2015

Holmes case and trial costs still being tallied

Anonymous — Sun, 20 Dec 2015 20:22:20 +0000

Holmes case and trial costs still being tallied Anonymous (not verified) Sun, 12/20/2015 - 13:22 Lo Snelgrove , Peri Duncan , Carol McKinley

Number reaches $4.5 million — and that doesn't begin to count defense attorney salaries and some expenses still to be released by prosecutors

Graphic by Lo Snelgrove/�鶹��Ѱ��News Corps

No one knows exactly how much taxpayer money was spent on the Aurora theater shooting case, but the three-year investigation and trial is surely one of the most — if not the most — expensive in Colorado history.

Figures obtained by �鶹��Ѱ��News Corps from several public agencies reveal that the investigation and trial has cost at least $4.5 million in total, and those numbers will rise even more when the 18th Judicial District releases final figures early next year. Ten attorneys’ salaries for both sides — another $4 million — are not included in this figure, because they would be paid regardless of the trial happening. The ACLU of Colorado estimates the average cost of a death penalty trial to be $3.5 million, before any appeals.

“Given how much the prosecution cost, plus ancillary costs like security at the courthouse and police overtime, it’s a safe bet to say this was the most expensive case ever to be tried in Colorado,” said Steve Zansberg, president of the Colorado Freedom of Information Coalition.

But this is still only an educated guess from the longtime media lawyer — nobody can say with certainty what the costs of this trial actually are. Nobody except the people who spent the money.

�鶹��Ѱ��News Corps opened official records requests with multiple entities, including the 18th Judicial District, the Colorado Bureau of Investigation, the Arapahoe County Sheriff’s Office and the Office of the State Public Defender. All requests were fulfilled, except that of the State Public Defender, who replied only with the salaries of the five attorneys who worked on the case for three years. Nobody outside of the OSPD knows how much money was spent on psychiatric experts, forensics, travel or any additional costs.

State Public Defender Doug Wilson has been under scrutiny for not releasing his office’s bill for the trial, but Wilson said his ethical obligations to protect his client’s communications and confidentiality prevent him from doing so.

“My job is to protect that person sitting beside me,” Wilson said. “I have no duty or loyalty to you as a citizen, or to the victim, or to the governor or to law enforcement. I have one duty and that is to protect that one person sitting beside me, and we believe in that.”

Colorado’s public defenders and prosecutors are now engaged in a very public spitting match over who spends how much in capital punishment cases and how much the public should know about those costs. The 18th Judicial District Attorney George Brauchler said the public defenders have an obligation to the taxpayers to open their financial books. Brauchler led the prosecution of Holmes and convicted him, but lost a bid for the death penalty.

“They don’t want the public to know how much they spend,” Brauchler said. “Taxpayers should say, ‘We’ll give you money when you tell us how you spend it.’”

In response to the influx of criticism, Wilson performed his own open records requests on the Colorado District Attorneys’ Council. He told �鶹��Ѱ��News Corps that on a statewide level, the DA’s yearly budget is almost twice that of the public defender’s, or nearly $157 million.

Ernie Lewis, executive director of the National Association for Public Defense, said it’s dangerous to compare the budgets, because the two offices’ jurisdictions are funded differently.

Both sides are funded by taxpayer dollars: the 18th Judicial District’s budget is supported by its counties, the OSPD is fed by the state. One aims to bring justice to victims and criminals. The other defends Constitutional law and people who couldn’t otherwise afford an attorney. Both are vital to the functioning of our justice system.

“The competition over budgets between prosecutors and public defenders is a relatively old story,” Lewis said. “It happens in most places because the pie is finite, and when you’re in an adversarial relationship, both parties are going to want some sort of advantage.”

Some prosecutors are starting to feel outmanned by the OSPD, which has been reported to often have more lawyers on a case than their opposition. Tom Raynes, executive director of the Colorado District Attorneys’ Council, said some counties can’t keep up.

“For example,” Raynes said, “In Pueblo, there are 22 prosecutors, but there are 26 public defenders. They get pounded down there.”

Wilson holds fast to his claim that he cannot — according to the American Bar Association — ethically divulge any details on the Aurora theater killer case, but his state-approved budget, along with performance reviews, is available on his office’s website.

“We are more transparent than almost any state agency, and we are more transparent than almost any prosecutor’s office in the state,” Wilson said.

Squaring Off

Prosecutors claim they reveal every penny they spent on the Aurora theater shooter case, from how much they pay their experts to what it cost to stock the courtroom with tissues. Unlike the OSPD, the DA’s office is subject to the Colorado Open Records Act (CORA).

The public defender’s office does not have to comply because it operates under the Judiciary System — the entire branch can turn away CORA requests. Colorado is one of 13 states that exempts offices within the judicial branch from open records requests.

“We’re really not trying to hide anything. This isn’t me playing a shell game,” Wilson said.

Still, prosecutors contend that taxpayers who fund the OSPD should know how every dime of their money is spent.

“This is a fundamental responsibility of state government. And since no one can question them, they are their own gatekeeper,” Brauchler said.

Some state legislators agree with Brauchler and are working on a bill for the 2016 session that would make the State Judiciary subject to CORA. But Wilson says even if such a bill passes, he would not — could not — give up the numbers. It’s going to take a lawsuit, he said.

“I’ve been waiting for you guys to sue me for three years,” Wilson said. “Sue me. Let’s find out. I believe we will win.”

Wilson cited Colorado Rules of Professional Conduct, Rule 1.6, which he said preserves client confidentiality, and, along with Colorado law, shelters his office from having to release details about how it allocates much of its budget. If Wilson released the numbers, he said, he would face personal penalties, the worst fathomable being disbarred.

Lisa Teesch-Maguire, one of Brauchler’s deputy prosecutors, called Wilson’s use of Rule 1.6 a ruse.

