Click above to hear my comments, click below on "Read more..." for transcript. From the comments:
"This history of the focus of Colorado’s elections has been trending more and more towards electronics and “ballots” and away from votes that citizens believe will decide the people and issues under which they will be governed..."
Bipartisan Election Advisory Commission Meeting
September 6, 2024, 10:00 AM
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8/30/2024 - Notice (PDF) https://coloradosos.gov/pubs/elections/LawsRules/committeeFiles/20240906BEACNotice.pdf
After the meeting concludes, a recording will be available on our audio broadcasts page here: https://www.coloradosos.gov/pubs/info_center/audioBroadcasts.html. Peg's comments were at the very end of the meeting.
STATE OF COLORADO
Department of State
1700 Broadway, Suite 550
Denver, CO 80290
Comments by Peg Cage, Boulder County
Posted at www.MyColoradoGOP.org
I think it is imperative that the electorate can trust that our voting systems are secret, verifiable, and accurate. In 2004 in Boulder County, Al Kolwicz proved during required testing that they are not and was nearly arrested for that.
In 2012 and 2014, the Republican and American Constitution Party Canvass Board members, the majority in Boulder County, refused to certify the elections because most ballots had been “cast” by mail and the identity and eligibility of the voters were not verifiable.
In 2016, SOS Wayne Willims changed the definition of “ballots cast” and removed the canvass board members’ access to information about electors, focusing instead on the “ballots received” and further removing voters from their elections.
In 2020, election manipulation was found in every step of Colorado’s “Gold Standard” election process. Again, rather than correct the problems, the SOS and other 3-letter agencies went after citizens who found faults in the process.
In 2022, I hosted a debate between Matt Crane, the Executive Director of the Colorado County Clerks Association and Shawn Smith from Cause of America. We were hoping to give Matt a chance to defend Colorado’s “Gold Standard.” Matt told me he would not attend because the “time for debate is over.” Shawn and Jeff Young conducted an informative talk from their point of view on the same live-stream link that had been published for the event. About five minutes into the live-stream, the YouTube channel was shut down, so we moved to the private channel of one of our pastors. The church’s channel never went back online, and years of sermons were lost. Shawn and Jeff’s talk was removed from the pastor’s channel within days.
In 2023, the Colorado County Clerks Association started pushing for legislation to make it a criminal offense for citizen canvass board members to refuse to certify elections.
Now, in 2024, all pretense of a republican form of government is just smoke and mirrors. Tina Peters faces jail time after a trial in which she wasn’t allowed to defend the intent of her actions. Joe Oltman is being required to pay $1,000 per day until he exposes someone for giving him access to a call where the “Dominion guy” said he had made “f-ing sure” that President Trump wouldn’t win. Members of an election integrity group were tried and finally acquitted for having knocked on doors and talked to people about elections.
This history of the focus of Colorado’s elections has been trending more and more towards electronics and “ballots” and away from votes that citizens believe will decide the people and issues under which they will be governed. But now it’s not just the “election deniers” and “grifters” who are warning about the frailty of Colorado’s election. Even the FBI is warning that our “critical infrastructure” is vulnerable to hacking. The recent CrowdStrike attack proved that trusting SCORE to be available during elections is dangerous.
Even the simple process of hosting a zoom webinar is vulnerable, and having the entire state reliant upon electronic pollbooks to conduct elections is dangerous to the integrity of the election.
The solution is to return to elections that a simple volunteer Canvass Board member could actually VERIFY. Meaning, going to constitutional one-day, in-precinct, in-person, on-paper-ballots, with paper poll books and photo voter ID’s, hand-counted at location by bipartisan volunteers.
Colorado has a large population of citizens interested in election integrity who would be willing to share their research and tested processes and help the SOS and County Clerks prepare for that type of election, if those government and NGO entities would be willing to trust the people who supposedly elected them. This would also be a great cost savings for Colorado and allow more funds to be allocated to other critical infrastructure, such as water and the electrical grid.