This is another blog that has to do with our caucuses. Only this time, I am writing about who is currently running for the various races and that we’ll be considering, starting with the caucuses.
There are 11 different races that will be on the ballot here in Delta County in the November 2024 election. Currently there are over 50 candidates. Two races are at the County level, seven are at the State level and two are at the Federal level. The County races include two county commissioner seats. The State races are for State House District 54 and State House District 58, State Senate District 5, Judicial District 7 (District Attorney), CU Regent for District 3 and 2 CU Regent At-large seats and the State Board of Education District 3 seat. The two Federal races are Congressional District 3 and for President of the United States. This list is just to let caucus attendees keep track of the various current candidates and the seats they are running for. The Colorado State GOP Bylaws and the Delta County Republican Central Committee Bylaws require the Executive Committee to remain neutral prior to the Primary. So, I won’t be giving much information or any recommendations on the Republican candidates, unless they are running unopposed. I recommend you do your own research on the Republican candidates if you are planning to become a delegate and are not certain who you will support. My main goal with this blog is to inform you of the offices that are up for election this year and the candidates that are running for them.
Delta County Races: There are only two open seats at the county level this year. Those seats are both for County Commissioner. District 2 is open, because incumbent Don Suppes is term-limited, after serving two terms, and District 3 is open with incumbent Wendell Koontz running for a second term. The current candidates for those two seats are:
1) County Commissioner District 2 –
Candyce Blair (R)of Cedaredge.
Craig Fuller (R) of Eckart.
2) County Commissioner District 3 –
Wendell Koontz (R) incumbent from Hotchkiss.
Stephen D. Reed (R) of Hotchkiss.
Niko Woolf (UA) of Crawford.
Colorado State Races: There are seven state races that affect Delta County this year. They are for state house districts 54 and 58 and state senate district 5, District Attorney in Judicial District 7, CU Board of Regents District 3 and 2 at-large seats and State Board of Education District 3. The candidates for those races are:
3) HD 54 –
Incumbent Matt Soper (R) will be running for his fourth and final two-year term.
4) HD 58 –
Incumbent Marc Catlin of Montrose is term-limited and so is not running for this seat. The candidates who are currently running are:
Mark Roeber (R) of Delta County, near Paonia.
Larry Don Suckla (R) of Montezuma County.
Kathleen Curry (D) of Gunnison County.
5) SD5 –
Incumbent Perry Will (R) has decided not to run for re-election. The candidates who are currently running for this seat are:
Marc Catlin (R) of Montrose County (current HD 58 Representative, who is term limited, as HD58 Representative.)
Colin Buerger (D) of Glenwood Springs.
Barbara Bynum (D) of Montrose.
6) JD7 –
Seth Ryan (R) Incumbent of Montrose.
7) CU Regent CD3 –
Kristine Sposato (R) of Cedaredge.
Robert Bruce Logan (D) of Durango.
8) CU Regent At Large –
John Isaac Barela (UA) of Aurora.
Elliot Hood (D) of Boulder.
Charles Johnson (D) of Denver.
Carlos Luis Licon (Nonpartisan) of Boulder.
Dennis Smith (R) of Denver (Terminated his candidacy).
9) State Board of Education 3rd District –
Brenda Krage (R) of Pueblo.
Sherri Wright (R) of Cortez.
Federal Races: The two main federal races affecting Delta County this election are Congressional District Three (CD3) and the Presidential race. As most of you know, Lauren Boebert dropped out of the CD3 race and has moved to CD4 to run for the seat Ken Buck currently holds but who has decided not to run for re-election. There are 14 candidates vying for the CD3 seat in Congress: 8 Republicans, 2 Libertarians, 1 for the Unity Party, 2 Independents and 1 Democrat.
