{"id":43870,"date":"2021-11-05T17:04:00","date_gmt":"2021-11-05T23:04:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/6-big-takeaways-from-the-2021-election-results-in-colorado-and-beyond\/"},"modified":"2021-11-05T23:04:00","modified_gmt":"2021-11-05T23:04:00","slug":"6-big-takeaways-from-the-2021-election-results-in-colorado-and-beyond","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/6-big-takeaways-from-the-2021-election-results-in-colorado-and-beyond\/","title":{"rendered":"6 big takeaways from the 2021 election results in Colorado and beyond"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Rebecca
Rebecca Balboni drops her ballot in the ballot box Tuesday at the La Plata County Clerk and Recorder's Office in Bodo Park. (Jerry McBride\/Durango Herald)<\/span>cca<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Colorado voters\u2019 decisions in the 2021 elections left plenty to be dissected Wednesday.<\/p>\n

Here are six big takeaways from the results:<\/p>\n

The failure of two conservative-backed ballot measures<\/div>\n

As Republican candidates have lost in Colorado over the past two election cycles, conservatives have placed more emphasis on trying to advance their policies through ballot initiatives. And they had some success \u2013 until Tuesday.<\/p>\n

Both Amendment 78, which sought to require more legislative oversight of spending, and Proposition 120, which would have lowered some property taxes, were rejected by wide margins. In fact, they didn\u2019t even do well in conservative parts of the state, including Mesa, Douglas and El Paso counties.<\/p>\n

The ballot measures also failed despite there was no serious money spent to oppose them.<\/p>\n

Michael Fields, the head of the conservative fiscal nonprofit Colorado Rising Action, who led the push for both measures, blamed the initiatives\u2019 failure on voter confusion. He says he will pursue tax-cutting ballot questions every year into the forseeable future, and Tuesday\u2019s results don\u2019t necessarily change his plans.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t know if these (results) have any further ability to project what\u2019s going to happen next year,\u201d he said. \u201cI don\u2019t think Republicans are going to stop putting stuff on the ballot. You can\u2019t win them all.\u201d<\/p>\n

While liberal groups that opposed Amendment 78 and Proposition 120 were pleasantly surprised by their defeat, they weren\u2019t exactly jumping for joy.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think this is a strategic inflection point,\u201d said Scott Wasserman, who leads the liberal-leaning Bell Policy Center, a fiscal policy advocacy nonprofit. \u201cI think for our side, the worst possible lesson they could take away from these results is complacency.\u201d<\/p>\n

Proposition 119 was a big bust<\/div>\n

One surprise of election night was how poorly Proposition 119 fared despite the support of some big-name politicians, including Gov. Jared Polis.<\/p>\n

As of Wednesday morning, only five counties had voted in support of the ballot measure, which would have hiked recreational marijuana sales taxes to pay for out-of-school learning. The measure was failing by 9 percentage points statewide as of 11 a.m. Wednesday.<\/p>\n

Republicans win in Aurora, Douglas County<\/div>\n

Despite the defeat of their ballot measures, conservatives were celebrating Tuesday night because of their apparent wins in Aurora City Council and Douglas County School Board races.<\/p>\n

\u201c\u200b\u200bThe big story is big wins in Douglas County and Aurora,\u201d said Joseph Jackson, executive director of the Colorado GOP.<\/p>\n

Four Republican-backed candidates for Aurora City Council \u2013 Steve Sundberg, Jono Scott, Dustin Zvonek and Danielle Jurinsky \u2013 were headed toward victory. The one apparent loss for the GOP was Bill Gondrez, who was running to represent Ward 1 on the City Council.<\/p>\n

City council elections in Colorado are nonpartisan, but given Aurora\u2019s Democratic lean the GOP was taking their candidates\u2019 victories as a positive sign heading into the 2022 election season.<\/p>\n

In Douglas County, three conservative school board candidates won their races and a fourth was trending toward victory. The winning candidates will make up a majority of the school board.<\/p>\n

Republican-backed candidates also won local elections in Westminster, Loveland, Commerce City and Thornton.<\/p>\n

Jackson called the results \u201ca harbinger of what is to come in 2022.\u201d Colorado GOP Chairwoman Kristi Burton Brown said Republicans won in areas of the state that have traditionally been Democratic strongholds because of Democrats\u2019 policies.<\/p>\n

Ian Silverii, a Democratic political consultant, called it \u201cpreposterous\u201d to think that Republican-backed candidates winning in Aurora means the GOP will have success in 2022 races when control of the statehouse and the congressional delegation will be up for grabs.<\/p>\n

The real reason the conservative candidates in Aurora won, he said, is because of spending by dark-money groups, which are called that because they don\u2019t have to disclose their donors, and because the ballot didn\u2019t inform voters the candidates were Republicans.<\/p>\n

The Republican-leaning nonprofit Colorado Rising State Action, a dark-money group, put at least $450,000 into a political committee called Aurorans for a Safe and Prosperous Future that supported Zvonek, Gondrez, Sundberg and Scott. The committee paid for digital ads, mailers and door hangers supporting those candidates.<\/p>\n

