Speaker 1: Ladies and gentlemen in this corner from the University of Colorado.
Speaker 1: Thirty years in Lorraine, fighting for truth, justice and the
Speaker 1: American Way.
Speaker 2: Dannchapleas, all right, guys, this is not Dan Caplas. This
Speaker 2: is Heidi Ganol filling in for Dan. It's great to
Speaker 2: be here this afternoon.
Speaker 3: It's like Thursday. I hope, I hope you understand if
Speaker 3: I forget what day it is, what time it is,
Speaker 3: what meal I've eaten.
Speaker 2: I mean, it's that crazy break period between Christmas and
Speaker 2: New Year's. But wow, what a great holiday it was.
Speaker 2: And the weather's been fantastic. It's kind of weird. I'm
Speaker 2: actually headed down to Florida next week for a little break, and.
Speaker 3: I think it's going to be freezing down there.
Speaker 2: It's supposed to be this big ice storm that hits
Speaker 2: all of America. I guess I don't know, at least
Speaker 2: the eastern now. But anyway, so happy to fill in
Speaker 2: for Dan, So grateful to be here. There is so
Speaker 2: much going on in the news, but I wanted to
Speaker 2: start with something kind of sad for Colorado. It was
Speaker 2: a rough, rough weekend when it comes to football in Colorado.
Speaker 3: Jesse, did you watch any of the games.
Speaker 4: Unfortunately, Yes, I was actually working the Buff game, so
Speaker 4: it was brutal. CSU didn't do fair much better, but yeah,
Speaker 4: the Colorado teams all the way around.
Speaker 2: It was a struggle not to mention the Broncos. What
Speaker 2: the heck was that?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 4: That was a cherry on top of a bad football
Speaker 4: weekend for sure.
Speaker 2: I know we're all recovering. Yeah, the Buffs, saw man.
Speaker 2: I love my Buffs. I've done a diehard Buff fan
Speaker 2: since I was there in eighty six, and it's been
Speaker 2: quite a journey. But you know, I've got to give
Speaker 2: it to Dion. He's done an incredible job with the program.
Speaker 2: I'm really gonna miss seeing Travis and Chador play together.
Speaker 2: You never know where they're going to end up, but
Speaker 2: probably not on the same teams, but it's going to
Speaker 2: be so exciting to see them take off into the
Speaker 2: NFL and see what they do. God, wouldn't it be
Speaker 2: fun if one of them ended up a Bronco. I
Speaker 2: don't think that'll happen, but that would that would be
Speaker 2: really cool.
Speaker 4: You bet?
Speaker 3: So where what's like your big college team? Jesse? I'm buffs.
Speaker 3: Oh you are Buffs?
Speaker 5: Good?
Speaker 3: Good, good, well for us.
Speaker 2: Phew that that's a relief, and that's why I love
Speaker 2: hanging out with Dan.
Speaker 3: He's a huge buff too, so he.
Speaker 4: Yes, he is in primes. Got those boys pointed in
Speaker 4: the right direction for sure, So you got to remember that.
Speaker 4: I mean, they won one game last year, so.
Speaker 3: That is insane, that's wild.
Speaker 2: And people were pretty pessimistic coming into this year too,
Speaker 2: and I think they did a great job. The kids
Speaker 2: stayed really teed up even when they weren't winning or
Speaker 2: even when they were facing a rough game. So you know,
Speaker 2: I'm really proud of the program, proud of what he did.
Speaker 2: The last thing I did as a regent in at
Speaker 2: the University of Colorado, which was in January of twenty three,
Speaker 2: when I finished out my turn, was approved that contract
Speaker 2: for Dion, So I think that.
Speaker 3: Was a great way to go out, Yes, you bet, but.
Speaker 2: Onto other crazy things going on in world. I don't
Speaker 2: know how many of you are on Twitter what's now
Speaker 2: called X, but I perused X today just to see
Speaker 2: what the latest greatest stories were, and I tried not
Speaker 2: to be on too much over the break. In fact,
Speaker 2: I took a couple days off and when I came
Speaker 2: back the world had gone mad about HB one visas,
Speaker 2: and everyone was mad at Elon and then Vivek wade
Speaker 2: in and he was talking about how kids shouldn't do sleepovers,
Speaker 2: and it was just.
Speaker 3: A lot of turmoil.
Speaker 2: But what I liked about this was we were having
Speaker 2: feisty debate about a really important issue and how it
Speaker 2: plays into the promises that were made during the campaign.
Speaker 2: And I think it ended up okay. I think we're
Speaker 2: at a place where we can agree kind of what
Speaker 2: happens next. We need to reform the visa program. We
Speaker 2: need to stay firm in dealing with immigration, especially criminals
Speaker 2: who need to be booted out of the country, especially
Speaker 2: here in Colorado. And we need to make sure that
Speaker 2: we fund and build that border wall and stop people
Speaker 2: from coming in illegally, especially bad actors. So you know,
Speaker 2: I think at the end of the day, we all
Speaker 2: ended up in a good place. But I would love
Speaker 2: to hear your feedback. I want this next couple hours
Speaker 2: to be really engaging. I would love for you to
Speaker 2: call in the call in numbers three oh three, seven, one,
Speaker 2: three eight, two five five, or you can text Dan.
