Speaker 1: Kent Theory is one of the people behind the rank
Speaker 1: choice voting initiative here on the ballot. He's been k
Speaker 1: You've been very busy over the last few years, sort
Speaker 1: of reshaping how politics has been going. You were behind
Speaker 1: the ballid initiative to open the primaries. You've been behind
Speaker 1: other ballot initiatives that have really had a big impact
Speaker 1: on Colorado. We won't talk about the Gallagor amendment right now,
Speaker 1: although I did already tell him I'm kind of mad
Speaker 1: at him about that one, because ranked choice voting is
Speaker 1: something that I have been very open on the show
Speaker 1: about vacillating back and forth. I sort of you know,
Speaker 1: and I kind of wanted to give you the opportunity
Speaker 1: to give a solid primmer on what this valid initiative
Speaker 1: actually does, how our system would work if it passes,
Speaker 1: and then why we can get into the why we
Speaker 1: need to do this or we don't whatever after that,
Speaker 1: but let's start with what it actually does.
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, thank you Mandy for shedding some light on
Speaker 2: this subject because it's so it's so important. What it
Speaker 2: does is it establishes a very tidy, integrated three step process.
Speaker 2: Step one, an all candidate primary everybody on one ballot
Speaker 2: and with their party affiliation number two. The top four
Speaker 2: advance from that all candidate primary. Step three you go
Speaker 2: get You got to earn a majority of support, and
Speaker 2: we do that through ranked voting. So step one, all
Speaker 2: candidate primary, all of us voters vote for one person.
Speaker 3: Step two.
Speaker 2: Four of those advanced, which creates tremendous diversity. You don't
Speaker 2: just get the fire left and fire right, but you
Speaker 2: get center right, and center left and maybe even center center.
Speaker 3: So you're giving much more choice to that third step,
Speaker 3: which is the.
Speaker 2: General election, where we say, hey to become an elected
Speaker 2: official in Colorado, earn a majority of support and rather
Speaker 2: than having a runoff election costing millions of dollars a
Speaker 2: month after the normal election, if they do in many states,
Speaker 2: we would achieve it through ranked voting, which is something
Speaker 2: that already exists in sixty four political jurisdictions across America.
Speaker 1: So let me ask you to clarify what happens, because
Speaker 1: I think the primary ballot is easy to understand. You
Speaker 1: cast one vote on the primary ballot, and if your
Speaker 1: person is among the top four vote getters in that primary,
Speaker 1: you were going to see them on your general election ballot.
Speaker 1: So let's say we've got candidates ABC and D, just
Speaker 1: to keep it simple, and candidate A. No candidate gets
Speaker 1: over fifty percent in the first go round, Okay, so
Speaker 1: we'll just go in. A came in first place, B
Speaker 1: came in second place. C came in third place. D
Speaker 1: came in fourth place. Okay, So what happens when candidate
Speaker 1: A is at forty percent and all the other candidates
Speaker 1: are less?
Speaker 4: What happens at that point?
Speaker 2: Yeah, So at that point, since no one has demonstrated
Speaker 2: to a majority of people that they're preferred, then you
Speaker 2: go to the person who is in fourth place, in
Speaker 2: last place, and that person D isn't Dog gets taken out.
Speaker 2: At that point, they've lost. Just like losing in a primary.
Speaker 2: In the current system, you lose, you don't get to advance.
Speaker 2: And so number four, whoever that is, goes away, and
Speaker 2: any of any of Diaz and Dogs voters who indicate
Speaker 2: a number two choice, their vote gets reallocated to that
Speaker 2: number two choice, and then you see if anybody gets
Speaker 2: over fifty percent from that. If you do, you stop
Speaker 2: right there. If not, you then take the third place
Speaker 2: person and reallocate their number two votes and then you
Speaker 2: automatically are going to get a winner because at that
Speaker 2: point someone's going to have over fifty percent.
Speaker 1: Okay, So this is one of those things that as
Speaker 1: a person, and I've also been open with my audience
Speaker 1: about the fact that in two thousand I voted for
Speaker 1: Ralph Nader because I was voting for the viability of
Speaker 1: a third party candidate.
Speaker 4: Right.
Speaker 1: So I'm not opposed to anything that shakes up the
Speaker 1: two party system. But the biggest concern that I have
Speaker 1: seen on the against side is that this destroys the
Speaker 1: two party system.
