“I am leaving the Republican Party. Colorado GOP leaders have made abundantly clear that theirs is the party of conspiracy mongering and petty bigotry. The state party is not serious about winning elections or helping to guide policy. Enough.”
That’s what I Tweeted yesterday. The message had some resonance, with my Tweet getting 176 retweets, 1,645 likes, and 216K views as of 1 pm today (Sunday).
Other Coloradans who used to be active with the GOP are similarly irritated.
Radio host Mandy Connell remarked:
With the election of David Williams as Chair of the Colorado GOP, I will be changing my party affiliation on Monday. I won’t be associated with this dumpster fire anymore. Independent, here I come.
Radio host Ross Kaminsky said:
I’m guessing that most people who aren’t actively political or on Twitter . . . might not learn about the suicide of the [Colorado GOP]. But, folks, if you are a Colorado Republican, come join me as unaffiliated. Been here for years and the water is fine.
Former Republican legislator Cole Wist wrote, “I thought it [GOP politics] couldn’t get worse. I was wrong.” He added, “To all of the new unaffiliated voters in Colorado, welcome! You’re now a part of our state’s largest voting bloc.”
Former conservative-libertarian publisher Brad Jones wrote, “Welcome, Ari, to the politically-homeless class. The Colorado Libertarian Party has similarly been taken over by crazies.”
Political activist and rancher Kelly Maher wrote, “Man, it’s really something when the institutions you’ve dedicated years of your life to are just obliterated away by weaponized incompetence.”
Republican activists (not to be confused with the average Republican voter) voted in Williams yesterday. Williams is a former legislator who lost a primary for U.S. Congress after trying unsuccessfully to get listed on the ballot as “Dave ‘Let’s Go Brandon’ Williams.” Williams is widely known for his conspiracy mongering about the 2020 presidential election, insisting, “Joe Biden is not a legitimate president.” Tina Peters, who is facing criminal charges stemming from her time as Mesa County Clerk and who is herself a major promoter of election conspiracies, endorsed Williams after failing to take the lead in the race for chair. Williams beat out other conspiracy mongers, including Erik Aadland, who lost a bid for Congress after insisting the 2020 election was “absolutely rigged.” See coverage by the Denver Post, CPR News, the Colorado Sun, Colorado Politics, Axios, and Erik Maulbetsch.
With the election of Williams, Colorado Republican activists have made clear that they are far more interested in conspiracy mongering and (metaphorical) bomb throwing than in seriously seeking to guide Colorado politics for the well-being of the people who live here. Colorado Republicans are again doubling down on Trumpism even after Colorado voters have repeatedly indicated that they want none of it.
A larger problem is that election rules strongly favor a two-party system, and there is no other viable party to step in to fill the void left by Republican disintegration. (See my proposed solution to these dumb and unjust election rules.) Hence, the legislature has taken a hard-left turn with only the “libertarian” Democratic-progressive governor Jared Polis left to stand up for sensible policy.
I kept hoping that, following the crazy years of Donald Trump, Steve Bannon, and Roger Stone, Republicans eventually would come to their senses, reject conspiracy mongering, and embrace reality. They have not done so (again, talking about the activists who drive the party).
Right now I am leaning toward going unaffiliated. Colorado has semi-open primaries, which give unaffiliated voters quite a lot of sway. (I don’t think those are the best rules, but I didn’t write them, and at this point all I can do is play the hand dealt to me.)
I have also suggested that Colorado liberty activists join the Democrats and create something like a Democratic Liberty Caucus. I still think that’s a good idea. I just don’t think I want to do it, mainly because I’d be tempted to spend a great deal of time with the project. I have plenty of other things on my plate.
Here is a brief review of my party affiliations. My family has a long history in Republican politics, so I became a Republican as soon as I could vote, in the late 1980s (the George H. W. Bush era). But, as a fan of the work of people such as Milton Friedman and Ayn Rand, I also developed a strong libertarian side, and I became very active in the state Libertarian Party in the early 2000s. In 2002, the LP ran Rick Stanley for U.S. Senate. Stanley promoted racist and violent rhetoric, and eventually he went to prison for threatening a judge. In many ways, Stanley anticipated Trumpist Republicanism and the (misnamed) “Mises Caucus” style of Libertarian politics. More than anything else, that experience turned me off of Libertarian politics, and eventually I left the party to become unaffiliated. I joined the Republican Party in the lead-up to the 2016 presidential election specifically to try to keep Trump out of office through the primaries. That effort failed, obviously. I stayed in the party in the hope of helping to recapture it from the Trumpist crazies. Now, it seems clear, that effort also has failed.
For now, then, I am politically homeless. To flip Reagan’s remark, I didn’t leave the Republican Party; the Republican Party left me. It also has left any semblance of sanity or decency.
Image: Kalyanvarma