Speaker 2: Text the word Dan to five seven, seven three nine
Speaker 2: and that'll pop up on my screen and I can
Speaker 2: talk to you that way. But I think I think
Speaker 2: we're in a good place there. I do want to
Speaker 2: chat a little bit about vivec and his comments about
Speaker 2: fewer sleepovers.
Speaker 3: Now, I grew up.
Speaker 2: In the eighties, graduated high school eighty four, and it
Speaker 2: was just a thing that you had sleepovers, you hung
Speaker 2: out with your friends.
Speaker 3: You would be gone most of the weekend.
Speaker 2: You know, even as a younger kid kind of you know,
Speaker 2: as they kid around, we were traveling around the neighborhoods
Speaker 2: drinking out of water hoses. I mean, that's kind of funny.
Speaker 2: But I grew up a monument which is right down
Speaker 2: the road. It was a small town back then, And
Speaker 2: I'm not sure I agree with Vivek's take. He said,
Speaker 2: quote a culture that celebrates the prom queen over the
Speaker 2: math Olympia champ or the jock over the valedictorian will
Speaker 2: not produce the best engineers. He went on to recommend
Speaker 2: a different upbringing for America's kids. More movies like Whiplash,
Speaker 2: fewer reruns of Friends, more math tutoring, fewer sleepovers, and
Speaker 2: I just I feel like I had an incredible upbringing.
Speaker 2: We had a lot of freedom to roam the neighborhoods
Speaker 2: and do things to kind of exert our will, but
Speaker 2: also be held accountable if we were behaving badly. So
Speaker 2: I'm not sure that I agree that that's what America
Speaker 2: needs now. Do our kids need a little bit more guidance,
Speaker 2: a little bit more clarity about what's happening in their lives, Yeah,
Speaker 2: I would say so. I think one of the things
Speaker 2: that we're seeing with kids is they're really lost right now.
Speaker 2: There's a lot of mental health issues. They're turning to
Speaker 2: drugs in some cases. I don't feel like they have
Speaker 2: a good purpose. I don't feel like they have a
Speaker 2: really clear purpose about what they want to do in life.
Speaker 2: I think purpose can do a lot of things to
Speaker 2: turn kids around. A few years ago, I think it
Speaker 2: was twenty fifteen, I did a TED talk called the
Speaker 2: Art of the Comeback and the Comeback Gosh, I've been
Speaker 2: through so much more now than I could do Art
Speaker 2: of the Comeback two point zero. But I reference a
Speaker 2: talk I had with my pediatrician, who is the great
Speaker 2: doctor Bucknam. If any of you live in Lewisville or
Speaker 2: up in Northwest Metro area, I'm sure you know of
Speaker 2: doctor bucknam Or you've read the book Baby Wise's we
Speaker 2: call him the Godfather and our family, he's an incredible
Speaker 2: Guy's wife, Gail's equally is incredible and he's raised four
Speaker 2: just wonderful children who've been very successful. And my oldest
Speaker 2: daughter was struggling, and I went to him and said,
Speaker 2: what can we do to help my daughter deal with
Speaker 2: what she's going through in high school? And he said,
Speaker 2: the best thing you can do for kids is turn
Speaker 2: them outward, make them realize they're part of something bigger
Speaker 2: than themselves, get them volunteering, get them seeing the world
Speaker 2: for what it is.
Speaker 3: And the world is very complicated.
Speaker 2: It has a lot of issues, and it usually makes
Speaker 2: their issues seem a lot smaller. So that's what my
Speaker 2: TED talk was about. And really what occurred to me
Speaker 2: was kids need a sense of purpose, and once they
Speaker 2: have a sense of purpose, they can really kind of
Speaker 2: push aside some of their struggles and make a difference
Speaker 2: in the world and make a difference for themselves. So
Speaker 2: that's where I think Vivek's a little.
Speaker 3: Off on that.
Speaker 2: I think, yes, our education system needs to kick it
Speaker 2: into gear. We're going to talk about that in the
Speaker 2: five o'clock hour and have a school board member from
Speaker 2: Albert County, Heather Booth, on to talk about an issue there.
Speaker 2: But we also as parents, I think, need to give
Speaker 2: our kids room to grow, to heal from what happened
Speaker 2: with COVID and some of the things in the past
Speaker 2: few years, but also give them structure. And you know,
Speaker 2: by any means, I'm not I'm not saying I'm the
Speaker 2: best parent on the planet, but I have four kids,
Speaker 2: been through the through the ups and downs of a
Speaker 2: twenty nine year old all the way down to I
Speaker 2: have twins that are twelve, and I just think that
Speaker 2: too much structure isn't necessarily good as well. I'd love
Speaker 2: to hear your feedback on that. You can call in
Speaker 2: at three zho three seven one three eight two five
Speaker 2: five or text five seven seven three nine text the
Speaker 2: word Dan and we'll talk about it. So if you
Speaker 2: have a different perspective, Jesse, I don't know. Do you
Speaker 2: have kids?