Morgan Carroll, chairwoman of the Colorado Democratic Party, said Democrats had wins in school board contests in Jefferson and Larimer counties, as well as in municipal elections in Delta County, Montrose County and Pueblo.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat being said,\u201d Carroll added in a written statement, \u201clast night\u2019s election showed what we\u2019ve always believed, that we can take no vote or election for granted.\u201d<\/p>\n

Conservative spending didn\u2019t work in Denver<\/div>\n

Denver\u2019s long ballot included three questions backed by Republicans and a conservative dark-money group. All of them failed.<\/p>\n

The initiatives were:<\/p>\n

2F, which sought to make it illegal for five unrelated adults to live together.303, which sought to cap the city\u2019s sanctioned campsites for people who are homeless and force Denver to move more quickly to remove illegal campsites.304, which would have capped the city\u2019s sales tax rate at 4.5%.<\/div>\n

The ballot measures were funded by Defend Colorado, a conservative nonprofit that doesn\u2019t have to disclose its donors and hence is called a dark-money group.<\/p>\n

Defend Colorado spent more than $319,000 on digital ads and mailings supporting 2F and 303 after spending $325,000 to help get the measures on the ballot. For 304, Defend Colorado paid to help get it on the ballot.<\/p>\n

Denver liberals were celebrating the failure of the initiatives.<\/p>\n

\u201cLast night housing options won,\u201d Denver Councilwoman Robin Kniech tweeted. \u201cInclusivity won. Facing our challenges head on, investing in proven solutions and perseverance won. Dark, out-of-town money lost.\u201d<\/p>\n

Turnout bounced back on Election Day, but there were interesting trends<\/div>\n

Turnout for the 2021 election looked like it was going to be lower than in previous odd-year contests in Colorado, but a last-minute surge in ballots propelled returns to more than 1.4 million and well above what they were in 2019 and 2017.<\/p>\n

One change over the past three election cycles is that unaffiliated voters turned out in larger numbers than Republicans and Democrats. In 2017 and 2019, more Republicans voted than unaffiliated voters and Democrats.<\/p>\n

While more Republicans still voted this year than Democrats, they did so by a lesser margin, according to ballot counts though 5 p.m. on Election Day.<\/p>\n

\u201cClearly, Republicans stayed home,\u201d Wasserman said of why the conservative-backed statewide ballot measures failed.<\/p>\n

Fields thinks turnout didn\u2019t contribute at all to the failure of his ballot measures, however.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt all comes down to how unaffiliated voters vote,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

And Burton Brown said she, too, was pleased with Republican turnout this year.<\/p>\n

What happened in Virginia and New Jersey<\/div>\n

On the national level, political observers are dissecting what happened in Virginia, where Democratic gubernatorial candidate Terry McAuliffe lost to Republican Glenn Youngkin. That\u2019s despite it being a state President Joe Biden won in 2020 by a hefty 10 percentage-point margin.<\/p>\n

New Jersey\u2019s gubernatorial race was even more of a shocker. Democratic incumbent Phil Murphy won a close race with Republican Jack Ciattarelli. Biden carried New Jersey by more than 15 percentage points in 2020.<\/p>\n

The New Jersey gubernatorial race this year was not expected to be close.<\/p>\n

The results in New Jersey and Virginia prompted Sabato\u2019s Crystal Ball, an election prognosticator at the University of Virginia\u2019s Center for Politics, to downgrade Colorado\u2019s 2022 U.S. Senate race, in which Democratic incumbent Michael Bennet will be running for election, from \u201csafe Democratic\u201d to \u201clikely Democratic.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bennet \u201ccould potentially be vulnerable if 2022 turns into a GOP mega-wave,\u201d Sabato\u2019s Crystal Ball wrote in a memo dissecting the results.<\/p>\n

\"Democratic
Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Michael Bennet, D-Colo., arrives for a campaign stop at the Spotlight Room at the Palace on Feb. 8, 2020, in Manchester, N.H. (Andrew Harnik\/Associated Press file)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

\u201cIf Biden\u2019s approval rating is in the low- to mid-40s next year, as it is now, everything we know about political trends and history suggests that the Democrats\u2019 tiny majorities in the House and Senate are at major risk of becoming minorities,\u201d the memo said.<\/p>\n

Gov. Jared Polis, who is up for re-election next year, blasted out a fundraising email warning that what happened in Virginia could happen in Colorado.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe know the same special interests that poured millions into attack ads in Virginia are going to throw everything they\u2019ve got into reversing the progress we\u2019ve made here in our state,\u201d the email said.<\/p>\n

Burton Brown, the chairwoman of the Colorado GOP, said she expects national Republicans to invest in Colorado next year like they did in Virginia.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur state is very reflective of the Virginia electorate,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Colorado Sun correspondent Sandra Fish contributed to this report.<\/em><\/p>\n

The Colorado Sun is a reader-supported, nonpartisan news organization dedicated to covering Colorado issues. To learn more, go to coloradosun.com.<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

good news for Republicans and Democrats \u2013 and warning signs to both parties<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":41330,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[663,266,28,1304,1621],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-43870","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-democratic-party","tag-election","tag-headlines","tag-republican-party","tag-voting"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43870","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=43870"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43870\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/41330"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=43870"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=43870"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=43870"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=43870"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}