Our blog post last week discussed Colorado Concern, a group of Colorado businesses, and their lawsuit filed against Governor Polis re: his recent executive order allowing signatures to be printed and mailed in. He granted the Secretary of State the ability to create temporary rules for collection of these signatures. The group believes that the Governor overstepped his authority.
On Wednesday May 27, a Denver District judge ruled in favor of Gov. Polis and against the challenge of his order. Judge Robert McGahey wrote, “Given the strong culture and history of the initiative and referendum process in Colorado, the injunction sought by the Plaintiffs would harm the public interest by negatively impacting citizens’ fundamental right to initiative and referendum as provided by the Colorado Constitution.”
According to CEO Mike Kopp, Colorado Concern disagrees with the judge’s ruling and is now planning their next steps. There are multiple initiatives that would cause concern to Colorado business owners.
Another group is unhappy with the Governor’s executive order. Due Date Too Late is suing the Governor’s office with claims that his order purposefully leaves their campaign out of the signature relief. Their initiative, the 22-week abortion ban, is in their “cure” period, which ends May 29th. This period gives them an extra 15 days to collect the additional signatures they did not collect by their original deadline in March. Their initiative is the only one in the state that wouldn’t benefit from the Governor’s order, as the rules are expected to take effect at the beginning of June.