Speaker 4: How do you respond to that?
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, I'm more conservative than you on this one,
Speaker 2: because I actually am very nervous about moving away from
Speaker 2: the two party system, and I think what we're doing
Speaker 2: is going to save it.
Speaker 3: The fact is the two.
Speaker 2: Party system has been losing customers at an amazing clip.
Speaker 2: Half of Colorado voters are now independent, more than Democrats
Speaker 2: and Republicans combined, and the numbers going up higher and higher.
Speaker 2: Sixty four percent of young adults under age thirty five
Speaker 2: are independence, and eighty five percent of Generation Z says
Speaker 2: that neither party has anything to offer them. And so
Speaker 2: I actually believe that as opposed to what's happening with
Speaker 2: the two parties now, where they're becoming more and more.
Speaker 3: Extreme to to the left and the right.
Speaker 2: They're building higher and higher fences over smaller and smaller parties.
Speaker 2: We're going to end up with new parties they don't
Speaker 2: if they don't become more attractive to a majority of
Speaker 2: the voters.
Speaker 4: So this is where this is what I The next
Speaker 4: question I'm going to ask you.
Speaker 1: Is what I love about the potential of ranked choice voting.
Speaker 1: But even as I talk about the potential, I also
Speaker 1: think to myself, you know, socialism sounds great on paper,
Speaker 1: but the reality of socialism is much different than the
Speaker 1: paper version of socialism, and I have concerns about ranked
Speaker 1: choice voting. I want to talk specifically about what happened
Speaker 1: in Alaska, because this is immediately the thing that gets
Speaker 1: brought up.
Speaker 4: In Alaska.
Speaker 1: They had two Republicans running against one Democrat. The two
Speaker 1: Republicans went at it in the primary, and the losing
Speaker 1: primary candidate their voters did not vote for the Republican
Speaker 1: in the general, and a Democrat ends up pointing a
Speaker 1: House seat for Alaska, which is really crazy, just really crazy.
Speaker 1: How do you explain to people that this is not
Speaker 1: going to game the system in that way to where
Speaker 1: if you have three Republicans running in one Democrat running,
Speaker 1: the Republicans are not just going to eat each other.
Speaker 2: Yeah, now, this one has been so misrepresentative and misunderstood,
Speaker 2: So I'm glad you're bringing it up first, Mary Peltola.
Speaker 2: That Democrat that got in actually got more first place
Speaker 2: votes than the other two candidates right away from the
Speaker 2: first round. But put that aside for a moment. Alaska
Speaker 2: is misunderstood. Alaska only has twenty eight percent of their
Speaker 2: voters registered Republican. Now that's twice as many as are
Speaker 2: registered Democrats.
Speaker 3: There's fourteen.
Speaker 2: But fifty five percent of Alaska voters are fiercely independent.
Speaker 2: And the reason it's viewed as this rock solid Republican
Speaker 2: state is because they had closed primaries, and so the
Speaker 2: two parties, even though they had less than fifty percent
Speaker 2: of the voters, got to set all the rules of
Speaker 2: the game, and that led to Republican domination. So what
Speaker 2: happened in that general election is the Democratic candidate appealed,
Speaker 2: not the two Republicans were still focused on the twenty
Speaker 2: eight percent, plus some of.
Speaker 3: The independents who always vote Republicans.
Speaker 2: So they were focused on the thirty five percent that
Speaker 2: were safe Republicans, and they let her focus on the
Speaker 2: other sixty five percent of the population.
Speaker 3: And so they learned a lesson.
Speaker 2: Because one of the great things about ranked voting is
Speaker 2: that you've got it represent the entire electorate, and it
Speaker 2: makes sense for you to.
Speaker 3: Be thoughtful with them and sensitive to them because they
Speaker 3: can determine when or not you get reelected.
Speaker 1: So essentially, and this is kind of how I have
Speaker 1: have viewed it from the outside looking in.
Speaker 4: The two Republican.
Speaker 1: Candidates didn't get they didn't pay attention to the new
Speaker 1: rules of the game, because ultimately, the real positive for
Speaker 1: me and ranked choice voting is the potential to change
Speaker 1: the way campaigns are run. Because to your point, you
Speaker 1: can no longer just focus on the tiny, little and
Speaker 1: getting smaller Republican or Democratic Party here in Colorado, you
Speaker 1: have no choice but to campaign to everyone.
