Colorado Democrats are now fewer than 3,000 voters away from overtaking registered Republicans among the state’s active voters. Democrats still outnumber total registered Republican voters in Colorado by about 20,000.
Each month, the Secretary of State releases a data dump of voter registration figures. In July, the report made headlines because registered Democrats outpaced registered Republicans here for the first time in 20 years. The caveat was that there were still about 8,400 more active Republican voters throughout the state than Democrats.
By the end of August that number shrank to about 2,680.
“Active” voters are registered voters who have an address that the Secretary of State’s office can confirm with a mailing; “Inactive” voters include voters who don’t appear to live at the address the state has on record. “Both are eligible to vote,” says Secretary of State spokeswoman Lynn Bartels, but her office can’t send a ballot to an inactive voter because officials know the address is wrong and ballots are not forwardable.
Colorado went to mail-in ballots after a change in state voting laws in 2013. This year will be the first presidential election in Colorado under the new vote-by-mail system.
As of Sept. 1, there are now 1,160,214 registered active and inactive Democrats versus 1,140,173 Republicans, meaning there are about 20,000 more Democrats in Colorado who are eligible to vote than Republicans. Colorado’s largest voting bloc is still unaffiliated voters— to the tune of 1,318,043.
“There’s a reason why the gap in active registered voters is closing— we’ve had our coordinated campaign organizing for months,” says Colorado Democratic Party Chairman Rick Palacio. “We are strong and getting stronger, and we will continue to work to register voters so that come November Colorado helps elect the first woman president, reelects Michael Bennet to the Senate, and takes back seats in the House of Representatives.”
The Colorado GOP remains stoic, with the state party’s spokesman, Kyle Kohli, pointing out there are currently more Republicans who will get ballots in the mail than Democrats.
“Additionally, we feel very confident about appealing to unaffiliated voters considering the response we have seen at Trump rallies and events,” he said. “A significant amount of the voter registrations and volunteer recruitments at these events are first timers.”
The general election is Nov. 8.
Voters in Colorado have the opportunity to vote entirely by mail if they choose, and ballot goes out Oct. 17. Colorado also has same-day registration, meaning voters can register and vote on Election Day if they aren’t already signed up. To register to vote or to update your registration, click here.
Photo by beeveephoto for Creative Commons on Flickr.
Cleaning out the graveyards, eh?
This Administration is Essentially “Hiring” people to register as Democrat & vote ‘Party Ticket” is not the principles the U.S.A was founded on. Do the right thing- say no to “bribes”. And confront people here “illegally” to also start the Legal process if they want to live/work here. I had to do it in Central/South America- so should they.