“They just hide behind the veil of, ‘it’s attorney-work product,’ and I don’t think it is,” Teesch-Maguire said.

The high-profile mass murder trial is what drew attention to the OSPD’s spending, but it’s one piece of the office’s overall budget. Nationally, Colorado falls in the middle of overall spending for public defenders, with funding of $16 per resident per capita. Oregon spends nearly $26 and Mississippi spends just over $5. Colorado’s public defenders have an annually approved budget paid by the state, compared to Louisiana, which is funded by fees associated with traffic tickets.

But when it comes to the death penalty, the Colorado OSPD opens its wallet a little wider, said Bob Grant, the former district attorney who prosecuted Gary Lee Davis. Davis was the last person executed in Colorado.

“I think they spend money on capital cases to say they spend money,” Grant said. “The public defenders want to make it as expensive as possible.”

Grant said it makes sense that the public defender puts greater fiscal emphasis on capital cases — the OSPD opposes capital punishment. But, he said, “Many people would question the basis for that magnitude of that expenditure. Outside of capital cases, I don’t have any reason to believe they’re frivolous in their spending.”

Grant said district attorneys and public defenders cannot be compared side-by-side. The two entities take on different types of cases, and their budgets can’t be compared without first considering case and workload of both offices.

Public Defender Costs

Here’s what the Office of the State Public Defender has released about its budget in response to Open Records requests from several news agencies, including �鶹��Ѱ��News Corps.

A figure that amounts to half of the office’s total attorney salaries for the entire state in the last 13 years went toward defending Holmes. Of the $4.34 million paid in salaries since 2002, more than $2 million was for salaries of the five attorneys who defended the mass murderer. Wilson pointed out that those attorneys would have been paid regardless of having the theater shooter case to work on.
The office has spent at least $6.3 million on 10 death penalty cases over the past 13 years, according to documents obtained by �鶹��Ѱ��News Corps from the Office of the State Public Defender.
$1.99 million of that $6.3 million represents “aggregate expenses”.
The OSPD’s budget for next year will be $86 million. Last year they returned $500,000 of unused funds. Wilson supplied �鶹��Ѱ��News Corps with the entire budget for all prosecutors in the state, which is nearly $157 million.
�鶹��Ѱ��News Corps specifically requested numbers regarding the millions of dollars spent on Holmes’ trial, but the public defender’s office would only supply salaries of the five attorneys defended the Aurora theater shooter. Wilson also confirmed that the OSPD did not pay to house the defendant’s parents during the trial, who came from California to support their son.

The 12 information requests denied to �鶹��Ѱ��News Corps included:

Money spent on expert witnesses, some of whom never testified.
Money spent on travel to conduct interviews with the gunman’s family and friends in and out-of-state.
Cost of housing character witnesses and their families during the trial.
Cost to house the five attorneys during the four-month trial.

18th Judicial District Expenses

Here’s what �鶹��Ѱ��News Corps has learned about money spent by by District Attorney George Brauchler’s office to build its case and prosecute the killer. They reported spending a total of $1.84 million for the three-year investigation and trial. The office received a federal grant that brought their out-of-pocket expenses down to $183,024. This number is subject to rise after the first of the year.

$543,131 in total mandated costs funded by state funds:

$498,852 for expert witnesses
$44,279 in other costs associated with the trial (water bottles, tissues, subpoena services, testifying witness travel)

$1,114,498.92 in federal grant money spent:

$871,733 for Deputy District Attorney Lisa Teesch-McGuire + 3 victims advocates and 1 victim compensation specialist
$201,718 for victim travel
$28,846 for additional supplies
$12,202 “professional services”

$183,024 spent from the Office of the District Attorney’s operating budget:

$75,123 for the help of retired district attorney Dan Zook
$66,433 for Teesch-Maguire’s salary between January 20 – October 10, 2015
$20,000 in 640 hours of employee overtime
$12,809 for investigator travel
$8,658 for additional supplies

More Costs of the Holmes Case

Additional costs we gathered from other public entities added up to nearly $2.5 million.

The Arapahoe County Sheriff’s Office

$1.625 million for housing, feeding and transporting the defendant from his arrest in July 2012 until Aug. 28, 2015, the day after sentencing. The Sheriff’s Office received a grant of $403,218.77 to help with the costs.

Nearly $95,000 went toward housing, at a cost of $83 a day. The mass murderer was in a single-person cell.
$35,917 that went toward transportation, but Arapahoe County spokesperson Julie Brooks did not go into detail.
$506,372 in employee overtime.

Graphic by Lo Snelgrove/�鶹��Ѱ��News Corps

Colorado Bureau of Investigation (CBI)

$17,265 for investigating James Eagan Holmes from July 20, 2012 until Aug. 27, 2015 (13 months). That includes ballistics, fingerprints, computer/IT information, and any other costs related to the case.

Colorado State Patrol Department of Public Safety

$997 for a plane ride the killer took to the Mental Health Institute at Pueblo in late July 2014 for in-person sanity evaluations.

Colorado Department of Human Services

At least $499,079 for 700 hours of service for two court-appointed psychiatric experts hired to examine Holmes. The final figure is unknown. The amount above does not include the on-stand testimonies of state-appointed psychiatrists Dr. Jeffrey Metzner and Dr. William Reid during the guilt-or-innocence and sentencing phases of the trial. It’s normal for expert witnesses to be paid $300-600 per hour. At one point during the trial, Reid made a statement under oath said on-stand that implied he’d been paid, “half a million dollars”.

Aurora Police Department

$315,200 in employee overtime.

Looking Ahead

After years of facing criticism over their accused secrecy, Wilson’s office is starting to open up. At a Smart Act hearing this week, he announced his attorneys’ salaries with lawmakers.

Colorado Public Defender Doug Wilson

“He’s sharing so that we can have some idea of what taxpayers are paying for,” said Rep. Yeulin Willett (R-Grand Junction).

