Twenty Years Ago This Week: Attorney General Ken Salazar filed charges against John Samuel MaCarthy, a former employee of voter registration business Choose 2 Vote.

The charges stemmed from an ongoing investigation involving District Attorneys Bill Ritter, Jim Peters, and Bob Grant as well as the secretary of state’s office into allegations of fraudulent voter registration activity.

MaCarthy was charged with four counts of forgery, a Class 5 felony, and one count of procuring false registration, a misdemeanor. The state’s affidavit alleged that MaCarthy had forged voter registration documents or falsely registered residents in Arapahoe and Jefferson Counties with “the intent to defraud his employer.”

Because the secretary of state’s office had followed up on an initial referral of 59 allegedly false documents, prosecutors discovered and intercepted 48 false registration documents before they had been processed.

McCarthy was already in the custody of the Denver County Jail on unrelated charges.

Ten Years Ago: In one of the most hotly-contested congressional races in the country, incumbent Republican U.S. Rep. Mike Coffman and Democrat Andrew Romanoff spent a long evening locked in debate.

Coffman spoke first in the 6th Congressional District debate, saying he was committed to finding solutions, to working across the aisle and that if “…every district were as evenly divided as Colorado’s 6th Congressional District, Congress would be a much more productive institution, because it would actually force members… to work to get things done.”

But during discussion of campaign finance Coffman said to Romanoff, “You went to Harvard and Yale, I went to the Army and Marine Corps. There’s a difference there.”

Audible gasps were heard from the audience but Romanoff said stoutly, “I’m glad I was able to get a good education, an I’m running for Congress because I want to make it possible for every student in America to get a good education.”

Romanoff also stated that he had tremendous respect for Coffman and asked that everyone involved with his campaign “treat you [Coffman] with the same respect as well.”

Romanoff then pivoted to his own pledge not to take contributions from political action committees and challenged Coffman to join him “right now here on this stage in turning down contributions from special-interest groups … We can lead, we can make national news right now.”

But Coffman resisted being drawn in, responding, “I think everybody in here is a special interest somehow. The difference is; I lead and you follow. People decide whether to support me based on what I do. I think, for you it’s different.”

Even as the debate turned toward immigration reform, a touchy issue in the 6th CD with nearly 20% of residents Hispanic.

Coffman made the argument for a step-by-step approach for a broken system and touted his own bill that would allow “young immigrants brought into the country illegally the chance to advance toward citizenship by serving in the military.”

“That would be fine,” Coffman argued, “if Congress were willing to take a single step. It’s been more than a year since the Senate passed bipartisan comprehensive immigration reform legislation. If you oppose the bipartisan plan passed by the Senate then you’ve got to identify a comprehensive plan you do support.”

Perhaps the sharpest barb came after the debate regarding Romanoff’s refusal to take a side regarding the Keystone XL pipeline because its route was the subject of a court case.

“This exposed Andrew Romanoff for what he is — super slick, super weak, and super out of touch with his working class district,” Coffman’s campaign wrote in an email. “Romanoff hides. Coffman leads.”

Rachael Wright is the author of the Captain Savva Mystery series, with degrees in Political Science and History from Colorado Mesa University, and is a contributing writer to Colorado Politics and The Colorado Springs Gazette.