Speaker 4: So I love that aspect of it.
Speaker 1: But how long do you think it takes kent for politicians,
Speaker 1: political systems, political consultants to figure out the new rules
Speaker 1: of the game.
Speaker 4: What kind of growing pains are we looking at here?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 2: Well, certainly there won't be zero. That's not the way
Speaker 2: democracies work. I mean, when when women's suffrage was put in,
Speaker 2: When when minority voters were allowed, I mean, all these
Speaker 2: things there are, it's clearly the right direction to go,
Speaker 2: but there's always some speed bumps. But the factors elected
Speaker 2: officials are really quick on this stuff, as much as
Speaker 2: those two Republicans for some reason didn't seem to really
Speaker 2: get it. So let's talk about the Alaska state Legislature,
Speaker 2: which had been totally gridlocked for over a decade. They're
Speaker 2: actually formed a bipartisan majority governing caucus, these and ours
Speaker 2: to together, and they didn't even invite the fringe left
Speaker 2: and the fringe right. They said, you guys have been
Speaker 2: holding us back for a decade with not wanting to
Speaker 2: compromise than anything. So the officially essentially formed almost a
Speaker 2: new party, and that group is working together because now
Speaker 2: to get re elected, the path is to get stuff
Speaker 2: done as opposed to performative art or you want to
Speaker 2: demonstrate how you never compromise. And so in Alaska, a
Speaker 2: majority of the state legislature changed its demeanor and its
Speaker 2: practices overnight, and they got a budget done in record
Speaker 2: time that hadn't been done for a decade, and there
Speaker 2: are other things like that, and so the elected officials
Speaker 2: are pretty damned sensitive to the incentive system.
Speaker 1: So I got a bunch of questions on our text
Speaker 1: line because so let's kind of do these, you know,
Speaker 1: as quickly as possible, but thoroughly as possible, because these
Speaker 1: are all good questions. One of them is from Benita.
Speaker 1: Ask him how you would audit rank choice voting? How
Speaker 1: would that process work?
Speaker 2: Yeah, this is where I'd have to have of our
Speaker 2: elections experts give a technically satisfactory answer. What I can
Speaker 2: tendue to tell you is that there's existing methodology and technology.
Speaker 3: To do it. It's been do multiple times. That exists
Speaker 3: out there. And the great thing.
Speaker 2: That's happened now that there's sixty four places doing rank
Speaker 2: voting across the country is there's an entire ecosystem of
Speaker 2: pro bono support groups for voter education, material, for marketing material,
Speaker 2: for technology enhancements. And the good news for Colorado is
Speaker 2: ninety eight percent of our countanies are already have the
Speaker 2: necessary technology in house and will help the other two percent.
Speaker 1: So we already have the ability to do this, like
Speaker 1: we have the technology, and we can make this happen.
Speaker 3: Absolutely Now.
Speaker 2: It takes hard work, and we want to develop with
Speaker 2: the clerks a very significant and thoughtful implementation plan. We're
Speaker 2: already in conversations with the governor and going through what
Speaker 2: should be the line item and his proposed budget that
Speaker 2: would include millions of dollars for supporting the clerks. So
Speaker 2: I'm not saying it's easy. But we did Vork by mail.
Speaker 2: A lot of people said, oh my god, that's going
Speaker 2: to lead to a cluster. We pulled it off well.
Speaker 2: In twenty sixteen we did the semi open primaries, Oh
Speaker 2: my gosh, everybody said this is too risky, you can't
Speaker 2: do audits all that.
Speaker 3: They were wrong again, So this one is no more
Speaker 3: or less difficult.
Speaker 2: You've got to be on your game, you've got to
Speaker 2: have resources, but it's totally doable.
Speaker 1: A lot of people on the text line are sending
Speaker 1: some variation of are you trying to cement Democrat power
Speaker 1: in Colorado forever? Because their concern is and I'm going
Speaker 1: to use the first Congressional District as an example because
Speaker 1: it is reliably Democrat and my friend Valdemar Achiletta outstanding
Speaker 1: candidate on the Republican side. He is fighting a don
Speaker 1: Quixote like quest in that district just because of the
Speaker 1: makeup of the district. So it stands to reason that
Speaker 1: if you have an open primary, there could be four
Speaker 1: Democrats that come out of that primary race.
Speaker 4: How do you address that concern?
