An issue on Colorado’s November ballot would fundamentally alter how statewide elections are conducted in ways proponents say would deemphasize political extremes and restore power to the sensible center.
Proposition 131 would create nonpartisan primaries and ranked-choice voting in races for U.S. Senate, U.S. House of Representatives, governor, attorney general, secretary of state, treasurer, Colorado University board of regents, state board of education, and state legislature.
It would not apply to presidential elections.
What this means is that candidates from all political parties would appear on the same primary ballot, and the top four vote-getters would appear on the general election ballot. Conceivably, those four candidates could all be from one political party, or from a mix of established parties and smaller ones.
Next, in the general election, people vote for their top choice, their second choice, their third choice, and their fourth choice. When votes are tallied, the fourth-place candidate is eliminated, and his or her votes are distributed to the second-ranking candidate on each individual ballot.
The process of elimination continues until one candidate receives more than 50 percent of the vote, and that candidate wins the election. It eliminates the need for runoff elections.
Kent Thiry, the former CEO of DaVita and a friend and benefactor of the African Leadership Group, is spearheading the effort to get Proposition 131 passed. In an interview with ALG, he elucidated the reasons he believes this change would be of great benefit to Colorado voters.
Thiry said there are three root causes of democracy’s decline in the U.S. over the past 20 to 30 years: gerrymandering, closed primaries, and partisan primaries with plurality winner-take-all. “Each of those three cancers on our democratic system have cumulatively spread throughout the body politic and weakened faith in our election system,” Thiry said.
Gerrymandering – the drawing of districts to benefit one party or the other – essentially means “politicians get to pick their voters instead of the other way around,” Thiry said.
Partisan primaries with plurality (less than 50% vote-share) winners result in one candidate from each party advancing to the general election, leaving voters with limited choice. Often, more ideologically extreme candidates emerge from this process.
A recent example is U.S. Rep. Lauren Boebert, a far-right demagogue, winning the Republican primary in Colorado’s fourth congressional district against several other Republicans with far less than 50 percent of the vote. Under a nonpartisan primary, she would have advanced to the general election, where she likely would have faced off with at least one other Republican, and would likely not have ever topped the required 50% vote threshold.
“The American people are screaming for and ready to vote for person over party,” Thiry said. “In some instances, even people who vote for a Democrat 85% of the time want the right to vote for a Republican when they think that would be better for their district or their state or their country. Currently, we deny them that right, despite the fact that there are more independents in Colorado than there are Democrats and Republicans combined. For the system to suppress ballot access for what will soon be a majority of voters is just wildly unfair and undemocratic.”
Though there is little organized opposition to the initiative, critics have said the new system would be confusing to voters because it is such a major departure from established voting practices. Thiry said that criticism belittles voters’ intelligence.
“It’s insulting to the voters (to say that),” Thiry said. “And they especially make the point about lower income or people of color, it’s really condescending and inappropriate.”
Colorado Gov. Jared Polis has endorsed Proposition 131, and a recent poll shows that it is likely to pass.
Why should ALG members consider supporting this initiative? “The data is very clear (from other states) that our system results in more women and people of color running and winning and getting reelected,” Thiry said “The great equalizer of that single all-candidate primary ballot followed by allowing four people to advance to the general means that people who are newer to the system, not as well entrenched in the power structure have a much greater chance of making the final general election.
“And then with majority-winner rank voting, the person who appeals to the greatest number of people, as opposed to just the embedded power structure in the far left and far right, has a chance under our system. Under the current system, they really don’t have that chance.”