Willett was so impressed with Wilson’s willingness to divulge that the state representative decided to withdraw his sponsorship of a bill seeking to force the public defender to reveal more.

“If their overall budget is fair, I have to respect their office,” Willette said. “The death penalty is the ultimate punishment, and it’s easy to criticize how much they spend on those cases.”

If Wilson stops providing this kind of information openly, however, Willett said he will reinstate his support for the bill.

Other legislators remain unsatisfied with the lack of accessibility to information kept within Wilson’s office. State Representatives Polly Lawrence (R- District 39) and Rhonda Fields (D-District 42) have plans to push a freedom of information bill that would make the entire Colorado Judicial Branch subject to open records requests, to include the state public defender. A similar bill aimed specifically at Wilson’s office failed last year.

The OSPD is wading into two new high-profile cases as the new year approaches: that of accused Planned Parenthood shooter Robert Dear, and that of a 16-year-old girl arrested in relation to threats made to her high school in Highlands Ranch. Although Wilson has professed fiscal transparency to the public and to legislators, his office isn’t leaving the spotlight with the year 2015. He can likely anticipate ongoing demands for more disclosure as his office continues representing clients people love to hate.

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Meet Colorado’s Public Defender

Anonymous — Mon, 07 Dec 2015 18:09:07 +0000

Meet Colorado’s Public Defender Anonymous (not verified) Mon, 12/07/2015 - 11:09 Carol McKinley and Lo Snelgrove

Why we don't know how he spends taxpayer dollars and what it's like to defend bad guys like the Planned Parenthood shooter

Colorado Public Defender Doug Wilson

This �鶹��Ѱ��News Corps story ran in the Colorado Independent.

Colorado Public Defender Doug Wilson’s office, which provides free criminal defense for people who cannot afford a private attorney, spends $80 million plus each year. When it comes to specific cases, the public is left asking: On what?

Wilson was appointed in 2006 and inherited an office that was underfunded and 45 percent understaffed. In 2008, the American Bar Association said that understaffed public defenders have an ethical obligation to turn down cases. Wilson took the ABA’s opinion to the Statehouse and pled for more funding, which he received.

Compared to how much other states spend on their public defenders, Colorado lands in the middle, averaging out at $16 per resident. Oregon spends the most at $25 and Mississippi the least at just over $5 per resident. He stresses that the money that is spent on defense is in direct response to the prosecutions’ charging decisions. In other words, the defense only reacts to what and how the prosecution decides to charge in a particular case.

Over the past three years, prosecutors and lawmakers have grilled Doug Wilson about where all his office’s money is going in high-profile cases like those of mass murderer James Holmes and accused Planned Parenthood shooter Robert Dear.

And while Wilson has been forthcoming about how, generally, his office spends its budget, the lack of details in his disclosures has left many wondering:

How much does it cost taxpayers to defend someone in a capital case?
Where is the money going?
Why was Colorado’s Judicial Branch, under which Wilson’s office operates, noted as one of the country’s most secretive?

�鶹��Ѱ��News Corps reporters Carol McKinley and Lo Snelgrove sat down with Wilson to find out why he won’t reveal how much money his office spends on high-profile clients to the public that pays his salary.

�鶹��Ѱ��News Corps: So you feel the need to explain yourself?

Doug Wilson: I‘m not.

Why are you talking to the press?

I have an obligation to get people off my lawyers’ backs for stuff that’s just inaccurate, uninformed and sometimes intentionally wrong.

Robert Dear made 18 outbursts in court during his last hearing on Dec. 9, including statements about wanting a new lawyer. (The attorney he’s referring to is Dan King, who also defended James Holmes.) Why did you bring Dan King back in so soon off of the theater shooting trial?

Dan King is the best lawyer for this case because of his extensive background working with mental health issues.

Did you give King the job of defending Dear, or was it his choice to fly in from Thanksgiving vacation in Vermont the night before the first appearance on November 30?

(Nods his head ‘yes.’)

That’s a tough duty.

It is. He’s a tough boy. He’ll be fine.

But you said you wanted to give the lawyers who worked on the theater shooting trial a break.

Well, he had a couple of months.

How long was Robert Dear talking to the police before he finally got a lawyer?

They spent five hours with him before we ever saw the guy. And now we’re trying to figure out what he said and what he didn’t.

Same with Holmes?

Yes. It’s a cat and mouse situation a lot of times.

About the costs of defending the ‘bad guy’

�鶹��Ѱ��News Corps: Your office represented James Holmes. People get upset about tax dollars being used to help a killer.

Doug Wilson: People assume we condone our client’s actions and that we don’t care about the victims. Neither of those things are true. What my reaction to California (San Bernardino murders) was, I was in a meeting and I left the meeting because I felt so bad for the victims. It’s no different when there’s a homicide or a bad case in the state of Colorado. I feel bad for the victims. But the difference is this: Tomorrow, I’ve got to go to jail and meet that person. Because that’s my job. And that’s what we do. And we believe sincerely in the protection of that person’s constitutional rights.

You say you’re transparent, but your opponents say you’re not. This is partly because you won’t reveal details about how much it costs to defend your clients. I’m going to use James Holmes as an example because that’s the most expensive. It’s got to be millions and millions of dollars — five attorneys working on this case for three years, investigators, forensics, experts. Why can’t we know how much you spent defending Holmes?

First, we were created in 1970, and in legislation, there were three things I think are critical to this discussion. First, I am mandated to give representation to indigent clients at the same level that people who have money can get. Two, I am required to comply with Colorado rules of professional conduct. And third, I have to comply with the American Bar Association guidelines: 1.6 of the rules of professional conduct, which specifically states that I may not release any case-specific information without the client’s permission.

What happens if you do?