10) CD3 – The candidates who are currently running for CD3 are:
Republicans: | Democrats: | Others: |
|
|
|
2. Jason Bias (R) | 2. James Wiley (L) | |
3. Joseph Granado (R) | 3. Gary Swing (Unity) | |
4. Ron Hanks (R) | 4. Frank Hernandez (I) | |
5. Jeffrey Hurd (R) | 5. Adam Withrow (I) | |
6. Curtis McCrackin (R) | ||
7. Austin O’ Connell (R) | ||
8. Stephen Varela (R) |
11) President - The race for President is also quite crowded. While many of the candidates running for the Republican nomination have suspended their campaigns with only Nikki Haley and Donald Trump still actively campaigning; the other five Republican candidates have currently not withdrawn their names from the Colorado Presidential Primary Election. Their names remain on the ballot and any votes cast for them will be counted. I mistakenly told our DCRCC February meeting that because they were no longer actively campaigning any votes cast for them would not be counted. I was in error about that. After the meeting I checked with our Delta County Deputy Clerk, Rene Warner, on that. She informed me that since they had not actually withdrawn from the Colorado ballot, any votes cast for them would be counted. Now, if that actually makes any difference is a different matter. It seems that only Donald Trump and Nikki Haley are actually still campaigning. So, all the names of candidates who are running will be listed on each of the major parties’ Presidential Primary ballots and are listed in the table below (Note, the write-in candidates are registered with the State, but their names will not actually appear on the ballots, they have to be hand-written in):
Democrats: | Republicans: | Write-ins: |
|
|
|
2. Gabriel Cornejo | 2. Asa Hutchinson | 2. Walter Iwachiw |
3. Frankie Lozado | 3. Nikki Haley | |
4. Dean Phillips | 4. Ron DeSantis | |
5. Stephen P. Lyons | 5. Chris Christie | |
6. Marianne Williamson | 6. Ryan L. Binkley | |
7. Joseph R. Biden Jr. | 7. Donald J. Trump | |
8. Armando “Mando” Perez-Serrato. | ||
9. Noncommitted delegate |
So, the Republican candidates I have listed will be the candidates that will be voted on at the various assemblies. The delegates that are elected at the precinct caucuses will go to those assemblies and vote for the delegates. At the County Assembly candidates must receive thirty percent (30%) or more of the delegates votes for their name (s) to be placed on the Primary Election ballot. Only the names of the top two vote-getters (who receive at least 30%) will be placed on the ballot. The same thing will happen at the other various assemblies. The role of the delegates is critical in electing the candidates that will go on and appear on the Primary Election Ballot.
The other way a candidate may get their name placed on the Primary Election ballot is through the petition process. This process allows a party member to gain access to the party’s primary by getting a minimum requisite number of signatures on a petition to be placed on the ballot. For county offices, this requirement is the petitioner must collect the lesser of 1000 signers or signers equal in number to 10% of the votes cast in the political subdivision at the contested or uncontested primary election for the political party’s candidate for the office for which the petition is being circulated or, if there was no primary election, at the last preceding general election for which there was a candidate for the office. (Obviously, lawyers wrote this.) For District 2 in the 2024 election the 10% would be 587 signatures; for District 3 the 10% would be 567 signatures.
This is a pretty significant requirement. For most county candidates, this is probably too onerous. The requirements for state and federal races are similar, extensive and therefor expensive. For example, a petition for the office of United States senator must be signed by at least one thousand five hundred eligible electors in each of the eight congressional districts (12,000 signatures from across the state). While the petition process is often portrayed as an easy way to bypass the caucus and assembly process, it actually requires considerable work and expense. At the county level, candidates generally go through the assembly for nomination to the primary ballot.
I want to close with a few reminders. First, a quick reminder on when and where the Delta County Caucuses will be held:
All Delta County Republican Caucuses will be held Thursday March 7, 2024. Precincts will meet at the following locations:
Precincts 1-8 (Delta Area Precincts) Delta Middle School – located at 401 E. 10th St., Delta CO.