Speaker 5: Do not?
Speaker 3: You don't yet? Uh no, I hopefully I'm not deterring you.
Speaker 4: No, no, no, no, I dodged that bullet.
Speaker 2: What do you think about what's going on with kids
Speaker 2: today in society?
Speaker 4: I think you're onto something when the guy have to
Speaker 4: have purpose, and there's so many distractions like that we
Speaker 4: didn't have to deal with when we were growing up.
Speaker 3: You know where'd you grow up?
Speaker 4: Southeast Denver?
Speaker 2: Oh?
Speaker 3: Did you what high school?
Speaker 4: George Washington?
Speaker 3: Nice? Nice?
Speaker 4: Yep, Patriot.
Speaker 3: That's good.
Speaker 2: I mean things have changed a lot in Denver too,
Speaker 2: especially in the education system. I remember when Denver Public
Speaker 2: Schools was one of the top school districts in the
Speaker 2: whole country. Am I how the the mighty have fallen?
Speaker 4: Not anymore?
Speaker 3: No, it breaks my heart me too.
Speaker 2: I don't have the latest stats, but when I was
Speaker 2: running for governor a couple of years ago, there was
Speaker 2: a stat that was really really horrible that only five
Speaker 2: percent of African American and Hispanic kids could read at
Speaker 2: grade level in Denver Public schools.
Speaker 4: It's inexcusable.
Speaker 2: No, and I imagine things haven't changed that much. I
Speaker 2: haven't seen anything that would change it that much. In fact,
Speaker 2: I've heard more and more parents moving out at DPS
Speaker 2: or finding other options, whether it's charter schools, private schools, homeschool.
Speaker 2: But boy, we've really got to get more focused on
Speaker 2: like success in education, not just making our kids feel good.
Speaker 2: Which I guess is a little counter to what I
Speaker 2: was saying earlier. But our kids need to know how
Speaker 2: to read, write, and do math in order to be successful,
Speaker 2: and thus will give us more highly qualified people to
Speaker 2: be engineers at you know, SpaceX or Tesla or any
Speaker 2: of the high tech companies that they're saying they have.
Speaker 3: A lack of.
Speaker 2: But I, you know, I applaud Vivek and Elon for
Speaker 2: doing all the hard work they're doing. I doubt they're
Speaker 2: getting paid for taking the hits that they are. Every
Speaker 2: once in a while we're going to disagree with their approach.
Speaker 2: But I do think Doze is really important, and I
Speaker 2: think it's really important to, you know, have these tough
Speaker 2: discussions about the HB one versus about Doze, about the government,
Speaker 2: the size of the government, the whole shebang. So more
Speaker 2: to come after this break. It's Hidi Ganal filling in
Speaker 2: for Dan Caples. We'll see you soon afternoon. It's Heidi
Speaker 2: Ganal filling in for Dan Caples. Great to be here.
Speaker 2: It's kind of a sleepy week between Christmas and New Year's.
Speaker 2: Hopefully you guys have some great New Year's plans. If
Speaker 2: you've got some great advice on what to do, where
Speaker 2: to go in Denver.
Speaker 3: Give us a call.
Speaker 2: You can call the call in line at three O
Speaker 2: three seven one three eight two five five or text us.
Speaker 2: Just put the word Dan to start off, and then
Speaker 2: five seven seven three nine. I believe we have a caller, Jesse.
Speaker 2: Her name's Jessica. Hello, Jessica.
Speaker 5: Hey, Hi, it's for us Mommy.
Speaker 3: By the way, Oh hello jess How are you good?
Speaker 5: Are you? I wanted to talk about this stuff because
Speaker 5: I was raised so strictly where I wasn't allowed to
Speaker 5: do it, And now I'm obviously I'm not a mom now,
Speaker 5: but I'm like, I wouldn't let my kids either. I
Speaker 5: would be so strict about it.
Speaker 3: Well, just I think there's a couple aspects to that.
Speaker 2: Like one is, when I first heard the article, I
Speaker 2: was like, oh, I didn't let my kids do actual
Speaker 2: sleepovers until they were older and could communicate to me
Speaker 2: really well. And I knew the families really well, but
Speaker 2: we would do like I can't remember what we called them,
Speaker 2: but where they'd stay a little bit later. But I
Speaker 2: think the more general theme is do you kind of
Speaker 2: let loose have a more like let them have more
Speaker 2: freedom or you're really strict, like Vive's talking about, where
Speaker 2: it's all about studying math, not going out on the weekends,
Speaker 2: staying in and really being disciplined about education, like.
