Today is Dec. 14, 2023, and here’s what you need to know:

Colorado Republicans plan to vote in early January on whether to give the party’s formal endorsement to Donald Trump’s reelection bid ahead of the state’s Super Tuesday presidential primary in March, GOP officials told Colorado Politics on Wednesday.

Under a proposal introduced last week by former Monument Councilwoman Darcy Schoening, the state GOP would throw its support behind Trump – and call on his primary opponents to withdraw from the race – nearly two months before Colorado voters register their preferences at the ballot box.

While the move would be unprecedented, Colorado Republican Party Chairman Dave Williams said the state party’s prohibition on taking sides in a primary likely doesn’t apply to the presidential nominating process, paving the way for endorsing Trump.

Colorado’s House delegation split along partisan lines Wednesday as Republicans voted to formally authorize an impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden over fierce objections from Democrats, who called the move an act of political retribution.

“It’s time to impeach Joe Biden once and for all,” tweeted U.S. Rep. Lauren Boebert, a Silt Republican and one of the Biden administration’s most persistent critics. “The American people gave us the House to hold him accountable. Let’s get the job done.”

Calling the inquiry “baseless,” U.S. Rep. Joe Neguse, a Lafayette Democrat, countered that the House GOP’s lengthy investigation has yet to turn up any evidence to support removing the president from office.

Nearly a half century ago, a developer in Greeley sold off the lots surrounding W. 11th Street Road. The deeds did not explicitly say what happened to the mineral rights underneath the road.

Decades later, after advances in hydraulic fracturing and horizontal drilling rendered the mineral rights under the road – and other rights-of-way across the state – more accessible and lucrative, the Colorado Supreme Court has been asked to step in.

The question before the justices now is: Who should earn the royalties for drilling under W. 11th Street Road? The property owners on either side? Or the entity that swooped in four years ago to purchase the below-the-surface rights from the original developer?

The federal appeals court based in Denver agreed on Wednesday that a handful of Michigan residents lacked standing to sue Dominion Voting Systems, Inc. solely because they each received a letter asking them to stop making defamatory statements about the election technology supplier.

Dominion, which is headquartered in Colorado, became the subject of election-rigging conspiracies after the 2020 presidential campaign. The company fought back against the damaging allegations – most notably reaching a $787 million settlement with Fox News over the network’s role in amplifying unproven claims that Dominion equipment contributed to Donald Trump’s election loss.

As part of its effort to counter defamation, it sent cease-and-desist letters to a handful of Michigan residents and poll watchers who authored affidavits attesting to alleged election regularities they witnessed at a polling center in Detroit. Dominion took no further action against the recipients of the letters.

Aurora will send out a request for proposals to determine what the financial effects of privatizing its public defender’s office would be following heated debate at Monday’s City Council study session.

The council originally voted to send out the RFP, which would show whether court-appointed defense counsel would be more cost effective than maintaining the city’s public defense office, in October.

Aurora’s chief deputy public defender, two Aurora councilmembers and other officials identified numerous issues with the RFP, saying that, in its current form, it does not fully encompass the public defender’s role or the extra costs that come with privatization of the office.

Proponents of the RFP in its current form pushed for it to go forward so the council can get an analysis of the costs of privatization to decide whether or not they will go forward.