Voters Decide Future of Ranked Choice Voting

Voters in Western states and the District of Columbia voted on some form of ranked choice voting or “jungle primaries” that includes ranking the final candidates in the general election.

Voters in Nevada, a battleground state in the presidential race, rejected Question 3, according to Ballotpedia. This was a ballot measure that would have moved the state to a “top five” primary if approved. That means up to five at-large primary candidates would compete in a ranked choice voting general election.

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Blue States Succeed in Stripping Defunct Definitions of Marriage from the Books

Gay Marriage

California and Colorado have successfully stripped definitions of marriage from state law, repealing same-sex marriage bans that have not been in effect for nearly a decade.

Californians are poised to pass Proposition 3, according to the New York Times, guaranteeing a constitutional right to marriage between same-sex couples and striking down Proposition 8, a previous law passed in 2010 banning same-sex marriage in the state. Colorado is poised to pass Amendment J, according to the NYT, striking similar language from the state’s constitution prohibiting the act.

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Colorado Election Officials Find at Least a Dozen Fraudulent Ballots Cast in 2024 Early Voting

Colorado Fake Ballots

Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold on Thursday announced that at least a dozen mail ballots have been stolen, filled out, and sent in so far in the 2024 general election.

The blue-leaning state has been sending mail-in ballots to every registered voter for years, and has served as an example for other liberal states during the COVID-19 pandemic, according to NBC News. 

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New York City Residents on Edge as Tren De Aragua Gangsters Terrorize City

New York Coty Mayor Eric Adams with NYPD officers

Tren de Aragua (TdA)-associated gangsters as young as 11-years-old are wreaking havoc on Times Square out of a migrant shelter in New York City, and they’re getting away with it, sources told the New York Post.

Around 20 migrants in the TdA-associated gang called “Los Diablos de la 42” are robbing residents and tourists in New York City neighborhoods while avoiding jail time due to their young age, sources in the New York Police Department (NYPD) told the New York Post Monday. TdA has gained notoriety in the United States after multiple reports emerged this year of their activities in major U.S. cities such as Aurora, Colorado, and El Paso, Texas.

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Colorado Senator Seeking Reelection Vows to Retire After a Second Term

John Hickenlooper

Democratic Senator John Hickenlooper of Colorado announced on Wednesday that he will retire after serving a potential second term, according to Punchbowl News.

The 72-year-old freshman senator said that he plans to seek reelection in 2026, but has vowed to make this potential second term his last, Punchbowl reported. Hickenlooper previously served as the mayor of Denver from 2003 to 2011 and the governor of Colorado from 2011 to 2019 before stepping into the Senate in 2021.

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Colorado Jury Unanimously Finds Tina Peters Guilty on Seven of 10 Counts

Tina Peters

The trial of former Mesa County Clerk and Recorder Tina Peters ended on Monday, with the jury unanimously finding her guilty of seven of the 10 counts she was charged with. Peters was prosecuted in relation to backing up an election server since she said she believed that a scheduled upgrade of the election software would override election files that were required to be saved for 22-25 months by federal and state law, and she was concerned there was election fraud in the 2020 and 2021 elections.

After deliberating for around three hours, the jury found Peters guilty on three counts of attempting to influence a public servant, official misconduct, violation of a duty, failure to comply with requirements from the Colorado Secretary of State (COSOS), and conspiracy to commit criminal impersonation. She was found not guilty on another count of conspiracy to commit criminal impersonation, criminal impersonation, and identity theft.

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In Mesa County, Colorado Clerk Trial, Prosecution’s Partisan Witness Sobs, Other Witnesses Backtrack

Stephanie Wenholz testifies

The third fully live streamed day of the trial against former Mesa County Clerk and Recorder Tina Peters featured testimony from a partisan election employee who sobbed for about five minutes while speaking, as well as backtracking from other witnesses when cross-examined by Peters’ attorney. Peters is being prosecuted for her role in attempting to take a video of a software update on Dominion voting machines. She was concerned that overriding the election files with the upgrade would violate both state and federal law requiring retention of files for 22-25 months. 

Stephanie Wenholz, the elections manager for Mesa County, broke down in tears when asked about the day she found out that the Colorado Secretary of State’s (COSOS) office was investigating Mesa County over the incident. Although Wenholz admitted that Peters instructed employees not to speak with law enforcement, but to direct them to her and her attorneys instead, Wenholz said she contacted Detective James Cannon, the chief investigator for the Mesa County District Attorney. 

