Colorado Libertarian Party candidate pledge for 2024
As we noted in this space in June, Colorado Republican Party Chairman Dave Williams is trying to build an “alliance” with the Colorado Libertarian Party in an effort to prevent Libertarian candidates becoming “spoilers” in races that Republicans think they might otherwise be able to win. But in creating this alliance, Williams may also be backing some of his own candidates into a difficult corner.
The idea of a Republican/Libertarian alliance stems in part from a belief that Republican Barbara Kirkmeyer might have defeated Democrat Yadira Caraveo in the race for congress in CO-08 were it not for the presence of a Libertarian candidate named Dan Ward on the 2022 ballot. Caraveo defeated Kirkmeyer by a margin of just 1,902 votes, while Ward collected a total of 9,280 votes by himself. It’s certainly possible that Ward voters might have otherwise voted for Kirkmeyer, though it’s equally possible that thousands of of those voters would never have voted for Kirkmeyer in any scenario.
Making this entire scenario even harder to understand is the fact that Williams explicitly said in late June that he would make sure to find another Libertarian candidate in CO-08 if Kirkmeyer made another run at the seat. In other words, Kirkmeyer might have won if a Libertarian candidate had not been on the ballot, but Williams’ Republican Party wouldn’t have wanted Kirkmeyer to win anyway.
Williams is also leading a lawsuit to invalidate Colorado’s “open primary” law — which allows Unaffiliated voters to select a Democratic or Republican primary ballot — because of the belief from his hardcore MAGA base that only REAL Republicans should get to select Republican candidates for a General Election. Don’t try to make sense of this with some sort of logical unified theory — you’ll only develop a migraine.
Regardless, the Republican/Libertarian alliance has now advanced to the “litmus test” stage, as Erik Maulbetsch reports for the Colorado Times Recorder:
The Libertarian Party of Colorado [on Sunday] released pledges it expects Republican candidates to sign in order to prevent a Libertarian candidate from entering their race. There are separate pledges for federal and state candidates.
The first commitment a Republican running for federal office must make: “I will immediately work to pull funding for Ukrainian aid and push aggressively for peace negotiations with Russia.” They must also pledge to “abolish the Department of Education,” as well as “work towards… abolishing U.S. Intelligence agencies.”
The pledges are the result of a negotiation between GOP Chair Dave Williams and Libertarian Chair Hannah Goodman, designed to put forth liberty-minded Republicans who can challenge Democrats without a potential Libertarian spoiler.
Republican Senate candidate Joe O’Dea painted himself into a corner in 2022 even without a Libertarian candidate pledge.
As Maulbetsch notes, there are limits to the efficacy of any Republican/Libertarian agreement, since political parties in Colorado can’t officially prevent one of their members from seeking elected office. In congressional district three, for example, a Libertarian candidate named Mark Ellworth, Jr. filed paperwork recently to challenge incumbent Republican Rep. Lauren Boebert in 2024.
But if you are a Republican planning to seek elected office next year and you would like to have the official support of the Libertarian Party (and, theoretically, no Libertarian opponent), you must abide by some very specific rules:
State candidates must commit to a wide range of positions, some very general and others quite specific. General planks include standard one such as protecting TABOR and gun rights and opposing tax increases. However there are also commitments to “vote to eliminate the income tax,” band red light cameras and “support a version of the Defend the Guard Act,” which prevents national guard troops from being deployed to American military efforts. They must also promise to support “deregulating the medical marketplace,” and “food freedom, such as raw milk and local meat processing,” presumably in conflict with federal health regulations for dairy farmers and ranchers.
Federal candidates also must commit to a trio of very specific positions, namely not opposing presidential pardons for Wikileaks founder Julian Assange, NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden, and Ross Ulbrecht, who founded Silk Road, a dark web marketplace which facilitated drug sales, money laundering and other illegal activities.
State Republican Party Chairman Dave Williams: Making life more complicated for future Republican candidates.
Julian Assange, Edward Snowden, and Ross Ulbrecht? What year is this?
Check out Maulbetsch’s full story to see the complete Libertarian Party pledge list for both Federal and State candidates. Some of these issues mesh well with current Republican ideals, but some will be more difficult. Item #15 on the “State Pledge,” for example (I will introduce or support a version of the Defend the Guard Act), conflicts with Republican claims that the National Guard should be used for border control reasons:.
Some of the Libertarian pledges are flat-out unnecessary. Item #4 on the “State Candidate Pledge for Liberty” states that I will vote against tax increases, which is irrelevant because TABOR makes it impossible for elected officials to vote on tax increases.
