Politics & Government

At 9 a.m. today, January 10, at the Colorado State Capitol, attendees of a rally are expected to call for the resignation of Representative Steve Lebsock, a Thornton Democrat accused of sexually harassing at least eleven women, including fellow rep Faith Winter and lobbyist Holly Tarry. The group will be led by Erin Hottenstein, a Fort Collins resident whose petition calling for Lebsock to step down has been signed by more than 32,000 people at this writing.

The local chapter of DxE has drawn attention and ire for trespassing on farms and documenting conditions with videos and virtual-reality cameras. The group is known to rescue — or steal, depending on whom you ask — animals that it feels are in danger.

Although politically engaged folks seem to be at odds over just about everything these days, there’s one thing on which they agree: The current system, in which Republicans and Democrats spend a lot more time arguing than getting things done, is a mess. But Unite Colorado aims to change that, at least here, by way of an ambitious plan to back independent legislators who pledge to put the people’s business in front of endless bickering that accomplishes nothing.

New Census estimates released by Election Data Services show that Colorado’s influence in national elections and in the House of Representatives stands to grow after the 2020 Census.

There were 4,647 individual “contacts” in 2017, or interactions that include, at a minimum, law enforcement telling someone violating the ban to pack their belongings and move to another location. That’s down slightly from the 5,055 contacts in 2016, though still significantly higher than the 972 made in 2013, the first full year the law was enforced.

Though he disbanded his voter fraud commission, Trump continues to insist voting systems across the U.S. are rigged. And states continue to push back on his claim.

Representative Jared Polis will both collect petition signatures and go through the caucus and state assembly to try to become the Democratic candidate in the 2018 gubernatorial race.

For the eleventh straight year, attorney Michael Sawaya has a holiday gift for you: He’ll pay for your ride home on New Year’s Eve. He’ll even pay for Uber and Lyft.

While British prudey-pants party poopers continue to push their petition to ban mutton bustin’ at the National Western Stock Show, we’re surprised they don’t have their knickers in a twist over an event that’s a hallmark of gay rodeos around the country: goat dressing.

Drive around Denver and it’d be hard to tell Bernie Sanders lost. His campaign bumper stickers and posters are still on cars and walls around town, nearly two years after the race.

Who will be Colorado’s 2017 Californian of the Year? That’s not a typo; it’s the latest stunt coming from the Independence Institute, whose president, Jon Caldara, recently penned an essay castigating those who would “change our once liberty-loving state into East California.”

“The beneficial potential, safety, and efficacy of kratom has been discussed, studied, clinically researched and found to be as safe as coffee,” the letter, signed by seventeen lawmakers, states.

From cake to coffee, green roofs to I-70, here are the biggest news stories of the year in Denver.

How one man made a difference to help those experiencing homelessness.

On December 20, a mistrial was declared in the Nevada Bundy case. One of the self-proclaimed judges who advised the Bundys, Bruce Doucette, is among the eight individuals who were arrested in March in Colorado; he’s sentenced for trial on February 26.

In a day and age when ethics in government appears to be in short supply, Colorado Ethics Watch has announced that the organization will be shutting its doors for good at year’s end for budgetary reasons. But CEW director Luis Toro is hopeful that ethics oversight in the state won’t suffer too much as a result.

A Resolution of Disapproval is a legislative procedure used to reverse rulings made by the executive branch.

The ACLU of Colorado has filed a Freedom of Information Act request to obtain more information about how a 64-year-old Iranian man, Kamyar Samimi, died while being held at ICE’s detention center in Aurora on December 2.

A bipartisan group of Colorado lawmakers has assembled six bills for the 2018 legislative session that are intended to address the ongoing opioid crisis. Art Way, senior director of national criminal justice reform strategy for the Drug Policy Alliance, and state director for the DPA’s Colorado office, sees most of these efforts as steps in the right direction. However, he emphasizes that more still needs to be done to truly deal with the issue.

A new poll shows Colorado gubernatorial candidates ahead in hypothetical one-on-one match ups with Republican Tom Tancredo. It also shows Donald Trump’s Colorado approval rating in the mid 30s, and dangerously low among independent voters.

Within an hour of the Federal Communications Commission voting to rescind rules protecting net neutrality on December 14, Colorado Congressman Mike Coffman took to Twitter to voice his disappointment and announce that he’ll be introducing his own bill pertaining to net neutrality in Congress, where the “conversation belongs.” Net neutrality…

On December 16, 2016, the End of Life Options Act, passed by Colorado voters during the previous month’s election, took effect. Two days shy of a year later, Compassion & Choices, the group that led the campaign for the measure, originally known as Proposition 106, estimates that 45-55 terminally ill adults requested prescriptions for medical aid in dying.