Precincts 9-14 (Cedaredge Area Precincts) Cedaredge Middle School – located at 845 SE Deer Creek Drive, Cedaredge, CO.
Precincts 15, 16 & 17 (Hotchkiss - Crawford Area Precincts) Hotchkiss K-8 School – located at 465 Lorah Lane, Hotchkiss, CO
Precincts 18, 19 & 20 (Paonia Area Precincts) Paonia Elementary School – located at 846 Grand Ave., Paonia, CO.
Credentialing opens at 6:00 pm, the Caucuses run from 7 to possibly 9 pm.
Second, I want to remind everyone who hasn’t pre-registered, that they can pre-register for the caucuses. Voters can pre-register to attend the caucus and we strongly encourage you to do so. Pre-registration is done on-line on CRCAS (Colorado Republican Caucus and Assembly System.) The reasons we are encouraging pre-registration are 1) Pre-registering will first of all tell you what precinct you are in and 2) where your precinct caucus will be held. 3) It will also speed up the credentialing process. So, please, try to pre-register. The DCRCC will be helping people to pre-register so if you are not sure or you are unable to access a computer, we will help you do so. To pre-register you will need the following:
A computer, or if we assist you, we will be providing the computer.
Your email address
Your phone number.
This information will be provided to the County party, so we know how to contact you. This is important if you want to be a delegate, an election judge or poll watcher or just participate in party activities. If you don’t provide an email or a phone number, you won’t be considered for a delegate or an election judge.
How to pre-register on CRCAS:
Go to the website: http://caucus.cologop.org This link will take you to a Colorado Republican website where you begin pre-registering.
And my third reminder is on the assemblies that follow the caucuses. Here are the different assemblies that are currently scheduled to be held for the delegates elected at caucus to elect our candidates for the various offices:
County Assembly - March 23, 2024 in Delta CO, at the Delta Center for the Performing Arts at 10:00 am.
District Assemblies:
SD5-March 30, 2024, in Montrose, CO at Montrose Event Center, at 10:45 am.
HD54-March 30, 2024 in Palisade CO at Palisade High School at 2:00 pm.
CD3-April 5, 2024 in Pueblo, CO at the State Fairgrounds Event Center at 9 am.
HD58-April 5, 2024 in Pueblo, CO at the Pueblo Convention Center at 1:30 pm.
JD7- April 5, 2024 in Pueblo, CO at the Pueblo Convention Center at 3:00 pm.
State Assembly & Convention - April 6, 2024 in Pueblo, CO at the Southwest Motors Arena at the State Fairgrounds at 9:00 am.
CD=Congressional District, SD=State Senate District, HD=State House District, JD= Judicial District.
NOTE: ALL THE ASSEMBLIES HAVE CREDENTIALING (REGISTRATION) BEFORE THE ASSEMBLIES START, SO PLAN TO GET THERE AT LEAST AN HOUR BEFORE THE LISTED START TIMES. ALSO, SOME OF THE TIMES MAY BE CHANGED SO BE SURE TO CHECK LATER ON THE TIMES.
Finally, the mark the dates of the three elections coming up this year:
1) Colorado Presidential Primary – March 5, 2024; ballots have already been mailed out.
2) Colorado Primary Election – June 25, 2024.
3) Colorado General Election – November 5, 2024.
Our next DCRCC monthly meeting is going to be on March 5, 2024 at the Surface Creek Community Church in Austin. While this is just two days before the caucuses. We plan to go over any questions folks might have on the caucuses, the assemblies or the candidates and help with pre-registration for anyone who would like it. Hope to see you there and/or at the caucuses!
David Bradford
Chairman, Delta County Republican Central Committee
PS –Remember you can donate to the Delta County Republican Central Committee, by going to our website https://www.deltacoloradogop.com Since we don’t have a physical office space, donations are critical in helping build up our bank account so we have funds for supporting our candidates in the 2024 election. An individual donation of $20 is a great small donation. You can also donate in person at our monthly meeting. Thank you! db