I am responsible for every single pleading in every case in the state of Colorado. What happens is, I and my lawyers get a grievance filed against us. What happens then is anything from disbarment, losing my license, suspension to public censure to private censure to probation. That’s up to the Office of Regulation Counsel, which is an office set up right beneath the Colorado Supreme Court. Our licensing and regulatory agency. I’m subject to grievance. Whether or not — or how — they punish me is up to them. I’d be subject to some sort of discipline if I violate 1.6.

But the argument is that you’re different from private defense attorneys because the public pays your salary. So the public should know how you spend its tax money.

Show me a piece of paper that says I’m different than private lawyers.

But you’re paid by all of us. Shouldn’t we know where our money is going?

Absolutely you should. And you do. You know every dime I’ve spent. If you go to our website right now, you’ll see a budget breakdown. You’ll see a performance review. Every dime I spent in every district.

That tells me you’re okay with giving up all of those numbers except for the ones that explain specifically what you spend on specific cases.

I am okay with giving up any numbers if I am not ethically prohibited from doing so. And we do that better than almost every prosecutor in this state. I’ve been trying to get the prosecutors’ budgets for six years.

Do you have them now?

Yes.

What are they? How much do they spend a year?

Nearly $160 million.

How did you get those numbers?

Negotiated with them. I told them we’ll give you what we can, not case specific.

So the total that all prosecutors in this state spent on cases in fiscal 2015 was around $160 million?

It’s a little over $157 million, but that doesn’t include a single dime spent by local law enforcement. Not a single dime to the Colorado Bureau of Investigation. For Holmes? They were off the charts with lab work (spending). We’re not allowed to work with CBI…We have to go hire private out of our budget. They don’t. That doesn’t include the Attorney General’s costs when they work on cases, which they did on the Holmes case. And not the Department of Human Services, which spent half a million dollars on experts (for the prosecution).

But you had experts you didn’t even use whom you paid?

I’m not going to answer that question. You know that.

Robert and Arlene Holmes sat behind their son almost every day of the trial. Several of the victims and their families were also there every day. And, besides, some money from a victims’ compensation fund paid for their accommodations out of their own pockets. Did you pay for Mr. and Mrs. Holmes to attend the trial?

I’ll answer. It’s not a 1.6 violation. But it’s the stupidest friggin’ question I’ve ever heard in my entire life. Why would we do that?

So that they could attend the trial of their son?

Their son is my responsibility — their son. The Holmes family, I empathize with a lot because they have been vilified. Bob and Arlene Holmes have done nothing wrong except have a mentally ill son. We didn’t pay a dime for his parents. My understanding is they stayed with some local friends. That would be fiscally irresponsible for me to do.

Rule 1.6 Explained

(Link to earlier sit-down interview �鶹��Ѱ��News Corps did with 18th Judicial District DA George Brauchler)

https://cunewscorps.com/3579/aurora-theater-trial/coffee-with-george-brauchler-theater-shooting-case-da-lays-back/

�鶹��Ѱ��News Corps: Back to Rule 1.6. What would it take to get your office to release the costs to defend James Holmes? A legislative bill?

Doug Wilson: No.

A release from the Supreme Court justice?

No. It’s going to take a lawsuit, which is what I’ve been telling you guys for three years.

So, you wouldn’t mind if we all knew how much you spent?

I do not care. I just released numbers on Monday.

(Note: The office released aggregate costs on 10 death penalty cases over 13 years in which prosecutors filed a notice of intent. The cost amounted to $6.3 million spent on those 10 cases from July, 2012 to October, 2015. The office released the information in response to requests made by several news outlets, including �鶹��Ѱ��News Corps.)

You did announce the salaries for your attorneys on death penalty cases since 2002. And the Holmes case was about half of that. Am I right?

I’m not going to answer that question.

It cost over $2 million for attorneys on the Holmes case alone.

Right, but they worked on that case 100 percent of the time.

You did supply us with how much money, in the aggregate, your office spent on death penalty cases since 2002. You spent more than $4 million on ten of them in the 13 years.

(Note: The exact number supplied by Wilson’s office states it cost $4,343,484 to pay salaries since 2002. Attorneys salaries for the Holmes case ate up half of that 13-year figure.)

Doesn’t the public have the right to know about the rest of your expenses, for example how much you spent on things like defense experts, forensics and travel costs? Are you worried that if the public found out that number there would be an outcry and your budget might be cut?

I don’t know. What I know is that nobody from the public other than you guys and the legislature have asked me that question. I keep hearing this mythical unicorn: Public’s right to know overrides the Constitution and my ethical and statutory obligations. If you can show it to me, I will give you stuff right now. Can you show it to me?

No.

Because there isn’t anything.

Are you saying 1.6 supersedes the First Amendment?

It’s a Sixth Amendment issue. Does your First Amendment override my Sixth? I think not. It’s like the Ten Commandments. God didn’t come down and say the First Commandment is better than the tenth. it’s all equal. I’m saying we have 10 amendments. They’re pretty much all equal and my Sixth Amendment isn’t somehow subordinate to your First Amendment.

The Public Defender’s Budget

�鶹��Ѱ��News Corps: Prosecutors and some lawmakers are saying that you are not transparent. You’re telling me you’re more transparent than they are.

Doug Wilson: We are more transparent than almost any state agency, and we are more transparent than almost any prosecutor’s office in the state. What you’re asking is: “Wilson what’s your budget, how do you spend your money? Are you accountable to the taxpayers in the state for your budget?” I just had a hearing on my 2016 budget. Every year I have to present a budget to the Joint Budget Committee. I’m asking for a 0.47 percent increase. Not even 0.5. The request is $86 million dollars. Last year, we spent $81 million. Last year, we gave money back to the Joint Budget Committee’s general fund.

(Note: The office’s active cases increased from 80,000 in the 1999-2000 calendar year to more than 140,000 in 2013-2014, including 18,000 new cases from January 2014 to July 2015.)