Speaker 5: The Tiger mom stuff. I can see that. But yeah,
Speaker 5: it's so funny because I grew up to like hating
Speaker 5: how strict my parents were. Nowadays, I'm like, oh my gosh,
Speaker 5: I wouldn't let my kids do anything either. No, everything's
Speaker 5: so different nowadays.
Speaker 3: But it's tough.
Speaker 2: It's tough, and you know, I have different approaches with
Speaker 2: my four different kids, right They're all different, especially with
Speaker 2: social media. It's so tough around social media. It's a
Speaker 2: constant battle to keep them off their screens. But yet
Speaker 2: here we are, you know, we have to live our
Speaker 2: lives on screens too, So it's a crazy balance right
Speaker 2: now for us. Mommy, I want you to tell us
Speaker 2: what happened today, if you know, with the open meetings
Speaker 2: hearing did you go to that?
Speaker 5: I didn't go, but I was listening in and recording it.
Speaker 5: There was probably like twelve people who testified if they
Speaker 5: weren't voting on anything today, but there was some really
Speaker 5: good testimony on it, and you know, they just kind
Speaker 5: of said some stuff, but there was no vote to
Speaker 5: be done today.
Speaker 3: What was your feel like?
Speaker 2: And can you explain to the listeners or I can
Speaker 2: what that was about?
Speaker 5: So they passed what was the bill number? Last legislative session,
Speaker 5: they passed the bill. I forget what number. It was basically,
Speaker 5: and I think Soper was in on it, but it
Speaker 5: was basically to make the open meetings like harder, making
Speaker 5: things harder for to be open and transparent, and so
Speaker 5: they had to this was this meeting was a part
Speaker 5: of that.
Speaker 3: I don't know.
Speaker 5: It's also convoluted, it is.
Speaker 2: And they wanted to be that way, don't they. For
Speaker 2: those of you don't know, Jessica has a great Twitter
Speaker 2: handle Force Mommy. She is constantly calling out the government,
Speaker 2: local and state for all their shenanigans and just what
Speaker 2: do you think is the most egregious thing you've seen
Speaker 2: lately that really bothers you that the government's up to, well,
Speaker 2: the egg.
Speaker 5: Thing, Yeah, Carrie Sonovan and the egg thing. And she's
Speaker 5: up at her ranch in the mountains, you know, probably
Speaker 5: has her own eggs and everything. And they pass that
Speaker 5: and I guess someone was looking at her blue Sky
Speaker 5: account because they all ran the blue sky, of course,
Speaker 5: and she was like basically saying, Oh, it wasn't our fault,
Speaker 5: blah blah blah, you know that kind of stuff. And
Speaker 5: just all the rules they make on businesses, all these
Speaker 5: people who've never run a bit businesses making all these
Speaker 5: regulations on the businesses. It just drives me insane.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, that was one of the most difficult
Speaker 2: things about being an entrepreneur. I built a company called
Speaker 2: Camp bow Out. It was a big pet care franchise,
Speaker 2: and one of the things that got me involved in
Speaker 2: politics was how difficult it was to get through all
Speaker 2: the regulations and the red tape to even get one
Speaker 2: of the locations open.
Speaker 3: And granted, we were trying to open doggy daycare.
Speaker 2: Facilities in the middle of city areas, but we were
Speaker 2: respectful and understood that there were noise issues and like
Speaker 2: drainage problems, et cetera. And we were always trying to
Speaker 2: select properties that would work, but they just wanted to
Speaker 2: make it as difficult as possible. And we would create
Speaker 2: so many jobs with those businesses and bring a lot
Speaker 2: of joy to the dogs and the dog owners in
Speaker 2: the neighborhood, and we would have all of them testify
Speaker 2: and they would still turn it down over and over
Speaker 2: and over again. And so that's actually when I finally
Speaker 2: at some point said this is enough.
Speaker 3: Teach me how to push back.
Speaker 2: And I learned how to advocate for my franchise ease
Speaker 2: and small business owners. And that was back in like
Speaker 2: I don't know two thousand and eight or nine when
Speaker 2: I first started getting engaged, but that's you have a
Speaker 2: similar path to getting involved in the local government. You
Speaker 2: ran for city council in Arvada. Tell us how you
Speaker 2: got engaged.
Speaker 5: I was well, mainly during the COVID stuff when I started,
Speaker 5: and then I got onto Twitter and I was just
Speaker 5: so mad about everything that was happening. And I learned
Speaker 5: the local government and these unelected people were ruining all
Speaker 5: of our lives. So, you know, I started people like
Speaker 5: love to say they're political experts and stuff, and I'm like, no,
Speaker 5: you have to actually get involved and know what's going on.
