The Case for Electing Democratic State Level Officials and Legislators

The Case for Re-Electing Our State Democratic Officials
 and
Electing Democratic Majorities in our Colorado House and Senate

Original Date July 27, 2022; Updated & Republished 1/1/2024

State Democratic Officials (at 1/1/2024):  Governor Jared Polis, Attorney General Phil Weiser, Secretary of State Jena Griswold, and Treasurer Dave Young

Legislators (at 1/1/2024):  Senate District 15 Janice Marchman and House District 49 Judy Amabile

The horrific decision of the Supreme Court in June 2022 that overturned the Federal Constitutional right to abortion access brought renewed attention to how the decisions in Roe v Wade in 1973, and its affirming case of Planned Parenthood v Casey in 1992, arose in the first place.

Those cases arose due to state-level restrictions on abortion. The Roe ruling was the decision to frame a right to abortion at a Federal Constitutional level, thus overriding outright state bans or unreasonable state-level restrictions, and establishing reliability in women’s healthcare.

In the Roe decision in 1973, Justice Warren Burger even wrote in his concurring opinion that supporting a Federal Constitutional right was essential:

“. . . where the consequences of state intervention are so severe, uncertainty must be avoided as much as possible.”

So, after 49 years of being able to rely on some consistency in women’s healthcare rights, the Supreme Court made abortion rights once again subject to the political whims of the states.

What these events have pointed out is that it is increasingly important for voters to focus on electing Democratic state governors, state officials, and legislative majorities who support women’s healthcare needs, including abortion rights.

We already see extreme restrictions on women’s healthcare imposed in states with Republican-controlled legislatures and governors. Plus we see Republican State Attorneys General who are intensely pursuing investigations and legal actions against healthcare professionals who are trying to help women (and young girls) who need medical attention.  (This includes some states imposing travel restrictions for women attempting to go to another state for medical attention.)

These extreme restrictions by Republicans do not allow for exceptions in cases of rape, incest, or saving the life of the mother.

These types of onerous restrictions by Republican governors and legislators is a continuation of overreaching powers that they have used to pass laws in recent years decreasing voting rights in other states.

We are fortunate that in 2018 and 2022 Colorado voters elected Democrats to our Governorship (Jared Polis), Secretary of State (Jena Griswold), Attorney General (Phil Weiser), and Treasurer (Dave Young). Plus we established overall Democratic majorities in our Legislature and kept those majorities in the 2020 and 2022 elections. All of us are benefitting from those elections.

Colorado Reproductive Laws

In March 2022, our Democratic Legislative majorities in Colorado passed and our Governor signed into law the new Reproductive Health Equity Act recognizing each person’s fundamental right to make healthcare decisions without government interference. This law will protect women’s reproductive rights in Colorado after the overturning of Roe.

But we must remember that these are statutory changes passed by our Colorado Democratic legislature and signed by our Democratic Governor. It is not a change to the Colorado Constitution, and thus could be reversed if we do not retain the Governorship and legislative majorities with our Democratic candidates in future years.

To protect our rights, we were successful in November 2022 in re-electing all four of the Democratic candidates for State Officials for 4-year terms  -- Polis for Governor, Griswold for Secretary of State, Weiser for Attorney General, and Young for Treasurer.

In addition, in 2022 we were successful in electing Democratic candidates for our Legislature -- Colorado Senate District 15 (Janice Marchman) for a 4-year term and House District 49 (Judy Amabile) for a 2-year term. Both SD15 and HD49 were held by Republicans in 2020 -- so it was a success in turning them BLUE in 2022.  

In 2024, HD49 will have a new Democratic candidate since Representative Amabile is planning to run for another Senate seat in Boulder County.  The HD49 Democratic candidate will be determined in Colorado's June 25, 2024 primary.

Thus, maintaining Democratic legislative control will require getting out the vote in all our HD49 precincts for the November 2024 election.  This includes all precincts in Estes Valley.

Thus, our pleas to “vote the whole ballot” is most important in 2024 -- down ballot offices are always very important, but especially important this year.  As the Colorado Democratic Party reminds us:

“Elections matter. Every office. Every seat. Every year. They impact our laws, our rights, our lives, our courts, our policies, our opportunities, and our freedoms.”