Two proposed November ballot initiatives funded by deep pockets in the Denver business sector are making troublesome claims about Colorado having “1.3 million disenfranchised voters.” If true, this is a national civil rights scandal!

Who are these alleged victims of discrimination? They are Colorado’s unaffiliated registered voters, the 34 percent of active registered voters who have chosen to not affiliate with one of Colorado’s five recognized political parties.

Those Colorado voters are being called “disenfranchised” because they cannot vote in the June Democrat or Republican primary, only in the November general election – you know, the election that actually elects people to public office, not just nominates them. Yes, you heard that right. Over a million registered voters are being denied the right to vote in someone else’s primary election. An advocacy organization called Let Colorado Vote is gearing up for a November ballot initiative campaign to provide a remedy for this alleged oversight.

The number of unaffiliated voters is indeed growing. As of June 1, the 1,020,443 active unaffiliated voters are 34.1 percent of all registered voters and outnumber both Democrats (32.0 percent) and Republicans (32.5 percent). Minor parties like the Libertarians and Greens make up the remaining 1.4 percent.

If we want to inflate the number, we can add the 279,099 inactive unaffiliated voters – individuals classified as Inactive by the Secretary of State because they had their mailed ballots returned by the U.S. Postal Service. That would bring the unaffiliated total to 1.3 million in round numbers, which is the inflated number the people at Let Colorado Vote want to use. They also like to claim unaffiliated are 37 percent of the electorate, not 34 percent, by adding into the mix not only the Inactive voters but also 32,000 “preregistered” voters, people who will not be eligible to vote until their 18th birthday.

Are those one million unaffiliated voters – 34.1 percent of the total – “disenfranchised” in any legitimate, common sense meaning of that term? If they are, then Libertarians are equally disenfranchised from voting in the Republican primary and Greens are being disenfranchised in the Democrat primary. Really? Let’s get serious: you aren’t being denied a right if you never possessed that right in the first place.

A skeptic might suggest that invoking “disenfranchisement” is a way to suggest a moral parallel between unaffiliated voters and oppressed minority voters before passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965. While that parallel is preposterous, even insulting, on its face, it works well if your goal is to sow confusion.

Unaffiliated voters do, of course, vote in Colorado’s general elections. Yet, how many of them are exercising that right compared to voters affiliated as Democrats, Republicans, Greens and Libertarians?

? In the most recent general election in 2014, unaffiliated voters had the lowest turnout of any group – lower than Greens, Libertarians, Democrats, Republicans or American Constitutionalists.

? In 2014, if you look at the turnout of all registered voters, 67.7 percent of registered Republicans went to the polls along with 59.1 percent of Democrats. Yet, only 45.1 percent of unaffiliated voters found the time to fulfill that civic duty.

Unaffiliated voters already have a way to vote in a political party primary without any change in the law. Any unaffiliated voter can walk into a voting center on Election Day and change their registration (or can do it online and request a mailed ballot up to 8 days ahead of the election) and then cast a ballot in any political party’s primary election. They can then change their registration back to unaffiliated the same day if they wish.

Again, where is the “disenfranchisement”? In fact, the unaffiliated have a right that Democrats and Republicans do not have. A voter affiliated with any party must decide at least 29 days in advance if they want to change affiliation and vote in a different primary. The unaffiliated can change their affiliation even on Election Day.

A political party – whether Democrat, Republican, Green or whatever – is a private association with a voluntary membership. Any eligible voter can join any political party and vote in that party’s June primary election. In Colorado, 66 percent of active registered voters have made that choice. Or, a voter can choose to be unaffiliated (“independent”) and voluntarily forego participation in a party primary election, as 34 percent of Colorado’s active registered voters have done. That’s freedom of choice and freedom of association, and that’s the American way.