Speaker 5: So it was kind of like that where I just
Speaker 5: had to get involved and how to start, you know,
Speaker 5: I had to use my voice. I'd use my little
Speaker 5: bit of a platform, which I think it's growing and
Speaker 5: I think this legislative session in Colorado's gonna be one
Speaker 5: of our best. We're going to have the most people
Speaker 5: down there testifying, hopefully, and I don't know. I'm hopeful
Speaker 5: about Colorado. I'm just not giving up on Colorado.
Speaker 2: No, I'm not either, And I think Freestate Colorado's doing
Speaker 2: a great job also of covering what's happening at the capitol.
Speaker 3: You can follow.
Speaker 2: Brandon on Twitter and also I think he has a
Speaker 2: YouTube channel. But thanks Jess, thanks for joining and keep
Speaker 2: up the great work.
Speaker 5: Thanks.
Speaker 2: No sleepovers for Jess's kids if she has any WHOA. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I tend to agree with her on what's happening in society,
Speaker 2: and we got to be very careful. But I also
Speaker 2: think there's a crazy balance we have to find as
Speaker 2: parents between giving our kids freedom to make a few
Speaker 2: bad decisions or you know, keep them locked in their
Speaker 2: room studying all the time. I don't know my kids
Speaker 2: would freak out if I tried to do that. Oh, Jesse.
Speaker 2: One of the things that really caught my attention this
Speaker 2: weekend on the Sunday morning shows.
Speaker 3: I like watching it.
Speaker 2: I'm a glutton for punishment. Face the Nation had on
Speaker 2: a gal who was talking about the bird flu and
Speaker 2: how everyone should get vaccinated.
Speaker 3: Right now for this bird flu that's coming. Did you
Speaker 3: see that.
Speaker 4: I did see the clip of it. Yeah, that's I
Speaker 4: forget the name doctor Wynn I think is her name.
Speaker 4: I'll pass on that.
Speaker 3: I think all of America is going to take a
Speaker 3: pass on that. What are they thinking?
Speaker 2: I mean, even if it's serious, like take a different approach.
Speaker 4: Right, they're so tone deaf after everything that happened with
Speaker 4: COVID that to go out there and still push that
Speaker 4: is be beyond dumb to me.
Speaker 3: Yeah, getting whacked in the election wasn't enough.
Speaker 2: It's like, Okay, there was a red tsunami all across
Speaker 2: America telling you to stop this nonsense.
Speaker 3: Let's dry some more, let's do some more. Take the
Speaker 3: hint people, I know, and I mean that.
Speaker 2: That's a big conversation to the MAHA movement make America
Speaker 2: healthy again with RFK Junior, and I think there was
Speaker 2: even some little spats going on in that movement over
Speaker 2: the weekend. Everybody was feisty this weekend. I mean, our
Speaker 2: football team's lost, so we had a good reason to be.
Speaker 4: But right, yeah, there's a lot of infighting going on
Speaker 4: in the x sphere at the moment between the MAGA
Speaker 4: people and vivic and it's getting it's getting nasty.
Speaker 2: Well, you know, legislating is messy, and winning an election
Speaker 2: is one thing, and then figuring out how to actually
Speaker 2: change policy or lead a country in a different direction
Speaker 2: is is pretty different. But I think Trump made a
Speaker 2: statement today too with Speaker Johnson. He came out supporting
Speaker 2: Speaker Johnson, the current Speaker of the House, when there
Speaker 2: was a lot of questions about whether he should be
Speaker 2: the one. But we have such a slim majority, and
Speaker 2: we have a one seat majority in the House. There's
Speaker 2: it's not like we have a lot of options to
Speaker 2: choose anybody else. But next up, we're gonna talk about
Speaker 2: election integrity with my friend Bob Cooper. It's gonna be
Speaker 2: really spicy, really interesting. So join us back after the break.
Speaker 2: This is Hidi Ganaal filling in for Dan Capless. Thursday. Everyone,
Speaker 2: it's Hidi Ganna. Oh is it's not Thursday? Oh my gosh,
Speaker 2: see I'm in that weird, weird zone right now, Jesse, what.
Speaker 4: Day is does not apply? I believe today is Monday.
Speaker 2: Oh it's Monday. That's why I had I was in denial.
Speaker 2: This is Hidi Ganall. I'm filling in for Dan Caplis.
Speaker 2: Obviously I have holiday brain. We're gonna talk a little
Speaker 2: bit now about election integrity, a very interesting issue one
Speaker 2: that's been you know, in the in the headlines. In Colorado,
Speaker 2: we had Jenna Griswold, her department as Secretary of State
Speaker 2: leaked some bios passwords and caused a lot of voters
Speaker 2: a lot of concern about this election. And of course
Speaker 2: she put Tina Peters in jail for doing that exact thing.
Speaker 2: So I think that it's so so ridiculous that Jenna
Speaker 2: Griswold is not being held accountable, especially after the venomous,
Speaker 2: I mean way she went after Tina Peters, who truly
Speaker 2: believed with all her heart she was doing the right
Speaker 2: things for the voters and to protect her election in
Speaker 2: Masa County.