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Prosecution’s Key Witness in Trial Against Former Mesa County Clerk Repeatedly Claims He Doesn’t Remember Much

The trial against former Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters wrapped up its first week on Friday, featuring testimony by witnesses for the prosecution including IT professional Gerald Wood. Peters, who is charged with crimes related to making a copy of an election database since she was concerned that not keeping the files for two years would violate the law, hired Wood to help her with technical issues, but Wood repeatedly stated he couldn’t remember much when her attorney cross-examined him. 

Wood, who ended up not performing any work for Peters, spent much of his time on the witness stand distancing himself from the appearance that he was involved with Peters bringing in an outside IT expert to observe an upgrade of the Dominion voting machine software, since prosecutors alleged that a leak of computer bios passwords took place after IT expert Conan Hayes allegedly used Wood’s key card to enter the area where the upgrade was performed.

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First Two Prosecution Witnesses in Trial of Former Colorado Elections Clerk Referred Disparagingly to Conservative News Site

The trial against former Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters over her efforts combating election fraud began this past week where two witnesses for the prosecution testified all day made disparaging remarks about The Gateway Pundit, a conservative news site.

The prosecution’s first witness, James Cannon, who identified himself as the chief investigator for the Mesa County District Attorney, said The Pundit was “a conspiracy site.” The prosecution’s second witness, Jesse Romero, who described himself as the voting systems manager for the Colorado Secretary of State’s (COSOS) Elections Division, said the news site posted an article with a “bombastic title.”

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Trial of Former Colorado County Clerk Tina Peters for Exposing Election Discrepancies with Voting Machines Starts Next Week

Tina Peters

The trial against a former Colorado elections clerk over her efforts combating election fraud is set to begin on Monday.

Tina Peters, who served as Mesa County Clerk and Recorder from January 2019 to January 2023, is being prosecuted by the Colorado Attorney General’s Office on seven charges, including felonies, related to alleged election tampering, official misconduct, and attempting to influence public servants in 2021. She is accused of allowing an unauthorized third party to make copies of voting machine hard drives, which led to “confidential digital images” of Dominion Voting Systems property and passwords to be “published on the internet,” prosecutors asserted.

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A Nation Enriched by Legal Immigrants Now Buckles from Weight of Illegal Border Crossers and their Crimes

A nursing student bludgeoned to death near a tranquil Georgia college campus. A developmentally disabled person raped in Boston. A mother and son killed in a head-on crash in Colorado. New York’s finest assaulted in the heralded Times Square.

The roll-call of victims violated by Joe Biden’s border policies is rising as fast as the hotel and welfare tabs for sanctuary cities, thrusting an American society that long revered its immigrant heritage into a crisis of epic proportions driven by more than 8 million illegal border crossers since the 46th president took office.

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Trans Activists May Have Found a Backdoor to Force Hospitals to Provide Sex-Change Surgeries

Surgery Doctors

A lawsuit filed against a hospital for not providing transgender medical procedures could signal a new approach for LGBTQ activists to try to force medical professionals to affirm gender transitions, legal experts told the Daily Caller News Foundation.

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) filed a lawsuit on Feb. 14 on behalf of 18-year-old Caden Kent, a biological female patient identifying as transgender, arguing that the hospital’s policy violated the state’s anti-discrimination law by not providing a sex-change mastectomy. Legal experts who spoke to the DCNF said this argument may come up in more cases as hospitals are penalized for refusing to provide sex-change procedures, and may make it as high as the Supreme Court in time.

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Supreme Court Justices Appear Skeptical of Removal of Trump from Colorado Ballot Under Insurrection Clause

Trump Supreme Court

Supreme Court justices on Thursday appeared skeptical during oral arguments of Colorado plaintiffs’ assertions that former President Donald Trump should be kept off of the state’s ballot for president.

The justices focused on the consequences of allowing Colorado to remove former President Donald Trump during oral arguments on Thursday, pressing the Colorado plaintiffs’ attorney on the issues that could occur across the country. 

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Commentary: Trump’s Ballot Disqualification Case Reaches Supreme Court

In what may turn out to be the most pivotal election case since Bush v. Gore, the U.S. Supreme Court issued a short order on Jan. 5 granting the request by former President Donald Trump asking the court to overturn the Colorado state Supreme Court’s Dec. 19 decision disqualifying him from appearing on the state’s presidential primary ballot. The U.S. Supreme Court moved with unprecedented speed; Trump filed his petition for certiorari on Jan. 3, and the court granted the appeal only two days later.

