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Colorado Is One Step Closer To Changing The Way It Votes For Presidents

The hearing about the National Popular Vote bill drew a large crowd to the Capitol on Tuesday. Democratic lawmakers advanced the bill to the House floor for debate.
Scott Franz
/
Capitol Coverage
The hearing about the National Popular Vote bill drew a large crowd to the Capitol on Tuesday. Democratic lawmakers advanced the bill to the House floor for debate.

Longmont resident Ingrid Moore went to the state Capitol on Tuesday carrying a stack of maps she said illustrates why Colorado should change the way it chooses U.S. presidents.

"Over 57 percent of all the 2016 campaign events were held in just four states," she said as lawmakers on the House State, Veterans and Military Affairs Committee reviewed the map. "Virtually all campaign events ... were held in just 12 states. And those 12 states just have 30 percent of the population."

Moore said the current system isn't fair.

"Presidential candidates have no reason to pay attention to voters' concerns in safe states that are either solid red or solid blue," she said.

Democratic state lawmakers are making the same argument as they advance a bill to have Colorado join what's known as the National Popular Vote Compact.

The compact is a group of 11 states that want to award their electoral votes to the presidential candidate who wins the popular vote nationwide.

The change won't take effect until there are enough states in the group to award a presidential contender the 270 electoral votes needed to clinch the presidency.

Supporters of the movement say it would force presidential candidates to mount nationwide campaigns instead of just spending their time in a handful of battleground states.

But the dozens of people who showed up to testify against the bill on Tuesday voiced a number of concerns about the change.

Lynn Spence said it would hurt rural voters and give more power to states with higher populations.

"We cannot let California and New York control our elections," she told the committee.

Another opponent of the bill said there isn't an official popular vote count after an election because the figure is just compiled by media organizations.

The effort to have Colorado award its electoral votes based on the popular vote has packed hearing rooms at the Capitol this session.

Lawmakers listened to more than four hours of testimony Tuesday evening.

And in the end, the bill was advanced on another party line vote, with the six Democrats on the committee overpowering the three Republicans.

Republican lawmakers tried to stop the bill with several amendments.

They tried unsuccessfully to force Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser to testify and answer questions about the legality of the bill.

A proposal to send the question to voters was also defeated by the Democrats.

The bill already passed out of the Senate earlier this month.

It now goes to the House floor for debate.

Capitol Coverage is a collaborative public policy reporting project, providing news and analysis to communities across Colorado for more than a decade. Eleven public radio stations participate in Capitol Coverage from throughout Colorado.

Copyright 2019 KUNC

Scott Franz is a government watchdog reporter and photographer from Steamboat Springs. He spent the last seven years covering politics and government for the Steamboat Pilot & Today, a daily newspaper in northwest Colorado. His reporting in Steamboat stopped a police station from being built in a city park, saved a historic barn from being destroyed and helped a small town pastor quickly find a kidney donor. His favorite workday in Steamboat was Tuesday, when he could spend many of his mornings skiing untracked powder and his evenings covering city council meetings. Scott received his journalism degree from the University of Colorado at Boulder. He is an outdoorsman who spends at least 20 nights a year in a tent. He spoke his first word, 'outside', as a toddler in Edmonds, Washington. Scott visits the Great Sand Dunes, his favorite Colorado backpacking destination, twice a year. Scott's reporting is part of Capitol Coverage, a collaborative public policy reporting project, providing news and analysis to communities across Colorado for more than a decade. Fifteen public radio stations participate in Capitol Coverage from throughout Colorado.