Speaker 3: She was the Mason County Clerk.
Speaker 2: I have my friend Bob Cooper on to talk more
Speaker 2: about election integrity and what's happened over the last few months.
Speaker 6: Hello, Bob, Hi, how are you doing.
Speaker 2: I'm good, except it's Monday, not Thursday.
Speaker 3: Did you know that?
Speaker 6: No, you're kidding.
Speaker 5: I know, I know, Bob.
Speaker 6: No.
Speaker 2: I was just going to say, you've been in the
Speaker 2: trenches on the election integrity front for a while. We've
Speaker 2: gotten to know each other over the last year or so,
Speaker 2: and you are involved with a group called Colorado Institute
Speaker 2: for Election Integrity Coffee doing great work. But I want
Speaker 2: to talk a little bit about what's happened in the
Speaker 2: last couple months since you actually helped me with an
Speaker 2: audit we did in Douglas County over the last two
Speaker 2: years since the twenty two election, and we did a
Speaker 2: press conference a few months ago, it was a couple
Speaker 2: months before the election, talking about a few key issues
Speaker 2: that we found that we're concerning leading up to the
Speaker 2: twenty four election, and one of those was the US
Speaker 2: post Office and you were the lead on some research.
Speaker 2: I want you to talk a little bit about that
Speaker 2: project and what you did and.
Speaker 3: What you found.
Speaker 6: Sure, be happy to do that, just just as the
Speaker 6: backdrop that most Colorado citizens should understand, as we are
Speaker 6: in a mail in voting state, so not every state
Speaker 6: is like that, but what we do because we are
Speaker 6: a mail in voting state, is we mail out three
Speaker 6: point eight million ballots the US Postal Service and that's
Speaker 6: how votes are cast, the mail voting system. And there's
Speaker 6: two parts of that process. One is the delivery of
Speaker 6: the ballot to the home by the United States Postal
Speaker 6: Service or the residents, and the other part of that
Speaker 6: is a critical part of the election system is the
Speaker 6: ballot packets that are returned and categorized as undeliverable ballots.
Speaker 6: And many people do not understand that the accuracy of
Speaker 6: the voter registration records are partly dependent on reporting of
Speaker 6: undeliverable ballots because what happens is the counties are returned
Speaker 6: all the undeliverable ballots by the United States Postal Service
Speaker 6: that gathers them all up during an election, and these
Speaker 6: are typically ballots where records that the voter changed residents
Speaker 6: moved out of the state, and the US postal carriers
Speaker 6: along with the central Postal Office, categorize these ballots as undeliverable.
Speaker 6: They are not permitted to be forwarded and they are
Speaker 6: gathered up in returned to the county that controls that
Speaker 6: part of the voter registration system. The reason these are
Speaker 6: a vital election record is because they are partly used
Speaker 6: to determine whether the voter's status should be changed from
Speaker 6: active to inactive undeliverable. The reason that is extremely important
Speaker 6: is because if the record is not recorded as undeliverable inactive,
Speaker 6: that voter will continue to get a ballot even though
Speaker 6: they don't live at that address anymore. So it is
Speaker 6: a really crucial record.
Speaker 3: Bob.
Speaker 2: Can I ask you a question, do you know how
Speaker 2: many undeliverable ballots there were returned to the post office
Speaker 2: like statewide?
Speaker 3: Or can you give us an example in a county?
Speaker 6: Yes, I can give a county in the data I
Speaker 6: have right now for twenty twenty two. Or if I
Speaker 6: did the first thought it and that number was curtly
Speaker 6: over one hundred and fifty thousand, I think it's left
Speaker 6: one hundred and sixty thousand.
Speaker 2: So one hundred and sixty thousand or so ballots in
Speaker 2: the twenty two election were returned undeliverable. And I know
Speaker 2: that what you found in your research was there was
Speaker 2: a big gap in just the eleven counties that you
Speaker 2: looked at, specifically nine there were about thirty thousand ballots
Speaker 2: that were unaccounted for in those nine counties. Is that accurate?
Speaker 6: Yes? Let me clarify this so that the people listening
Speaker 6: understand one of the major issues on a voting system
Speaker 6: is they are poorly audited. And when I I'll give
Speaker 6: this example. Normally in a business, on this type of
Speaker 6: a document, what you'd want to have is very good
Speaker 6: chain of custody, in other words, documents that showed in
Speaker 6: the county. Hey, the United States Postal Service delivered to
Speaker 6: my county on this date four thousand undeliverable ballots as
Speaker 6: election returned items. Yes, So in twenty twenty two, via
Speaker 6: education from a former postmaster, we know that the United
Speaker 6: States Postal Service is required by regulation to return those
Speaker 6: ballots marked undeliverable. But they also are required to bill
Speaker 6: for that return. That's not done for free. So almost
Speaker 6: all the counties are supposed to have some kind of
Speaker 6: postal invoicing based on the returns of those undeliverable ballots.