The case has been put on what, for the Supreme Court, is a “rocket docket.” Trump’s brief and any amicus briefs supporting the former president in Trump v. Anderson have to be filed by Jan. 18; the challengers’ brief and amicus briefs supporting Trump’s removal have to be filed by Jan. 31. Trump’s reply brief is due on Feb. 5, and oral arguments will be held on Feb. 8. 

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Republicans Threaten to Remove Biden from 2024 Ballot, Mirroring Efforts to Jettison Trump

Biden Voting

Republicans are calling for President Joe Biden to be removed from the 2024 primary ballot as former President Donald Trump is facing challenges to remove him from ballots in multiple states.

As challenges are brought to disqualify Trump from 2024 GOP primary ballots in more than 30 states for allegedly instigating an insurrection on Jan. 6, 2021, Republicans are suggesting that Biden should be removed from the ballot in response, but because of the increased volume of illegal immigrants entering the U.S. through the southern border.

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Commentary: Trump Should Love the Colorado Ruling

Trump Colorado Supreme Court

The Colorado Supreme Court, acting as supplicants for the enemies of Donald Trump seeking the most extreme remedy for driving the former president into the ditch, may have just unwittingly gifted the former president a Rocky Mountain high – in the polls. 

This time, four left-wing Colorado justices attempting to kneecap Trump were not even going to wait on due process – the very foundation of law – to effectively declare Trump guilty of insurrection, a crime for which he has not, repeat not, even been charged. After believing their attempts to wipe Trump off the ballot would be a knockout punch, it is the left that is about to get walloped to the canvas with a right hook. 

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Ranchers Suing Colorado, Federal Agencies over Wolf Reintroduction

A pair of trade groups representing Colorado ranchers are suing state and federal wildlife agencies to delay reintroducing gray wolves to the Western Slope. 

The lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court by the Colorado Cattlemen’s Association and Gunnison County Stockgrowers Association, comes before the state’s deadline to reintroduce gray wolves by the end of this year.  

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Report: Mountain States Among ‘Most Free’ in North America

Mountain states rank among the “most free” in North America, according to a new report from the Fraser Institute.

The Canadian think tank employs 10 variables for its Economic Freedom of North America 2023 reports and scores states based on categories such as government spending, taxes, labor market freedom, legal system and property rights, sound money, and freedom to trade internationally.

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Commentary: Ken Buck Is Wrong About the J6 Defendants

U.S. Representative Ken Buck’s big wet sloppy kiss to Attorney General Merrick Garland last week could not have come at worse time for the Colorado Republican.

Judge Timothy J. Kelly of the federal court in Washington, D.C. was in the process of ordering prison time typically applied to murderers, drug traffickers, and serial child pornographers for five members of the Proud Boys convicted of no serious crime related to January 6. A well-known gun storage company faced backlash for assisting the FBI in yet another armed raid against a January 6 trespasser. And a young man from Utah took his own life just weeks after his arrest on four misdemeanors for his participation in January 6, at least the fourth known suicide of a Capitol protester.

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States with Weaker Marijuana Laws See More Impaired Driving, Report Finds

A new report found that states with less restrictive marijuana policies have higher incidents of residents driving while high.

The Drug Free America Foundation released a new report showing that states that have legalized or weakened restrictions around high-THC marijuana, either for medical or recreational use, saw 32% more marijuana-impaired driving than states that have not adopted the same policies.

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Governments Across America Spend Millions to Put Homeless in Hotels

In states like California, Colorado, Washington and Arizona, cities this summer are spending millions buying hotels and converting them to shelters for the homeless.

In Los Angeles, there is a ballot initiative in 2024 to require hotels to use vacant rooms to house homeless people besides paying customers. The American Hotel & Lodging Association has objected to the proposal.

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Texas Sends First Bus of Illegal Border Crossers to Los Angeles

A bus of foreign nationals who illegally entered Texas and were apprehended and released by the Biden administration were taken to Los Angeles for the first time, Gov. Greg Abbott said. They were dropped off at the Los Angeles Union Station Wednesday evening.

“Texas’ small border towns remain overwhelmed and overrun by the thousands of people illegally crossing into Texas from Mexico because of President Biden’s refusal to secure the border,” Abbott said. “Los Angeles is a major city that migrants seek to go to, particularly now that its city leaders approved its self-declared sanctuary city status. Our border communities are on the frontlines of President Biden’s border crisis, and Texas will continue providing this much-needed relief until he steps up to do his job and secure the border.”

