{"id":98417,"date":"2018-08-08T13:14:49","date_gmt":"2018-08-08T19:14:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/attorney-general-candidate-says-opponent-lacks-necessary-experience\/"},"modified":"2018-08-08T13:14:49","modified_gmt":"2018-08-08T19:14:49","slug":"attorney-general-candidate-says-opponent-lacks-necessary-experience","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/attorney-general-candidate-says-opponent-lacks-necessary-experience\/","title":{"rendered":"Attorney general candidate says opponent lacks necessary experience"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"George
George Brauchler, Republican Candidate for State Attorney General, met with Republican supporters Tuesday at Cortez GOP headquarters at 11 N. Broadway.<\/span>Rosemarie Beall\/Courtesy photo<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

George Brauchler, the 48-year-old Republican candidate for attorney general, said Tuesday that despite the partisan issues clouding the political climate, his party allegiance won\u2019t stand in the way of doing his job.<\/p>\n

Brauchler, currently the district attorney in Colorado\u2019s 18th Judicial District \u2013 which includes Arapahoe, Douglas, Elbert and Lincoln counties, the largest judicial district in the state \u2013 spoke Tuesday with The Journal\u2019s editorial board.<\/p>\n

\"Brauchler\"
Brauchler<\/span>du1-i-syn<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

\u201cAs attorney general, I stand for the rule of the law,\u201d Brauchler said.<\/p>\n

Even if a law doesn\u2019t align with his personal beliefs, Brauchler said he will uphold the laws that govern the residents of Colorado.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf anyone comes in and tells you they\u2019re taking a different approach, that\u2019s not the rule of law. That\u2019s the rule of whim. That\u2019s not what you want from the attorney general,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Brauchler, who prosecuted Aurora theater shooter James Holmes, was initially part of the crowded race for governor but exited the primary in favor of the attorney general\u2019s race in November, after current Attorney General Cynthia Coffman joined the governor\u2019s race.<\/p>\n

Brauchler is running against Democrat Phil Weiser, a former dean at the University of Colorado Law School who also worked in the U.S. Department of Justice under the Obama administration. Brauchler said despite Weiser\u2019s accomplishments, his r\u00e9sum\u00e9 doesn\u2019t qualify him to be attorney general, citing the fact that Weiser has never practiced Colorado law.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou don\u2019t pick a captain of a team from someone who never played the sport,\u201d Brauchler said.<\/p>\n

He also criticized Weiser\u2019s promise to have Colorado join a multi-state lawsuit against big pharmaceutical companies for over-prescribing opioid drugs, but not because he doesn\u2019t support the lawsuit.<\/p>\n

He said as attorney general, he would review the documents and make sure there is enough evidence to support a lawsuit.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat concerns me is when someone, who has never practiced Colorado law and not set foot in a Colorado courtroom, declares, as a matter of political expediency, \u2018elect me and I will drag Colorado into a lawsuit,\u2019\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Representatives for Weiser didn\u2019t immediately respond to phone calls seeking comment Tuesday evening.<\/p>\n

Brauchler said that in the unlikely scenario the federal government intervenes in Colorado\u2019s state marijuana laws, despite personal opposition to the legalization of marijuana, he would look into any potential legitimate argument that could trump the supremacy clause the federal government has over states.<\/p>\n

\u201cI would resist with whatever legal or political tools against any attorney general that comes in here and tries to impose federal marijuana law on top of us in an area where we have decided how we want to govern ourselves,\u201d Brauchler said.<\/p>\n

asemadeni@durangoherald.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Brauchler says the law will guide his decision-making<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":98418,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5736,5735],"tags":[94,21,1126],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-98417","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local-news","category-news","tag-colorado-state-government","tag-cortez","tag-politics-general"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/98417","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=98417"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/98417\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/98418"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=98417"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=98417"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=98417"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=98417"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}