycle in Colorado or the winner wasn't the
person who would have gotten a majority of the vote.
It was determined by whether or not the libertarian that
the Democrats put up to run got more votes to
take away from the Republican than the Green candidate that
the Republican has put up to run against the Democrat.
And we're literally having elections determined by who does better
(16:34):
the libertarian or the Green as opposed to between the
two major party candidates, which one a majority of people
would prefer.
Speaker 1 (16:42):
Okay, I've got time for one more question for you
can't so. Near the end of the legislative session, Emily Serrata,
one of the worst members of state legislature, jammed into
Senate Bill two ten, kind of secretly some stuff that
appears designed to thwart your plan.
Speaker 2 (17:03):
If it were to pass the voters.
Speaker 1 (17:06):
I encouraged Governor Polus to veto that bill because of
those provisions that Serota stuck in there, but he didn't.
Speaker 2 (17:14):
So, and again we only have about a minute here, but.
Speaker 1 (17:18):
Just tell us whatever you want to tell us about
these hurdles that have been put up in front of
rank choice voting if it were to pass the voters,
and whether you.
Speaker 2 (17:26):
Think they can be overcome in a timely way.
Speaker 3 (17:29):
Now.
Speaker 5 (17:30):
Number one, what's Serota and a very small number of
legislators secretly did was unethical and anti democratic disgusting. Number
two plus Governor Polis appropriately condemned it, but had to
sign the bill because the session was over and there
was some important stuff in there. Number three, the governor
(17:51):
has said, if we win, he's going to call an
he's going to issue an executive order. There will be
a qualified task force, and he said he's not even
going to pay attention to what Serota and that small
group snuff their weight through with that. That's not even
going to be a starting point for negotiations because it
was illegitimately.
Speaker 1 (18:11):
Done right, But that doesn't mean it won't end up
in court. If rank choice voting passes and they try
to implement it, someone's going to go to court and say, here,
look at this law.
Speaker 2 (18:19):
They can't do this.
Speaker 5 (18:22):
Yeah, we are going to pass enabling legislation, and because
we want a very thoughtful implementation plan as well, so
we'll be working very closely with the clerks to come
up with a rational plan and also push that other
legislation out of existence.
Speaker 1 (18:40):
Folks, I think you can understand why I started the
segment by saying, this is going to be a very
interesting issue, potentially.
Speaker 2 (18:46):
The single most important thing.
Speaker 1 (18:48):
On your ballot this year, and we're going to keep
talking about it repeatedly from today all the way through
election day. We're going to have Kimp back, We'll have
other folks on who are ford.
Speaker 2 (18:59):
And against it.
Speaker 1 (19:00):
At the moment, I'm leaning in favor of it because
of Einstein's definition of insanity, Like we have such bad
results in this state and have had for so long,
I'm willing to try almost anything. And I do think
the fact that Dave Williams hates this and the fact
that the chair of the Democratic Party hates this makes
me like it.
Speaker 2 (19:20):
But we're going to keep talking about it as time passes.
Speaker 1 (19:22):
Kent theory is the key backer of Proposition one point
thirty one. You can read more about it on my
website that has links to all of this stuff Kent.
Speaker 2 (19:30):
Thanks for your time, we'll have you back.
Speaker 3 (19:33):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (19:33):
Thank you Ross for shining a light on this issue.
It's so important.
Speaker 2 (19:37):
Glad to do it.
The Ross Kaminsky Show News
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