Other promises are grammatically confusing, such as #6 on the “Federal Candidate Pledge for Liberty,” which states: I will include auditing the Federal Reserve in your two-year congressional plan. Um, what?
Some questions are also impossibly vague, such as #16 from the “State Pledge”: I will support food freedom, such as raw milk and local meat processing. What does that mean, exactly? Does agreeing to this mean that you are pro-salmonella?
Colorado Republicans have had a difficult time winning elections in the last decade. This won’t help. It’s not at all clear how the Colorado Libertarian Party even could prevent a candidate from running in a specific district, but we’d argue that boxing yourself in by making a bunch of (sometimes conflicting) promises is more harmful than preventing a relatively-small number of votes from a third-party opponent.
Being for raw milk is not necessarily being in favor of salmonella.
Right, it's really much more pro-listeria, pro-e coli, and pro-campylobacter. Salmonella just has the better publicists.
Inclusivity ftw!
What was that shit that gave everyone the shits at Shooters Grill?
perfringens something. V had a lot of fun with that.
https://denvergazette.com/opinion/columns/column-state-gop-dodges-dave-s-bullet-this-time-dick-wadhams/article_d5bf4c20-831e-53bb-b05f-69af2b8e96f8.html
State GOP dodges Dave’s bullet — this time | Dick Wadhams
"Comrade Dave Williams and the Soviet-inspired wing of the Colorado Republican Party had a very bad day….
If Williams was constipated before Wadhams’ piece was published, he ought to be cured now. Wadham’s ripped him at least one new one.
Isn't there more than a little irony in being asked to take a pledge for liberty? How about the freedom to not pledge at all? Or are the Libertarians now all-in for compelled speech when it suits their increasingly myopic view of liberty?
Dick Wadhams certainly scorched Comrade Dave. I think we should do something nice for Dave for single-handedly killing the Colorado Republican Party. I’ll pitch in for a burning bag of poop!
I will vote to make all three-letter agencies four-letter words! _________.
Me sitting here trying to think up agency names that will make acronyms of F&%K and SH$T. 😎
With the Libertarian federal pledge…..”I will abolish the Department of Education……”
I grow weary of these ill-informed clowns who want to abolish the DOE. I will always ask such individuals: “what do you have against people with disabilities?”
DOE includes the Rehabilitation Services Administration, an agency created 40 years ago by Congress to support further education, job retraining, and job placement for people with disabilities. RSA provides 80% of the funding needed to support state vocational rehabilitation agencies. States each provide a 20% match. Money spent on VR returns about triple the amount spent in the form of taxes paid by rehabilitated persons after they return to work.
That Bud Light boycott is severely impacting the Libertarian/Republican Party brain trusts???
"I will abolish the Department of Education……"
Wasn't it Ronald Reagan who started the drive to eliminate the Department of Education in 1980?
"I will oppose a military draft, should the Ukraine-Russia conflict escalate."
What if it doesn't escalate but instead, China takes over Taiwan and starts making threatening noises towards Hawaii?
Is their opposition to conscription only if it involves offending Putin?
To be fair, that pledge is actually a refreshingly actually Libertarian wish list. And reminds us that beyond whining about taxes and regulations, Libertarians actually hold a number of principles that are the opposite of Conservatives. Too bad they didn’t need to put drug deregulation on there to highlight the differences. And of course it is silent about private individual conduct around sex and gender, which ought to be front and center in a comprehensive authentic Libertarian pledge.
It’s an easy target to mock raw milk, but in fact highly intense food production regulation that favors large producers. and the near-monopoly control of meat processing by a couple massive companies is a big deal for small/rural ag producers
I agree that "big ag" is a problem. Raw milk is not an answer. It's a great way to get nasty bacterial infections, which can be fatal.
I'm not disagreeing with you. However, from a Libertarian POV though, raw milk prohibitions are a valid Libertarian policy issue in an ag state. They preempt individuals from making their own informed choices about what to buy and consume, and they make it more difficult for small dairies to exist, or for small farmers to supplement their income with a couple dairy cows.
In any case, what interests me is the cognitive dissonance in a Conservative/Libertarian coalition. Republicans are stuck between their stated interest in deregulation, and their actual allegiance to monopolizing companies.
Very true about the meat processing monopoly. Ask any conservative/libertarian rancher how much they enjoy working under the thumb of the big four (Cargill, Tyson, National Beef & JBS). They pretty much set the market price for cattle and drive small independent ranchers and feedlot operators into insolvency. A little regulation of unfair business practices by the big four might just help them out, but no, we can't have that! Another classic case of working against your own interests…