Colorado

Colorado

A man is facing charges of forging signatures on petitions asking for the recall of Colorado Sen. John Morse.

The District Attorney’s Office said Thursday an arrest warrant has been issued for Nickolas Robinson. He’s accused of forging at least 13 signatures on recall petitions. Robinson could not be located for comment on Friday.

According to KKTV-TV (http://tinyurl.com/o3pybso), the warrant alleges that Robinson committed 13 counts of forgery, seven counts of perjury and 13 counts of attempt to influence a public servant last May.

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A lawsuit challenging the petition-gathering process that got a $950 million school-tax proposal on the November ballot was filed late Wednesday, according to a group opposing the measure.

The group, Coloradans for Real Education Reform, said Bob Hagedorn, a former Democratic state senator from Aurora, and Norma Anderson, a former Republican lawmaker from Lakewood, filed the suit in Denver District Court claiming that 39,555 of the signatures gathered for the ballot measure are invalid.

Read more:here

Gun-rights advocates were victorious last night in Colorado, as State Senate President John Morse and fellow senator Angela Giron were both ousted in their respective recall elections.  The recalls were historic, as no state-level officials had ever been recalled in the Centennial State, though numerous local officials have been.

In the election for Morse, the results were very close, 51-49 percent – a difference of less than 800 votes.  Giron’s recall was more one-sided, with a 12 percent point margin totaling over 4,000 votes. The voter turnout was much higher in Giron’s district.

Today is Election Day in Colorado for the recall of state senators John Morse and Angela Giron, the first recalls of state (as opposed to local) elected officials in Colordao history.

The recalls began after Senate President Morse and Sen. Giron backed legislation tightening gun control earlier this year. Tens of thousands of citizens in their respective districts signed petitions to trigger today’s elections, which have become something of a referendum on gun issues with possible national ramifications.

Read more here:

Denver Post: Historic election Tuesday over gun control votes

Colorado:

Tue, Sep 10 2013 — Source: Denver Post

A final, frantic effort is underway to get voters to the polls Tuesday in two state Senate districts where Democratic lawmakers face ouster for stricter gun laws passed in the 2013 legislative session.

State Senate President John Morse of Colorado Springs and Sen. Angela Giron of Pueblo are in the fight of their political lives in an election that has attracted national attention and money.

The polls close at 7 p.m. Tuesday.

Read more of this story: here

After 30 minutes of praise to God and several rollicking, hand-clapping hymns, John Morse stepped to the glass pulpit and offered a prayer of his own.

“We need you to reach down deep,” Morse, the state Senate president, told about 100 worshipers seated Sunday beneath a vaulted ceiling at Grace Be Unto You Outreach Church. “I need you not to just support me,” he said, slowing down to emphasize each word. “I need you to vote no.”

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Colorado Peak Politics gathers the latest early voting data in El Paso County, a recall election against State Sen. John Morse is in progress:

12,174 total early votes

ACN (Constitution Party): 37

Democrat: 4,023 (33 percent)

Green: 39

Libertarian: 100

Republican: 4,923 (40 percent)

Unaffiliated: 3,052 (25 percent)

 

Read More on this story: here

Million-dollar campaigns, saturation advertising and massive canvassing have become commonplace in U.S. elections, especially in a swing state such as Colorado. A campaign underway there has all of the above – in a recall vote for two state senators that has become a showdown over gun policy and political dominance in a changing state.

Democratic state Sens. Angela Giron and John Morse voted to require universal background checks for gun purchases and to ban large-capacity ammunition magazines. Colorado passed the restrictions in March, within a year of mass shootings in Aurora, Colo., and Newtown, Conn. Gun control opponents have mounted a campaign to kick them out of office; voting ends Tuesday.

Colorado:

Tue, Aug 20 2013 — Source: The Colorado Statesman

Recall elections to oust Senate President John Morse of Colorado Springs and state Sen. Angela Giron of Pueblo were once again thrown into flux this week after a Denver District Court judge’s ruling essentially made mail-ballot voting impossible. A few days later, the Colorado Supreme Court declined to hear the case on appeal and let the District Court ruling stand.

Judge Robert McGahey ruled from the bench Monday evening after hearing a day’s worth of arguments on a lawsuit brought by the Colorado Libertarian Party.

Read more: here

The Weld County Commissioners voted unanimously Monday to place a statehood initiative on the November ballot, joining three other counties interested in seceding from Colorado.

This makes Weld the fourth Colorado county, behind Sedgwick, Cheyenne and Yuma to send the idea of a statehood split to the voters. Five more counties, Kit Karson, Lincoln, Logan, Phillips and Washington, also are considering the ballot language and should be voting soon.

Read More: here

September 10 will be an historic day in Colorado.  For the first time in The Centennial State’s history, elected officials at the state level – specifically, two state senators – will be subjected to a recall election, after citizens conducted a successful petition effort.

Colorado has seen many local officials face recalls, both at the city and county level, but never a state official until this year’s recall efforts against State Senate President John Morse of Colorado Springs and Senator Angela Giron of Pueblo – both Democrats – for their support of three gun control bills passed in this year’s legislative session.

 

Recall is a procedural democratic device that allows voters to discharge and replace an elected official. At least 19 states provide for recall at the state level, and most states permit recall of local officials.

Coloradans, by citizen initiative, amended their constitution in 1912 to permit it here (approved handily by a vote of 53,620 to 39,564), and scores of recall elections at the local level have been held in Colorado in the past 100 years.

El Paso County Clerk and Recorder Wayne Williams filed court papers in Denver on Thursday to demand a date for the election that could recall Colorado Springs Democratic state Sen. John Morse.

Legal wrangling has tied up the effort to recall Morse, who was targeted over his stance on gun control measures that passed the General Assembly this year. A protest of the recall effort was filed by Catherine Kleinsmith of Colorado Springs, who claims the recall petitions used in the campaign to oust Morse don’t meet constitutional muster.

The protest was denied by the secretary of state’s office then appealed to Denver District Court.

The lawyer for Democratic Colorado Senate President John Morse made his first public case Thursday for tossing all 10,000-plus signatures certified as valid for triggering a recall election against the pol.

Mark Grueskin, an attorney representing a constituent who brought the complaint against the recall effort, said the petitions should be deemed invalid because they didn’t contain language specifying that there would be an election to replace Morse if he’s recalled.

A second Colorado senator faces a possible exodus from office from voters for her controversial stance on gun control.

The recall petition for Sen. Angela Giron’s was ratified on Monday, with about 1,400 valid signatures to spare.

After Giron’s support of various gun control initiatives in March, the grassroots organization Pueblo Freedom and Rights launched the recall measure against the District 3 Democrat.