Everyone wants to talk about James Holmes and Dexter Lewis (who was convicted for killing five people in Fero’s Bar and received a life sentence in August, 2015). But we had 160,000 active cases last year. Two of them were death cases. That’s not the biggest chunk of what we do every day. We spend most of our time grinding out in a courtroom in Saguache pushing back on the prosecutor, law enforcement on DUIs, domestic violence. That’s a bunch of what we do.

(Note: The OSPD’ reported its average cost per case is $519)

Public defenders vs. prosecutors: bad blood in Colorado

�鶹��Ѱ��News Corps: Can you practice in this state without adversity?

Doug Wilson: It’s an adversarial system. It’s not set up to be good buddies. It’s set up to be antagonistic.

Does that make you better because you keep each other on your toes?

Sometimes.

I don’t know if you want to be holding hands.

I don’t want to be holding hands.

Can you practice together in this state without adversity?

We don’t have vigilante justice in this country. We have an adversarial system where the prosecutor’s job is to seek justice. My job is to protect that person sitting beside me. I believe we should have strong, knowledgeable prosecutors, judges and public defenders. I’m not sure all prosecutors believe that. I think they believe that people have the right to counsel but they don’t have to be that good, either. Prosecutors will tell you poor people need counsel. They just won’t tell you they want good lawyers. They want us to be second-class citizens. Just like our clients are second-class citizens. They think poor people should have poor lawyers. They literally want a two-legged stool.

The head of the Colorado District Attorney’s Council, Tom Raynes, says this is about having parity. He sees counties that are staffed with more public defenders than prosecutors and he’s afraid they are getting, in his words, “clobbered.”

You know what? They should be happy that we’re good just like I am happy that they’re good because I would rather have smart , well-funded, ethical prosecutors on the other side of my case than somebody that isn’t paid well, isn’t very smart and cuts corners. I would take that non-political, smart, ethical prosecutor that is tough….any day.

What do you mean by non-political?

Someone who doesn’t think the way you try cases is on your Twitter account or on your Facebook account.

(Note: The 18th Judicial District Attorney George Brauchler was caught Tweeting from the courtroom during the theater shooting trial. Unlike Wilson, who is appointed, Brauchler was elected to his position. A rising star in the Colorado Republican party, he was courted to run for U.S. Senate against Michael Bennet but turned the opportunity down. He is considered by the state GOP to be a potential candidate for governor in 2018. Until then, he is running as an incumbent for DA in the 18th Judicial District in 2016.)

It’s unusual for you to sit down with reporters, especially with your budget sheets spread out all over a table. Your time is valuable, as you oversee 488 public defenders in 21 regional trial offices throughout the state. Is this a response to your critics who are criticizing you for refusing to divulge how you spend your money?

Yes. The story I’d like to see is that the public defender’s office is transparent except when it comes to protecting the individual clients’ rights and that the public defenders cannot ever violate that Sixth Amendment obligation to that client. We’re really not trying to hide anything, guys. This isn’t me playing a shell game. You look at the numbers we’ve just released. Ten capital cases. $6.3 million. That’s not a bunch of money.

How are the attorneys in your office holding up. You’ve had several high-profile capital cases in a row: Holmes, Lewis and now, potentially, Dear.

I think my people are worn out and exhausted and tired and they’re still doing their jobs because they believe in what they do.

Below is the entire interview between �鶹��Ѱ��News Corps reporters Carol McKinley and Lo Snelgrove, and Doug Wilson, Colorado’s State Public Defender.

[soundcloud width="100%" height="300" scrolling="no" frameborder="no" allow="autoplay" src="https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https%3A//api.soundcloud.com/tracks/238129090&color=%23ff5500&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false&show_teaser=true&visual=true"][/soundcloud]

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Hardrock River Rising

Anonymous — Sat, 05 Dec 2015 07:00:00 +0000

Hardrock River Rising Anonymous (not verified) Sat, 12/05/2015 - 00:00 Sam Schanfarber

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2h5JbQMeXI0]

Hardrock River Rising

The Gold King Mine Spill was only a symptom of damage caused by hardrock mining, but it may also be the impetus for change.

On the morning of Aug. 5, 2015, a crew from the Environmental Protection Agency began to conduct a series of tests on an abandoned mine called the Gold King, situated above the tiny mountain town of Silverton, Colorado.

A day later, a massive flume of fuming orange sludge made its way down the Animas River into the city of Durango, some 50 miles to the south. The EPA ordered the communities affected by the spill to not use the water for nine days. All activity connected to the Animas, from agricultural operations relying on the river to recreational summer activities, came to a grinding halt while investigations into the safety of the water took place.

The response of both locals and the nation at large was unprecedented. There were calls from both Colorado and New Mexico for the EPA to take economic accountability. Native tribal councils erupted in fury as their agricultural operations were crippled without their main water source.

Activists cried out, claiming that the pristine waters that the Animas was known for — that helped make towns like Durango and Silverton tourist destinations — would forever have their reputation sullied.

But there’s a secret that was rarely mentioned in the weeks of media coverage to follow: the Animas River has always been a dirty river.

For a century, toxic wastewater generated from abandoned mines north of the town of Durango has seeped into the Animas. Channeled from smaller tributaries like Cement Creek, the wastewater often goes unseen to the untrained eye, as the waste comes in narrow, consistent trickles that are diluted upon entering larger waterways.

At the Gold King Mine alone, an average of more than 100 gallons of waste water per minute have gushed from the site since data started being collected in 2006. Though it took a three-million-gallon rush of wastewater over the course of an hour to turn the Animas orange, it was simply a drop in the bucket. The process that causes these mine shafts to leach toxins is impossible to mediate.

Regardless of the media attention it brought; regardless of the countless statements from government officials released in its wake; regardless of the outpouring of sentiment from environmental advocates, the spill at Gold King Mine is minuscule both in its immediate and ongoing consequences.

The deeper story is much more complicated, much longer — and much dirtier — than a single spill on that single day in August 2015.

