June 01, 2021 10:25 AM UTC
Get More Smarter on Tuesday (June 1)
0 Comments- by: Colorado Pols
One year ago today, then-President Trump ordered peaceful protestors to be tear-gassed so that he could do a photo op with an upside-down Bible. Let’s Get More Smarter; if you think we missed something important, please include the link in the comments below (here’s a good example). If you are more of an audio learner, check out The Get More Smarter Podcast. And don’t forget to find us on Facebook and Twitter.
CORONAVIRUS INFO…
*Colorado Coronavirus info:
CDPHE Coronavirus website
*Daily Coronavirus numbers in Colorado:
http://covid19.colorado.gov
*How you can help in Colorado:
COVRN.com
*Locate a COVID-19 testing site in Colorado:
Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment
*Coloradans can now get a COVID-19 vaccine at one of six locations without a prior appointment.
► Texas Democrats did their part in trying to stop the latest Republican effort to severely restrict voting rights. Now they’re calling on Congress to join the battle, as The Washington Post reports:
Texas Democrats who defeated a Republican effort to pass a suite of new voting restrictions with a dramatic late-night walkout from the state House chamber on Sunday have a message for President Biden and his allies in Congress: If we can protect voting rights, you can, too.
The surprise move by roughly 60 Democratic lawmakers headed off the expected passage of S.B. 7, a voting measure that would have been one of the most stringent in the nation, by denying Republicans a required quorum and forcing them to abruptly adjourn without taking a vote.
The coordinated walkout just after 10:30 p.m. Central time jolted the national debate on voting rights, putting the spotlight on Democratic-backed federal legislation that has been stalled in the Senate all spring, even as state Republicans move to enact new voting rules…
…Republicans control every branch of Texas government and hold firm majorities in both the House and Senate. While Gov. Greg Abbott (R) vowed late Sunday to bring the voting measure back at a special legislative session for redistricting later this year — and threatened to defund the legislature in a tweet on Monday — the walkout represented an unmistakable and shocking defeat for Republican leaders who had assumed the bill would pass ahead of the House’s midnight deadline to finish its 2021 business.
► We’ve seen and heard the conspiracy theories — including from the “MyPillow Guy” — but this is the first time we’ve seen a real reporter confirming that Donald Trump actually buys into this crap. As Maggie Haberman reports for The New York Times, Trump apparently REALLY BELIEVES that he will be “reinstated” as President in August.
► The Denver Post reports on changes to health restrictions related to COVID-19:
Planners of large indoor events will no longer need the state’s approval to host more than 500 people according to a public health order issued Monday by Colorado’s state health department.
The amended order from the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment goes into effect on Tuesday as transmission of COVID-19 and hospitalizations due to the disease level off. The order is scheduled to expire July 1.
“Individuals are encouraged to remain at least 6 feet away from non-household contacts, wash their hands, and wear a face covering to reduce the likelihood of disease transmission,” the order states. “As we continue to combat COVID-19 in our communities, continuing some limited requirements to mitigate disease spread remain appropriate.”
In related news, you may want to double-check that your name is included for a $1 million COVID vaccination award drawing.
► Let’s catch you up on state legislative news…
Colorado Public Radio looks at how Democrats are moving forward with important new programs for Coloradans.
Colorado could become just the third state in the country to pass a data privacy law.
A bill that would give Colorado more power in restricting charter schools was voted down in a committee hearing.
Denver7 ponders what might happen to the 200 bills still on the legislative calendar with less than two weeks left in the 2021 session.
Republican lawmakers call vaccine requirements “discrimination,” because of course they do.
Democrats are working on legislation that could cut the cost of prescription drugs by as much as 40% in Colorado. This includes a bill that would fix a hole in Colorado’s insulin price cap.
Lawmakers are pushing ahead with a bill that would tell HOAs to stop being so damn bossy.
More political (and coronavirus) news is available right after the jump…
And Now, More Words…
► Scott Miller of Vail Daily looks at how Rep. Lauren “Q*Bert” Boebert (R-ifle) is being received by her constituents in CO-03…including a supporter of Boebert who is totally not being coached by Team Boebert or anything.
► As The Colorado Sun reports, the already-messy redistricting/reapportionment process gets more goo thrown into its gears:
Colorado Supreme Court on Tuesday rejected an effort by the General Assembly to make changes to this year’s consequential legislative and congressional redistricting process, ruling that it would be unconstitutional for state lawmakers to get involved.
