You probably will not be able to get prominent Democrats to admit it publicly, but the past year, 2021, was a banner year for the Democratic Party in Colorado. Look at the scoreboard.
1. Democrats did much better than Republicans at gerrymandering the state legislature. 2. The Democrats narrowly beat the Republicans at gerrymandering the state’s eight seats in the U.S. House of Representatives. 3. The Democrats defeated a key ballot issue backed by the Republican Party in the Nov. 2 statewide election that would have reduced our Democratic governor’s financial powers.
4. And, in a daring and perhaps precedent-setting maneuver, the Democrats put through the state legislature a law that abolished the effect of a conservative ballot issue — cutting property taxes — before the ballot issue was voted on by state voters.
That is a good record for a state political party in just one year. The Democrats will enjoy the fruits of these important yet little discussed political victories for years to come. Let us review them:
Gerrymandering the state legislature: For the first time in Colorado history, legislative redistricting was handled by a state commission of “average” citizens. Both political parties hired lobbyists to try to bend the redistricting in their direction. The results strongly favored the Democrats.
For the state House of Representatives, the Democrats ended up with 36 Safe-Democratic and Lean-Democratic seats. The Republicans got only 20 Safe-Republican and Lean-Republican seats. That means that, before any candidates were nominated or votes cast in an election, the Democrats had a 36-20 advantage over the Republicans in the Colorado House.
Note also that only 33 votes are required to become a majority and gain control of the state House of Representatives. With 36 Safe-Democratic and Lean Democratic seats through redistricting, the Democrats are likely assured of controlling the Colorado House for most of the next 10 years — until a new Redistricting Committee meets in 2031.
This is like the Denver Broncos starting a NFL football game with their opponent having 36 points and the Broncos only have 20.
It was much the same situation in the Colorado state Senate. The Democrats will have 18 Safe-Democratic and Lean-Democratic seats. The Republicans only will have nine Safe-Republican seats. With just 18 seats needed for a state Senate majority, the Democrats can look forward to controlling both houses of the Colorado state legislature through the decade of the 2020s.
Gerrymandering is real. When a Safe-Democratic seat is created by the redistricting commission, the likelihood that that seat will vote Democratic in all future elections is high.
We argue that, due to redistricting, there is less than a 10% chance the Republicans will ever control either of the two houses of the Colorado state legislature over the coming decade.
If you are the Democratic Party, that is a positive.
Gerrymandering the state’s eight congressional districts. A different commission of “average” citizens redrew the district lines for Colorado’s eight seats in the U.S. House of Representatives. The commission created four Safe-Democratic districts and only three Safe-Republican districts.
Due to its high rate of population growth, Colorado was awarded an eighth member of the U.S. House of representatives starting with the 2022 November elections. The congressional citizens redistricting commission arranged for a competitive seat – a seat that either major political party could win. The commission included in the new district, however, large numbers of minority voters, mainly African-Americans and Hispanics, who until the 2020 presidential election have been voting heavily Democratic.
If the Democrats win the new Eighth District, which is located in northern Colorado from about northeast Denver to Greeley, there will be five Democrats in Colorado’s U.S. House of Representatives delegation and only three Republicans. That would be another Democratic win.
Data on likely Safe-Democratic and Safe-Republican seats was provided by the non-partisan professional staff of the two citizen redistricting commissions.
A key ballot issue victory. The Colorado Republican Party strongly supported an important ballot issue in the November 2021 general elections.
Amendment 78 proposed to remove control over certain funds from the governor, currently Democrat Jared Polis, and give that control to the Joint Budget Committee (JBC) of the state legislature. This was a low-level attempt to hassle this Democratic governor and lessen his independent spending powers.
This complex and difficult to explain constitutional amendment turned out to have little or no appeal to the voters. It lost big-time despite having official Republican Party support.
We have noted in the past how libertarian-minded citizens use the initiative, where proposals are placed on the state ballot by gathering signatures, to hamstring the taxing and spending powers of the state legislature. The classic example was TABOR, the Taxpayer Bill of Rights, which voters adopted in 1992 and required a citizen vote on all tax increases.
As the Republican Party in Colorado has steadily lost control of the state legislature and the governorship to the Democrats, we have been expecting the Republicans to attempt to use initiated ballot issues to further limit the financial powers of the Democrats at the state capitol.
Amendment 78 was such a measure. That it lost so badly at the polls was unpleasant news for the Republicans but good news for the Democrats.
Legislative weakening of an upcoming ballot issue. Proposition 120 was designed to reduce residential property tax rates by 1.10%. The necessary signatures were gathered and Prop 120 placed on the November 2021 election ballot. All seemed in order for voters to vote on cutting their property taxes, a measure we believed was likely to pass.
With an audacity that shocked us, Democrats at the state legislature presumptively rewrote the state’s property tax laws so that Prop 120 would only cut property taxes on multi-family dwellings and overnight lodgings. Property taxes on residential properties (private homes) were only slightly lowered.
It worked. With no big property tax cut for them, average homeowners voted No on Prop 120. It lost at the polls, and the Democrats scored another 2021 victory.
Will the Democrats at the state legislature use this as a precedent?
An income tax cut that has been designed by a libertarian think tank has already received the requisite signatures and been placed on the statewide election ballot for November 2022. Will the Democrats at the state legislature attempt to extend their winning streak and head this income tax cutting ballot measure off with state legislation? Stay tuned.
Although 2021 was a successful year for Colorado Democrats, this new year of 2022 poses difficult challenges. The omicron variant of coronavirus has caused worker shortages and is again raising multiple uncertainties for our economy and public school attendance.
Meanwhile there are at least as many or more states where the Republicans, through legislation and gerrymandering, are taking control of state legislatures and seats in the U.S House of Representatives from the Democrats. Gerrymandering works both ways – for the Democrats in Colorado but for the Republicans elsewhere.
Democratic President Joe Biden had a good first half of 2021 yet a rocky second half of the year. The economy has flourished, but the political and social atmosphere of the country is divided, moody, and characterized by angst and anger rather than optimism and good will.
People are obviously tired and frustrated by our medical challenges and the restrictions they put on our lives. And people are equally frustrated by the narrowly divided Congress that seems combative rather than collaborative in doing their work.
The year 2021 was a good one for Democrats in Colorado. That may not be true nationally for 2022.
Tom Cronin and Bob Loevy write about Colorado and national political issues.
This content was originally published here.