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Drug Manufacturers, CVS, Walgreens Settle Another Opioid Lawsuit with 22 States for $17.3 Billion

Thirteen attorneys general announced settlements with opioid manufacturers Teva and Allergan on Friday, while 18 states settled with CVS and Walgreens for a total of $17.3 billion.

The attorneys general said settlement funds will start flowing into state and local governments by the end of this year and will be used for prevention and treatment of opioid addiction.

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Report: Colorado’s 32 Percent Increase in Crime Due to Changes in Prosecutions, Sentences

The crime rate in Colorado increased 32 percent from 2010 to 2022, a new report from a research group says.

The Common Sense Institute’s report, titled “The Fight Against Crime in Colorado: Policing, Legislation and Incarceration,” found the cost of crime in the state was nearly $30 billion in 2022. The cost of crime in Denver was $4 billion and $2.7 billion in Colorado Springs.

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State Senate DFLers Vote to Abandon Electoral College for National Popular Vote

DFLers in the Minnesota House and Senate voted this month to transform American presidential elections by abandoning the Electoral College.

The Senate voted along party lines, 34-33, on Wednesday to pass an elections omnibus policy bill that includes a provision that would have Minnesota award its presidential electors to the candidate with the most votes nationwide. Republicans unsuccessfully tried to remove that language from the bill.

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Advocates Warn of ‘Desperate’ Movement to Undermine the Electoral College

An organization’s efforts to circumvent states’ rights are “getting desperate” as they try new ways to push their interstate compact through state legislatures, two pro-Electoral College advocacy groups told the Daily Caller News Foundation.

The National Popular Vote (NPV) is a group initiative to reform the U.S.’ two-step, Electoral College system by ensuring that the candidate with the most popular votes nationwide becomes the president. Now that NPV has enacted its interstate compact in all of the “easy,” bluer states as a standalone bill, it is getting creative to force the law through in swing states like Minnesota, Nevada, Michigan and Maine, Trent England of Save Our States and Jasper Hendricks of Democrats for the Electoral College told the DCNF.

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Supreme Court Declines to Hear Energy Companies’ Appeals to Climate Damage Lawsuits

The Supreme Court declined Monday to hear local governments’ climate damage lawsuits against energy companies on Monday.

The companies, who localities want to hold financially accountable for burning fossil fuels they allege damaged the climate, appealed their cases to the Supreme Court, asking it to weigh in on whether the claims should be heard in state or federal courts. The Court’s decision benefits the environmental activists behind the lawsuits, who prefer the matter to play out in state courts, where judges may be more inclined to rule in their favor, experts previously told the Daily Caller News Foundation.

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Colorado Authorities Arrest 19 Year-Old Transgender Suspect for Alleged Attempt to Commit School Shootings

Colorado authorities have arrested a 19-year-old man who identifies as a woman for allegedly planning to shoot up multiple schools in the Colorado Springs area.

The 18th Judicial District Attorney’s Office filed formal charges Thursday against William Whitworth, who calls himself “Lilly Whitworth,” who allegedly planned to shoot up multiple schools in the Academy School District 20 (ASD20), Fox21 News reported.

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Sinema Leans on California to Join Colorado River Water Pact

As six states wait for California to join its Colorado River Basin water use agreement, Arizona Sen. Kyrsten Sinema called on the state to be willing to seal the deal.

In a letter to the U.S. Department of the Interior’s Bureau of Reclamation on Tuesday, Arizona, Nevada, Wyoming, New Mexico, Utah, and Colorado all agreed to work toward finding the best way to distribute the water source, which is facing drought conditions, but California was the missing signature.

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Democratic Senator’s Wife Counsels ‘Strategic Ways’ to ‘Quietly’ Defund Police Without Backlash

Susan Daggett, an attorney and wife of Colorado Democratic Sen. Michael Bennet, said in a video obtained by Just the News that there is a way to “quietly” defund police by reallocating funds and she hopes President Biden doesn’t run for reelection in 2024.

Daggett, law professor at the University of Denver’s Sturm College of Law, was asked if President Biden should run for reelection in the undercover video, released by the media watchdog group Accuracy in Media.

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Congressional Republicans Deploy Election Observers to Watch Tight Races, Investigate Irregularities

Determined to use their oversight authority to ensure election integrity, House Republicans are deploying dozens of trained observers to key races around the country while dispatching letters putting federal and state officials on notice to look for any shenanigans in the midterms.

The effort led by Rep. Rodney Davis, the top Republican on the House Administration Committee, includes investigating how federal agencies are implementing President Joe Biden’s executive order instructing the U.S. government to expand voter registration, along with the training and deployment of House staff as observers under the authority of Congress.

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