Speaker 2: Yeah, here's what's it would be amusing if.
Speaker 3: It wasn't such a serious topic.
Speaker 2: I just had an hour long debate with the head
Speaker 2: of the Democratic Party in here in Colorado and the
Speaker 2: lead attorney, and they are petrified that passing this will
Speaker 2: take away their supermajority status because we're going to put
Speaker 2: more and more power back in the voters' hands and
Speaker 2: put voters in the middle center, left, center, right and center,
Speaker 2: put their voice and choice back in the game. And
Speaker 2: so it's so ironic that we have on the one hand,
Speaker 2: Dave Williams and Lauren Bobert against us on the our
Speaker 2: public side, and then the head of the Democratic Party
Speaker 2: on the Democratic side. And so that's kind of how
Speaker 2: we know we're doing it right, and we're focused on
Speaker 2: the voters because party leaders on each side. Now at
Speaker 2: the same time, there's a number of hardcore partisans who
Speaker 2: have endorsed this, including Governor Polis and Mayor Mike Johnston
Speaker 2: from Denver on the Democratic side, and on the Republican side,
Speaker 2: people like Dick Wadhams, who was the Republican Party chair
Speaker 2: for the entire state and ran a bulk of the
Speaker 2: successful Republican campaigns. He's on the team as well because
Speaker 2: he thinks this could be to step forward to actually
Speaker 2: restore relevance for the Republican Party.
Speaker 1: Well, I don't know if you answered the question specifically.
Speaker 1: I mean, and I've kind of been bouncing this around.
Speaker 1: There are districts that there's almost a zero percent chance
Speaker 1: the Republican's going to win in the general anyway. So
Speaker 1: this would just kind of allow you, as a right
Speaker 1: leaning person to at least have a say, and you know,
Speaker 1: you could vote for your Republican candidate first and then
Speaker 1: vote for the least crazy on the.
Speaker 4: Other side, or vice versa.
Speaker 1: You have that opportunity that for me is the thing
Speaker 1: that you know, I'm trying to make a point of.
Speaker 3: Yeah, Okay, I hear what you're saying.
Speaker 2: I apologize for going down a parallel path, but what
Speaker 2: you say is exactly true. A district that's dominantly Democratic
Speaker 2: should elect a Democratic person and the one that's dominantly
Speaker 2: Republican should But what happens in the real world is
Speaker 2: exactly what.
Speaker 3: You just said.
Speaker 2: Let's say there's a district is sixty five to thirty
Speaker 2: five Democrat over Republican, and so that thirty five percent
Speaker 2: their first vote will be for Mandy Connell because that's
Speaker 2: their favorite Republican. Their number two vote, they're going to say,
Speaker 2: I'd much rather have sort of an Amy Klobuch, you're
Speaker 2: sort of person, not a Bernie Sanders, and so my
Speaker 2: number two vote is going to be for the moderate Democrat.
Speaker 3: Well that's very powerful because it means that.
Speaker 2: You're not permanently disenfranchising the minority party in that district.
Speaker 3: They actually have a voice.
Speaker 2: And if you're the moderate Democratic state senator, for example,
Speaker 2: you don't have to just run to Bernie Sanders to
Speaker 2: try to get votes. Suddenly, you market yourself and you
Speaker 2: listen to all the people in the minority because.
Speaker 3: They're very relevant for you.
Speaker 2: And I talked to one of our state senators just
Speaker 2: a couple of days ago who had an actual competitive
Speaker 2: race and and went door to door and it literally
Speaker 2: changed her perspective on some policies by her going and
Speaker 2: knocking on the Republican doors and the independent doors, not
Speaker 2: just the Democratic she said. She said, if I win,
Speaker 2: I'm going to be a way better leader because now
Speaker 2: I spent time listening to them kind of for selfish reasons, but.
Speaker 3: I got a lot out of it.
Speaker 1: I have a follow up question on how the ranked
Speaker 1: choice votes are counted, and this one seems like an
Speaker 1: interesting question.
Speaker 4: Mayby what happens if all.
Speaker 1: The second choice on candidate C went to candidate D,
Speaker 1: they were eliminated, then there was then you, I mean,
Speaker 1: how does that work? If you don't I mean, you
Speaker 1: would have to have a clear majority though, if you
Speaker 1: cleared out two candidates, right, No, I guess it could
Speaker 1: be fifty to fifty.
