From: Joy Overbeck <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.;
Sent: Wednesday, September 8, 2021 9:17 PM
Subject: The top 4 reasons opting-out will cost us elections, not win them
The top 4 reasons opting-out will cost us elections, not win them
1. Winning elections is a numbers game. Unaffiliateds are a larger group than either Democrats or Republicans, numbering about 1.7 million Colorado voters, while Republicans are only about 1 million. Reliable data says about 40% of the Unaffiliateds vote Republican in the primary and about 60% vote Democrat. These 680,000 Republican-leaners have what they consider good reasons to leave the Party, or maybe never to have joined it, but they can still vote in the Republican primary. It’s important to understand that if they vote in the Republican primary, they are probably more likely to vote Republican in the general because they’re already invested in our Party. We absolutely need all of their votes we can get! But if we opt out, our Party, for which they have little affection anyway, will deny them their current right to vote in the primary unless they register as Republicans. Some – certainly the Democrats – may call this disenfranchisement. The opt-out group thinks the U’s whose votes have been cancelled will joyfully scamper to register in the Party they have rejected in exchange for the great favor of maybe being allowed to vote in a closed assembly Republican primary. BUT they can ALREADY vote Republican in the open primary now. So is it more likely that, given their independent spirit, they will resent these high-handed tactics to force them to register, and become even more disgusted with Republicans and less likely to vote for them? And how can we call ourselves the Party of freedom when coercion is so obviously in play here?
2. If the opt-out succeeds, those 1.7 million Unaffiliated voters will receive only the Democrat primary ballot. They will get NO Republican ballot whatsoever with any Republican candidates up and down the ticket. NO Republican candidates - from county commissioner and sheriff races all the way up to senator and governor. Only Democrats and maybe a couple of minor party candidates will appear on their primary ballot. The Republican party will have simply vanished. Is deserting the playing field and leaving it wide open to the rival team a realistic way to grow the Party – or is it a really good way to lose more elections?
3. The opt-outters contend we are losing elections because of the open primary. But we’ve been losing elections and thousands of registered Republican voters long before the open primary took effect in the 2018 Midterms, in fact ever since the Gang of Four Democrat millionaires began their virulent campaign, known as The Blueprint, to turn Colorado blue. It’s an error in logic to consider a matter of apparent correlation, actual causation. Quoting George Brauchler in his Denver Post op-ed: “The notion that Republicans’ lack of electoral success since 2018 in Colorado is attributable to open primaries and all of the conspiracy theories that flow from them is contrary to facts. Both major parties have lost voter share since well before the era of open primaries. From 2010 to 2016, Republican’s share of registered voters tumbled six points from 38% to 32%. Over that same period, unaffiliated voters grew by … six points up to 35%. Since the adoption of open primaries, the GOP has lost another six points down to 26%. Democrats have dropped to 29% over the same period. The trend towards voters choosing free agency over team affiliation long pre-dates open primaries.”
4. Rep. Dave Williams and others, in their multitudinous letters urging opting out, insist “Every Republican who wants to vote will be given an opportunity to vote…” But the Open Primary Proposition 108 later became SB 17-305, which states that if a Party opts out, primary nominations can only take place at “assemblies or conventions.” There are just over 1 million registered Republicans in Colorado. Does Rep. Williams and those who echo his talking points think every registered Republican will be able to attend every assembly that must be held for every office in every jurisdiction in the state in order to vote? Every registered Republican can vote now without paying assembly badge fees to finance the meetings, without paying a babysitter, or filling their tanks with expensive gas (thanks Joe!) to drive to numerous assemblies. Also – can we predict what the State health authorities and our Democrat rulers will dictate in future regarding Covid lockdowns for large REPUBLICAN gatherings?
Much of what the opt-outters contend is simply not factual. Opting out will not change the Colorado election financing laws to ban Democrat millionaires like Katharine Murdoch from pouring huge bucks into our primaries to buy elections for their preferred candidates. Opting out will not prevent voter fraud. Opting out also will not stop Republican candidates from mud-slinging in nasty primaries, damaging the eventual winner.
Opting out, according to Douglas County Bonus Member John Fielding, will only “go a very long way toward destroying our party for a very long time.”
I feel I was elected an SCC Bonus Member to represent my fellow Republicans. Although I deplore the open primary law and did not vote for it, I will not vote for a scheme that makes it more difficult for registered Republicans to participate and vote in our primaries. To opt out of the open primary would actually disenfranchise, not only the Republican-leaning Unaffiliateds whose votes we need to win elections, but our own faithful registered Republicans.
Please vote NO on the opt out.
Sincerely,
Joy Overbeck
Conservative activist
Douglas County Precinct 353 Committee Leader
SCC Bonus Member
Townhall and American Thinker columnist
Admin of four conservative Facebook pages
"You're betraying your whole life if you don't say what you think and say it honestly and bluntly." Charles Krauthammer
Twitter @joyoverbeck1