Speaker 6: So when you mentioned thirty thousand in eleven counties in
Speaker 6: twenty twenty two, none of thirty thousand undeliverable ballots, the
Speaker 6: invoicing did not match. Ranged from counties like Denver where
Speaker 6: there were ten thousand out of the like seventeen thousand
Speaker 6: where there were no invoices, and yet they counted those
Speaker 6: as undeliverable, And there were three counties where they were
Speaker 6: built for twelve thousand more undeliverable ballots than they counted.
Speaker 5: Wow.
Speaker 6: So you know, and we are doing this again, doing
Speaker 6: an audit from the twenty twenty four election. Not from
Speaker 6: the standpoint point that we know something's really wrong. We're
Speaker 6: doing it because you can't determine if it's wrong or
Speaker 6: not if you don't have procedures like this to audit,
Speaker 6: to chain a custody.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Bob, That's one thing that I became very aware
Speaker 2: of after doing a lot of research and going through
Speaker 2: this analysis of the Douglas County election in twenty two
Speaker 2: is there is really no outside auditors that come in
Speaker 2: and look at the processes and systems of our elections,
Speaker 2: all of its self governing. Like we saw that with
Speaker 2: the BIOS password, Like she even hired I think a
Speaker 2: law firm that was involved somehow in her race or
Speaker 2: I can't remember, but anyway, it was all like very incestuous.
Speaker 2: And instead of bringing outside experts that know what they're
Speaker 2: doing to come in and look at the machines, look
Speaker 2: at the signature verification process, look at the US Post
Speaker 2: Office process for invoicing ballots, there's none of that. They
Speaker 2: all just kind of watch over themselves, which doesn't work.
Speaker 3: I mean, we'd never do that in the business world.
Speaker 3: Is that accurate?
Speaker 6: That's absolutely accurate, infective any message your listeners say out
Speaker 6: on this. The country should be all over this, citizens
Speaker 6: should be all over These voting systems are very poorly audited.
Speaker 6: In fact, we can absolutely illustrate to the public that
Speaker 6: they would not pass even federal GLO audit standards.
Speaker 2: So, Bob, let me take a break real quick to
Speaker 2: ask you a question. So when we talk about auditing
Speaker 2: and bringing in someone from the outside to look at things,
Speaker 2: I want to talk about who makes those decisions. Because
Speaker 2: we have a lot of Republican county clerks across the state.
Speaker 2: We have the majority of county commissioners that are Republican,
Speaker 2: I think it's about sixty forty the split, and the
Speaker 2: county commissioners hire the county attorney that has a lot
Speaker 2: of say over how things go in the counties. So
Speaker 2: even if the clerk doesn't want to do it, could
Speaker 2: pressuring the county commissioners or asking them to ask their
Speaker 2: attorney and their clerk to do some of these things,
Speaker 2: or bringing outside people. That's not allowed anymore. Because Jenna
Speaker 2: Griswold changed the rules is that correct.
Speaker 6: That's absolutely correct. That was done in twenty twenty one
Speaker 6: when the you know, the angst over the twenty twenty
Speaker 6: election was really high, and they immediately panned outside audits.
Speaker 6: And the citizens should really be upset about this, and
Speaker 6: it is up. This has to be changed with the
Speaker 6: Secretary of State and that the legislature must get on this,
Speaker 6: and that will only occur via a couple of things.
Speaker 6: The first item would be a public needs to understand
Speaker 6: these systems are poorly audited. The second item and thank
Speaker 6: you for having a show to get into this. The
Speaker 6: media needs to cover this.
Speaker 3: It's not you're funny. Maybe Rocky Mountain Voice has covered it.
Speaker 3: I don't know about the others.
Speaker 6: Yeah, And so we've tried to get this in front
Speaker 6: of even conservative streams and and it's not we're screaming
Speaker 6: election fraud. We're screaming the thing isn't properly audited.
Speaker 2: You'd never know, right, That's not too much to ask,
Speaker 2: especially with what's at stake right now, with people's mistrust
Speaker 2: in the elections. I don't think there would be any
Speaker 2: harm in opening up the books, as they say, and
Speaker 2: letting some experts.
Speaker 3: Obviously, in a.
Speaker 2: Secure way evaluate these systems and processes. We saw the
Speaker 2: disconnect in the signature verification process in Mason County where
Speaker 2: three ballots got through that shouldn't have and those voters
Speaker 2: weren't allowed to have their vote count because of that.
Speaker 6: That's a perfect illustration because it's parents I know in
Speaker 6: the entire state. I don't know of any audit that's
Speaker 6: been done on the accuracy of the signature verification system.
Speaker 6: There's no report you can find. So the entire process
Speaker 6: that is used to secure that the voter ID is
Speaker 6: linked to that that ballot, there is no reports on
Speaker 6: how accurate the process is that I know of. If
Speaker 6: someone knows, they ought to call in and let us know.