‘Well, there has been this spill’

“This isn’t a place where people come to rest. This is a place where you come to work.”

On a brisk September morning in Durango, Colorado, Brad Crist stands in the pre-dawn light, overlooking his farm, Calloused Palms.

Though intended to be a retirement home for the former owner, the property now run by Crist is used as a farm, a place where healthy organic food is grown for the community at large. Small operations like this require smaller management; owners become managers, and for Crist, that means no real days off. As a result, a vacationing Crist found himself on the opposite end of a telephone call from Durango on the morning of the spill.

“I get a call from Rachel — she’s my farm manager — and she’s wondering if we should irrigate today,” Crist said. “I’m in Wyoming. I tell her, ‘Well, what do you mean by that? Why would we not irrigate? If the crops are dry, yeah, we’ll irrigate.’ And she goes, ‘Well, there has been this spill.’”

Crist’s first thought was to ensure his crops weren’t contaminated by the mixture of toxic sludge coming down the Animas River—the very river Calloused Palms uses for their primary source of water. He called his ditch rider, the manager of his water claim, and received a more detailed account of what was occurring in the Animas.

Brad Crist, the owner of Calloused Palms Farm outside Durango, had to rely on brief reports from local news websites to learn that the water he uses to irrigate his farm had been polluted by the Gold King Mine blowout. Photo by Michael Kodas.

“I said no, don’t irrigate,” Crist remembered. “Turn off the water and don’t let it out on the crops. The ditch rider says we had the ability to supply water from the Hermosa Creek, and we did. Hermosa Creek comes down from Purgatory from under the mountain here and is pure, good water.”

Within an hour, Crist had ensured that the Fanta-orange waters of the Animas wouldn’t taint his crops, his decision mirrored by all those using the same water supplier as Calloused Palms. And just nine days later, the EPA declared the water in the Animas safe for recreational and agricultural use once more.

If the water wasn’t safe for agricultural use in the immediate aftermath of the spill, how did Durango residents — and the communities farther south of the Animas — obtain clean drinking water? There was no rush on bottled water in grocery stores, no mass purchasing of Brita filters and iodine tablets. In fact, for most water districts, ensuring contaminated water stayed out of plumbing systems was as simple as flipping a switch.

Danny Paul, a water technician for the Glacier Club water district, was working on the day of the spill and was the first in his district to respond to the incident.

“We got a call from the state health department, and it notified us within three hours of the accident,” said Paul. “The spill hadn’t reached us yet. I had plenty of time to shut out our pumps.”

Located roughly 20 miles north of the town of Durango, the Glacier Club water district supplies gray water to a golf course, as well as clean potable water to the small surrounding community. Because the Glacier Club is its own water district, Paul and his co-workers are responsible for conducting various monthly, weekly and annual tests for the state health department.

Water for the district comes from three sources: groundwater from a well near the facility’s treatment center, a reservoir and the Animas River. All three are regularly tested for contaminants. So although the Animas is a main source of the district’s water, with the safety of a secondary water source guaranteed, Paul simply had to turn off the pumps coming from the river and instead direct water from the other two sources.

Danny Paul, a water technician at the Glacier Club, learned of the blowout from the state and was able to flip switches and shut off water headed to his community from the Gold King Mine sludge streaming down the Animas River. Photo by Michael Kodas.

“It’s all automated,” Paul said of the water pumps. “It just goes in the computer, and we shut it off.”

The spill didn’t affect operating costs for the Glacier Club, nor did it endanger the health of anyone within its water district. For organizations such as Crist’s or Paul’s, where the livelihood of others relies on their product, precautions have to be in place in case of accidents such as the Gold King spill. Yet for the individual who simply lives near at-risk areas but whose activities have no immediate risk of impacting human health, the affect of the spill has a much greater implication; one that goes far beyond one singular event.

The area where the Gold King Mine site is located is known as Cement Creek. A heavily mined area, the creek itself no longer supports fish species, and it is one of the most polluted regions in Southwest Colorado.

But Cement Creek is also home to Silverton Mountain, a mecca for extreme skiing. The surrounding peaks outside the resort’s boundaries hold endless potential for backcountry skiing as well, making the area popular for winter cabins.

For longtime Durango residents like JJ Schiffel, owning one of these cabins is often a lifelong experience.

“We were the caretakers as we call it of this property, me and my partner, Ben,” Schiffel said. “We’ve been skiing here since like high school days basically and we never wanted to leave at the end of the day, so we kind of took over this cabin behind you, and then bugged the guy that owned it long enough that he finally sold it to us.”

Schiffel’s property is unique. It spans the top of a ridge line all the way down into the center of a steep ravine below, making the vast majority of his land dramatically sloped. It sounds like a skier’s dream until you hear about the neighbor across the ravine — the Gold King Mine site.

‘It was right in our backyard’

When the mine blew out, it eroded land on both sides of the ravine, including on Schiffel’s property.

Further, after the EPA began routing the continuous flow of wastewater down the ravine toward a temporary treatment site, a retaining pond of toxic wastewater formed on the bottom of the ravine, straddling Schiffel and the mine site’s property boundaries. Unlike at Calloused Palms and Glacier Club, where they could reach a conscious decision to stay out of contact with toxic waste, Schiffel had no such option.

In fact, neither Schiffel nor his partner were informed that the spill had affected their property.

“You know, my first noticing of (the spill) was I was in town, driving across Trimble Bridge, and it was pretty obvious that something was going on,” Schiffel said.

Schiffel did a Google search and noticed a short story on the Durango Herald website saying there had been a spill at the Gold King site.

“And I had no idea when or where or anything like that,” Schiffel said. “When I became aware that it was where it was, it was maybe a week after the spill itself, we came up to do a visit to the property and realized that it was right in our backyard.”

Few Durango or other Southwest Colorado residents knew what was happening.

