While losing hurts a lot, the past four weeks have been a great opportunity to spend time with my family, unwind, and do some reflecting on the past year. As a first-time candidate, I learned a number of lessons about the electoral process and wanted to share my thoughts about improvements we can and should make for statewide candidates. These changes will make the process more fair and protect the democratic nature of our elections.

Campaign Finance Reform

Campaign finance in Colorado needs to be reformed. The current maximum contribution limit of $1,150 is too low. While the intent of this very low limit was to restrain the power of big money, in practice it adds to that power, making it possible for only the super rich and those with ties to out of state special interests to be able to raise the money required to have a shot at winning statewide. This is not good for our democratic process.

I propose two changes which the next governor and legislature should enact:

Petition Gathering Reform

In recent years, we’ve faced drama with petition gathering efforts. In just about every cycle, candidates must go to court to get on the ballot. We can make changes which would be better for the campaigns and for the public.

Making changes to our campaign finance and ballot access process will make Colorado elections more fair for future generations.