Speaker 2: Well, but fifty to fifty exactly only happens about one
Speaker 2: out of every twenty thousand elections.
Speaker 3: Yeah, once you get.
Speaker 2: To where you're eliminating, you've eliminated number four and you
Speaker 2: go to eliminate number three.
Speaker 3: Yeah, you're guaranteed to get a majority with someone.
Speaker 1: Okay, Also, let me get some I've got a bunch
Speaker 1: of questions coming in here, Mandy. I'm sorry to harp
Speaker 1: on this, But what he's describing is bolder and the
Speaker 1: more popular moderate Democrat lost because of ranked choice voting.
Speaker 4: And I'm talking about Bob Yates.
Speaker 1: He should have won easily and he lost because of
Speaker 1: ranked choice voting, and the progressives, the radical progressives, beat
Speaker 1: him with ranked choice voting scam. So I know that
Speaker 1: somebody's brought the Bob Yates situation to your attention, and
Speaker 1: it almost it does kind of seem like the whole
Speaker 1: we're going to get the moderated it failed. What do
Speaker 1: you attribute that to?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean there's hundreds of elections in our state
Speaker 2: every year, and in any system, you're going to have
Speaker 2: some anomalies.
Speaker 3: I mean, it's just it's the nature of the beast.
Speaker 2: And I don't know enough about that campaign to know
Speaker 2: exactly what how the different competitors didn't in fact campaign.
Speaker 2: But what I do know is that this system requires
Speaker 2: that you get a majority support, and there's almost no
Speaker 2: way to gain anything given you have to get to
Speaker 2: that majority. It either exists or a doesn't. It's not
Speaker 2: like top two in California, which is a flawed system,
Speaker 2: because you can gain it with Top four, and you
Speaker 2: need that majority I've never yet had anyone be able
Speaker 2: to describe to me a real world scenario where someone
Speaker 2: gamed it and succeeded. And I mean, I've been on
Speaker 2: this trail for six months asking the question because I'm
Speaker 2: sure it's happened somewhere, but not a single opponent has
Speaker 2: ever been able to cite a single example of gaming.
Speaker 1: All right, last comment, and I'll let you respond, and
Speaker 1: then we've got to wrap it up. No rank choice voting.
Speaker 1: I do not want to see two Democrats in the
Speaker 1: general for governor or senator. I want both Republican and
Speaker 1: Democrat policies to have their voices.
Speaker 4: How do you respond to that?
Speaker 2: That's why we feel so strongly about top four that
Speaker 2: in our state, at least in the next fifty years,
Speaker 2: there's never going to be a case where one party
Speaker 2: would get all the top four spots.
Speaker 3: And if it does happen, it doesn't it means the
Speaker 3: other party.
Speaker 2: Has virtually no support, correct, in which case they don't
Speaker 2: deserve to be in the battle. So just like why
Speaker 2: I can't comment on the Boulder situation, you know, in
Speaker 2: a highly liberal spot or a highly conservative spot, that's
Speaker 2: what they are. That outcome is appropriate we're not trying
Speaker 2: to make moderates everywhere.
Speaker 3: And I'll close this for this, Mandy.
Speaker 2: It's not that we're looking for a world where every
Speaker 2: candidate lives in the middle.
Speaker 3: What we're looking for is a world where.
Speaker 2: Every candidate is willing to meet in the middle when
Speaker 2: common sense dictates on things like immigration, where the people
Speaker 2: would have reached a consensus compromised twenty years ago.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Kent theory. I appreciate what you're trying to do here.
Speaker 1: I'm going to be putting my voter Go voter Guide
Speaker 1: out on Monday, but considering the disastrous state of the
Speaker 1: current Republican Party, I'm relatively certain at this point it's.
Speaker 4: A yes for me.
Speaker 2: Now.
Speaker 4: That won't help you because my.
Speaker 1: Endorsement is the kiss of death, but I'm just letting
Speaker 1: you know for what it's worth, I'm convinced I'm ready
Speaker 1: to shake things up and I'm ready to do something
Speaker 1: different because what we're doing now clearly is not working.
Speaker 4: Ken. I really appreciate your time today.
Speaker 3: Yeah, thank you, Mandy so much.
Speaker 2: And I agree that this is a time where the
Speaker 2: status quo is broken and America needs to step up
Speaker 2: and fix it.
Speaker 4: All right, that's Kent Theory. Thank you Kent