Brad Crist was fortunate enough to have observational partners on the day that the sludge reached his neck of the Animas; otherwise, he never would have known to redirect his water source.
JJ Schiffel had to rely on the Durango Herald, a small town newspaper, to realize his property was being puddled with toxic wastewater.
The Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment contacted Danny Paul and the Glacier Club only because there was an immediate risk of contaminated water reaching the public’s washrooms.

But public ignorance of the mining problem extends beyond awareness of the risk of singular tragic events. Most people don’t understand that the EPA calling the water “safe” after a few days doesn’t mean it’s free of contaminants. Most people don’t understand that every day, wastewater still seeps into the Animas and other rivers like it across the state of Colorado; a continuous trickle of toxins. Most people don’t understand that there is no possible way to stop the wastewater from abandoned mines from being created — forever.

‘You make Swiss cheese out of a mountain’

The mine problem is not new. In fact, much of the toxic mine drainage being dealt with today has been brewing since the 1880s. Because of a century-old law, those responsible for creating the mines — parties who often drew fortunes out of their claims — haven’t borne much economic accountability for these sites.

But before discussing legislative challenges, one must first understand the science behind the spill.

A hard rock mine is one that is drilled with the intent to mine hard minerals, mainly precious metals such as ore containing gold and silver. Dan Olson, executive director of the San Juan Citizens Alliance, explains how this type of mining results in toxic mine drainage that cannot be stemmed.

“What happens when you do hard rock mining is that you essentially make Swiss cheese out of a hard rock mountain,” Olson said. “And when you do that, you create passages for water to move through these rock layers that were historically not exposed.”

When a mineshaft is created, the minerals exposed to oxygen aren’t just the gold and silver ore typically being sought by mining companies. Other minerals such as zinc, cadmium and copper, are also brought to the surface of the rock. When these materials meet the groundwater within the mountain, combined with oxygen, they form acid mine drainage — a toxic sludge containing a hodgepodge of heavy metal deposits. Acid mine drainage can permeate through a waterway without causing immediate damage, but leaving toxic sediment that can potentially cause longterm damage to ecosystems.

Photo by Roxann Elliott/�鶹��Ѱ��News Corps

There are no solutions to this waste. Organizations such as the EPA have both short and long-term measures that they use to attempt to mediate acid mine drainage. However, because the drainage will never stop being produced once oxygen is introduced into a mineshaft, the solutions are either to stem and monitor the flow of waste or to open treatment facilities beneath leaching mines to clean all of the acidic water coming out.

Treating the water is extremely expensive. A treatment facility must be constructed directly in the path of a mine’s wastewater, meaning it has to be routed through a reliable path out of the opening of the mine; one that ensures no contact with other waterways is ever established. Further, the facility must be able to operate consistently for the rest of time, which could be financially draining on the communities that rely on the treatment.

As a result, the EPA frequently turns to less stringent methods of mediation. Such is part of the story of the Gold King. In 2008, the Colorado Division of Reclamation, Mining and Safety developed a plan to close off the four openings, or adits, to the Gold King Mine. The goal of the plan wasn’t even to stop the flow of water from the mine, but simply to divert the discharge more controllably. However, one of the mine’s adits had already partially collapsed, and the EPA knew there was pooling wastewater behind the opening–they just weren’t sure how much. In an attempt to examine the condition of the mine entrance and its wastewater, an uncontrollable leaking began that resulted in the entirety of the mine’s reservoir of wastewater — all three million gallons — rushing down Cement Creek and into the Animas River.

As of Nov. 16 2015, the EPA states that it has spent a total of $17.23 million on the Gold King cleanup. This isn’t including the original cost of the wastewater diversion plan, which was paid for by the state of Colorado. In fact, the EPA knew and internally acknowledged that the state’s chosen work plan for the Gold King was not viable in the longterm, but allowed it to be undergone anyway because the state had the money to fund the project.

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZBlR05tDCbI]

The mediation that was ongoing at the Gold King Mine was unique to the site. More frequently, the EPA and state departments use a bulkhead as a means of partial wastewater management. A bulkhead is essentially a cork that goes into the opening of a mineshaft. The purpose is to either block the mine drainage from exiting, or to mediate the amount that can come out at once; the latter being in the form of a drain or plumbing coming of the mine and through the bulkhead.

But the success of bulkheads in containing acid mine waste is arbitrary. Often, by plugging up one source of drainage from a mountain mine, the toxic water simply permeates through the bedrock and finds an exit elsewhere. Some believe this is the cause of the Gold King spill; that potentially, the neighboring Sunnyside Mine’s bulkhead caused a growing balloon of waste to find the next nearest exit.

So if the safest, most permanent solution to a permanent problem is treatment facilities, why aren’t they being constructed with gusto? The problem is the cost. The use of bulkheads as temporary solutions to acid mine drainage is common across the state because they’re cheaper than treatment facilities to construct and maintain. They’re less burdensome than treatment facilities. The EPA cannot afford to construct these facilities at every single leaching mine site in Colorado, let alone in the U.S. There are an estimated 23,000 abandoned mining claims in the state of Colorado. While only a small percentage — perhaps a couple hundred — are leaching waste daily, this still represents a massive project were remediation to take place on a large scale, and the funding simply isn’t there.

Thus, the financial responsibility would fall upon state and local environmental departments, who also cannot afford such measures. This stalemate has led environmental advocacy groups to demand that those responsible pay for cleanup. Yet a law nearly as old as the mining problem itself protects the latter party.

‘Polluters should pay, not the taxpayers’

In 1872, the U.S. government became enthralled with settling the West, entrenching the concept of Manifest Destiny as it expanded toward the Pacific. Yet too few people were willing to uproot their lives and move into the harsh, largely unmapped and unsettled territory. To boost the incentive, the federal government passed the General Mining Law of 1872.