Legislative leaders introduced a measure, Senate Bill 247, that would have allowed the commissions to use preliminary U.S. Census Bureau data to start their work, among other changes to the map-drawing process. That effort was supported by the governor, attorney general and secretary of state.
The legislation came in response to a monthslong delay in Colorado receiving final population data needed to finish the maps, threatening to derail the deadlines mandated in Amendments Y and Z, the constitutional amendments approved by voters in 2018 to establish Colorado’s independent congressional and legislative redistricting commissions.
It would be unconstitutional for lawmakers to become involved in a process that voters have removed them from, a majority of justices found, and “attempts to direct the actions of the commissions and their nonpartisan staff … would be unconstitutional if enacted.”
The State Supreme Court did clarify one important point by ruling that Amendments Y & Z — which created the current redistricting process — do not require “exclusive use” of final U.S. Census data. Commissioners can thus consult other population data sets in order to inform the drawing of new maps.
In related news, we wrote in this space last week about how Republican cries about “gerrymandering” are just flat-out wrong.
► The New York Times looks into “how the world ran out of everything.”
► As Justin Wingerter reports for The Denver Post, Rep. Joe Neguse (D-Boulderish) is on board with President Biden’s ideas for re-creating a successful program from the past:
On a recent Monday night in Morrison, U.S. Rep. Joe Neguse walked through a former Civilian Conservation Corps camp where, 80 years ago, impoverished young men from across the country came to escape dire unemployment and build Red Rocks Amphitheatre.
“It worked before and it can work again,” the Democrat from Lafayette said of the New Deal-era program, which he and President Joe Biden would like to revive — albeit on a smaller scale and focused on combating climate change.
Neguse’s plan is to empower nonprofits and government agencies to build trails and fences, fight forest fires, remove invasive species and do an array of other work, primarily on public lands. In return, the organizations would receive federal money.
► Jesse Paul of The Colorado Sun looks at how Unaffiliated voters helped get Rep. Lauren “Q*Bert” Boebert into Congress.
► Fatalities in Colorado increased nearly 24% in 2020, thanks largely to COVID-19.
► The Denver Post looks at changes that could alter the landscape in Denver’s 2023 municipal elections.
► Ernest Luning of the publication formerly known as the Colorado Statesman does a Q&A with Jeffco Clerk and Recorder George Stern.
► Denver School Board Member Tay Anderson is stepping away — sort of — from some of his duties amid new sexual assault allegations.
► Vox.com suggests a national “green bank” to finance renewable energy projects.
► As POLITICO reports, Evangelicals are struggling about whether or not they should continue to embrace former President Donald Trump.
Say What, Now?
► In which Rep. Lauren “Q*Bert” Boebert compares vaccine incentives to pedophile kidnappers:
Your Daily Dose Of ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
► Well played:
► Bipartisanship is still possible in Congress…if the subject is UFOs. From The Washington Post:
UFOs — also known as Unidentified Aerial Phenomena, or UAPs, in official parlance — are having their moment in politics, and a bipartisan one at that.
This month, President Biden’s director of national intelligence will release a report containing everything unclassified that the U.S. government knows about UAPs as part of a provision contained in former president Donald Trump’s pandemic relief package.
When the report lands, as early as Tuesday, it will do so in a moment of rare agreement across the ideological spectrum that UAPs are worthy of further study. An increasing number of Democrats and Republicans — from former Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton and former Democratic Senate leader Harry M. Reid to Fox News host Tucker Carlson — have expressed an openness to UAPs, urging the nation’s leaders to investigate the phenomenon.
► Colorado Springs Gazette political reporter Joey Bunch tries very hard to convince you that he doesn’t care about whether elected officials like him or not.
ICYMI
► Longtime Colorado Pols reader/contributor Michael Bowman shares some thoughtful ideas on rural wealth creation.
► Congressman Jason Crow (D-Aurora) calls out Republican Senators for refusing to allow the creation of a commission to examine the January 6 insurrection.
► The 2021 legislative session can’t end soon enough for House Minority Leader Hugh McKean.
► This week on The Get More Smarter Podcast, hosts Jason Bane and Ian Silverii discuss expand on the segment “Legislating With Crayons” to include “Legislating With Lunatics.”
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