Speaker 6: But I know of no published report in the accuracy
Speaker 6: of that process.
Speaker 2: Bob, if you're willing to stay after the break, we'd
Speaker 2: love to keep talking to you. If not, I'll keep
Speaker 2: the conversation going and folks can call in at three
Speaker 2: oh three seven one, three eight two five five or
Speaker 2: text Dan to five seven seven three nine and we'll
Speaker 2: engage there.
Speaker 3: But this is really really important information.
Speaker 2: It's not the most fun topic to discuss, but it's
Speaker 2: really critical to in storing ensuring trust in our elections again.
Speaker 2: So this is Hidi Ganall filling in for Dan Caples
Speaker 2: with my guest Bob Cooper.
Speaker 3: Right now. We're going to talk more after the break.
Speaker 3: See you in a minute. Good afternoon.
Speaker 2: It's Heidi Ganall filling in for Dan Caplis, and have
Speaker 2: my friend on Bob Cooper, who's kind of election integrity expert.
Speaker 2: He's done some incredible work over the last couple of years.
Speaker 5: Bob.
Speaker 2: We've talked about the US Post Office and how there's
Speaker 2: some serious issues around reporting undeliverable ballots and just ballots,
Speaker 2: tens of thousands of ballots floating around that no one
Speaker 2: can account for. We've also talked about signature verification and
Speaker 2: how there's really been no analysis of whether the system
Speaker 2: works or not. And I think Jenna Griswold even says, hey,
Speaker 2: if you're looking for the signal, if you're working in
Speaker 2: the election process and you see a signature in your
Speaker 2: fifty one percentage, sure it's right, go for it. Then
Speaker 2: it's okay, which is crazy. And then we've got the
Speaker 2: voter roles that aren't necessarily cleaned up like they were
Speaker 2: supposed to be, even after the Judicial Watch lawsuit. And
Speaker 2: then we've got Jenna Griswold who lied about remote Wi
Speaker 2: Fi access in our voting systems in twenty twenty and
Speaker 2: come to find out there's twelve apparently counties according to
Speaker 2: Matt Crane, the head of the Clerk's Association, that have
Speaker 2: remote access in the voting systems after she said there wasn't.
Speaker 2: And the final straw that we discovered over the last
Speaker 2: couple of years was that the drop boxes are not
Speaker 2: monitored appropriately. The cameras aren't high quality enough, they're not
Speaker 2: pointed in the right direction. We've got four hundred plus
Speaker 2: drop boxes across the state, and the counties typically don't
Speaker 2: evaluate the tape or look to see.
Speaker 3: If anything went wrong.
Speaker 2: So with all that being said, I think you're right,
Speaker 2: and we only have a couple minutes to wrap this up.
Speaker 2: But one of the most important things we can ask
Speaker 2: our county commissioners and our county clerks at our local
Speaker 2: levels is to bring in outside experts to do audits.
Speaker 2: The Secretary of State's going to say, no, she created
Speaker 2: that rule, but someone needs to have the kahunas to
Speaker 2: sue her and say absolutely, we're going to do this.
Speaker 2: And I bet half of Colorado at least would have
Speaker 2: their backs.
Speaker 3: What do you think?
Speaker 6: I think so, I think it's part of it is
Speaker 6: the citizens need to understand this needs to be done,
Speaker 6: and it's not a political issue. It's an issue of
Speaker 6: having a very good, secure voting system with proper audit standards.
Speaker 6: There are none, So you know, this citizen should make
Speaker 6: an issue of this because heney this can be fixed.
Speaker 6: This is not a case of you know, there are
Speaker 6: simple things that could improve it immensely. And having met
Speaker 6: with multiple election officials and county clerks, these are very
Speaker 6: good people. They just are really charged with getting the
Speaker 6: election process done. But they can be a big part
Speaker 6: of a campaign to try and improve the auditing and
Speaker 6: improving chain of custody in demanding it and even if
Speaker 6: going past the Secretary of State in demanding it. So
Speaker 6: I think there's a bunch that can be done here.
Speaker 6: And I just think it's great you're willing to cover
Speaker 6: this well.
Speaker 2: I think it's so important to restore trust in our
Speaker 2: voting systems, in our process, in our vote, and that's
Speaker 2: missing for a lot of America, for a lot of Colorado,
Speaker 2: especially with all the debacles that happened in this latest election,
Speaker 2: and when we came out and did that election integrity
Speaker 2: press conference a couple months before the election, it was
Speaker 2: shocking how even the Republican clerks got mad at me
Speaker 2: and said, you know, I was freaking everyone out. And
Speaker 2: then a couple weeks later, Jenna does her whole bios
Speaker 2: password Lake. Good times here in Colorado, but we can
Speaker 2: fix it. Like Bob said, Bob, thank you for joining us.
Speaker 2: You can learn more at CEO Coloradofair Elections dot org,
Speaker 2: get involved Ceofair Elections dot org, and we'll be back
Speaker 2: right after the break