I’ve been a member of the Republican Party since the day I turned 18 and registered for Selective Service and then registered as a Republican. As a young adult, I had the great fortune to become an adult at the same time Ronald Reagan became president of the United States and set what I believed was a standard for what the Republican Party would stand for for the next 100 years, just as Abraham Lincoln set the standard for the Republican Party at its founding.

Sadly, Reagan’s influence and principles barely made it 30 years before the party of equality, the party of law and order and the party of the Constitution would be taken over by a small group of extremists that care nothing about the rule of law, care nothing about our state and federal Constitutions and would as soon shoot you in the head, metaphorically, if you aren’t 100% in lockstep with them.

This Saturday, the Colorado State GOP Central Committee will vote to adopt a bylaw whereby the ballot of any member not in attendance will go into the pocket of the chairman to be cast by him and for his proposals. The same group of people that have been jumping up and down about alleged ballot manipulation via Dominion are proposing ballot manipulation in the Republucan Central Commitee. They claim such action is necessary because of the “exceptional circumstance” under the Colorado law, whereby political parties need 75% of all of their Central Committee members to vote to opt out of Colorado’s Open primary system.

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This group has never been able to even garner a majority in the Central Committee to opt out of Colorado’s primary, much less the 75% required under Colorado law. So they have devised a plan, a Soviet-style politburo system, where they simply seize control and cast the unused ballots of absent committee members. Then, they will cancel the Republican primary and replace it with assemblies where 99% of Colorado Republicans cannot directly participate.

In other words, the “Party” decides what Republican candidates will appear on the general election ballot. There is a reason why Vladimir Putin is the only names on the ballot in Russia. If you think this sounds like political suicide, you would be right.

So why would they go to such extremes to actually hold a vote to take control of ballots not cast and then mark them for yourself? First is for power, obviously. They would then control every vote outcome in the central committee. The second though is revealed in the last election cycle. The State Assembly put conspiracy theorist Ron Hanks, felony-indicted Tina Peters and the gubernatorial candidate that stated he would pardon her at the top of the ticket. The new GOP chairman, Dave Williams, was a candidate for the 5th Congressional District and was the top-line candidate against solidly conservative U.S. Rep. Doug Lamborn. The presumptive new vice chairman, Todd Watkins, was soundly defeated in the primary for El Paso County Sheriff. All of them lost by double digits in the primary election.

This so infuriated the so-called “grassroots” Republicans they plotted a takeover of first the El Paso County Republican Party and then the state executive committee. They did everything in their power to get those extremist candidates elected and failed miserably. So now they are seeking even more power in order to silence the 900,000 registered Republicans in Colorado that do not participate in caucus and assembly. This cannot be tolerated by any originalist, law-and-order Republican. If successful, the GOP in Colorado will become closer to the party of Stalin than the party of Reagan and Lincoln.

I love the Republican Party and everything it has stood for. That is why I call on every Republican Central Committee Member to reject the Stalinist approach of Dave Williams and encourage our Central Committee members to vote no on the proposed bylaws amendment change this Saturday.

Erik Stone

Teller County Commissioner, former Teller County Republican Chairman

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