Essentially, this allowed for anyone — be it a mining company or an individual — to take a mining claim for free. Unlike coal and other mining industries, where royalties and reclamation fees are applied to all operators and used to pay for environmental mediation, the mining industry still operates beneath the tenants of this law. There is zero cost to operators past and present for the millions of dollars in precious metals — from mining claims acquired for free — they’ve earned in profit.

The only way to reverse the cycle of affected communities being forced to pay for or ignore abandoned mines and their wastewater is to change the 143-year-old law that protects the hard rock mining industry.

Aaron Mintzes, a policy advocate at the environmental nonprofit Earthworks, claims that a change in policy is the only possible way to seriously ramp up current efforts in mine drainage mediation.

For Mintzes — as well as the legislation his organization advocates — it’s all about the money.

“Polluters should pay, not the taxpayers,” he said.

Mintzes endorses the idea that regulation around hard rock mining should follow suit with the coal industry, turning fees into funds for reclamation. Using the Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act of 1977 as an example, Mintzes explains how it’s possible to generate the finances needed to address acid mine drainage on a national scale.

“For the last two generations, we’ve had a reclamation fee charged on the coal companies,” he said. “That money goes into a fund that pays to clean up abandoned coal mines, a portion of which according to a formula … goes to pay for hard rock mines as well.”

Mintzes’ solution is to do the same for the hard rock mining industry that the government does for the coal industry — that is, institute a reclamation fee on the actual value of the mineral or on the mass of its weight.

The money collected from owners of operating hard rock mines would go into a fund, which would then be used to mediate both operating and abandoned mines whose owners couldn’t be identified. So if two of every 10 hard rock mines has an operator paying into the fund, the treatment of the other eight abandoned sites would be piggy-backed off the same dollar. It’s not ideal, Mintzes says, but it’s a jump-start toward a better solution.

Currently two bills sit in the U.S. Congress that aim to establish these principles for the hard rock mining industry. In February 2015, Representative Raul Grijalva (D-Arizona) introduced H.R. 963, which would reform the General Mining Law of 1872, resulting in a fund created by royalties and fees on the existing industry.

This bill’s verbiage is nearly mirrored by a similar bill being presented in the Senate, known as the Hardrock Mining and Reclamation Act of 2015. The bill, sponsored by Senators Tom Udall (D-New Mexico), Martin Heinrich (D-New Mexico), Michael Bennet (D-Colorado), Ron Wyden (D-Oregon) and Ed Markey (D-Massachusetts), was introduced as a direct result of the Gold King Mine spill, a reflection on how an event that captures the nation’s attention can inspire lawmakers to seek relatable reforms for their communities.

Still, the bills face challenges in both the House and the Senate, respectively. The bills’ success will rely on the lawmakers’ ability to attract support from both sides of the aisle. Regardless, their introductions are part of a new chapter in proposed hard rock mining law.

Along with underscoring the goals of bills proposed at a federal level, the Gold King spill has affected policy decisions on a local level. Silverton has opposed a Superfund designation on abandoned mine sites near the community for decades, claiming such a label would ruin the town’s appeal to tourists. However, in the wake of the spill, Silverton town officials have been touring other Superfund sites in Colorado to become familiar with the process. The pressure and demand for change has demonstrated to local officials that the best solution for remediation is the multi-million-dollar investment in cleanup that a Superfund designation brings.

The story of the Gold King Mine spill is not one of tragedy but of awakening.

Members of the Durango community who had long known of the existence of abandoned mines at Cement Creek suddenly learned of their dangers, even after spending a lifetime without knowingly being impacted. The world looked on as a seemingly picturesque mountain community mourned for nine days the loss of its great Animas River.

Although most media coverage of the spill discussed only the temporary orange state, this event became an impetus for policy makers to reevaluate the lack of industry liability in decades-old mining regulations. Ironically, the thickened orange sludge of the Gold King’s wastewater may be a symbolic rising sun for environmental policy change.

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Race to the Ranch

Anonymous — Wed, 14 Oct 2015 06:00:00 +0000

Race to the Ranch Anonymous (not verified) Wed, 10/14/2015 - 00:00 Lars Gesing

Iowa pizza chain is a must-stop for GOP presidential candidates on the campaign trail

GOP presidential candidate Mike Huckabee talks to a crowd at the Pizza Ranch in Jefferson, Iowa. Photo: Lars Gesing/�鶹��Ѱ��News Corps

LAS VEGAS, Nevada – Have you ever gotten pushed around or hit with an elbow during the wee hours of Black Friday at your local shopping mall? Remember that feeling of hysteric masses, pushing and shoving, to get their hands on the hottest deals first?

Now imagine that elbow was a TV camera, and the shopper stampede a frantic press scrum that had grown men fretting for their bodily safety.

Welcome to the presidential debate spin room, where reporting is more like an NFL summer training camp drill.

One thing I learned tonight: the spin room is a contact sport. #NBC2016 #DemDebate
— Danny Freeman (@DannyEFreeman) October 14, 2015

During the Democratic presidential debate at the Wynn Las Vegas on Tuesday, the press was crammed into a filing room while the party loyals, donors and local activists watched the action unfold in the debate hall.

Only after CNN’s Anderson Cooper delivered the closing statement to his hailed two-hour interrogation of the five presidential hopefuls were the sheer forces of the press unleashed on the night’s protagonists. While the pri

The press filing center minutes before the debate. Photo: Lars Gesing/�鶹��Ѱ��News Corps

nt reporters were putting the final touches on their dispatches, and Twitter feeds started cooling off just a tad, TV crews geared up.

Now, in the spin room, it was their turn, overtime, with the ratings championship on the line. A whole array of campaign and party officials as well as the candidates themselves were waiting to give their five cents on the night’s performances. They had ample opportunity.

So.. This is the Spin Room right now. And the candidate is... Jim Webb. #madness #DemDebate pic.twitter.com/BrxLNrWBxf— Lars Gesing (@LarsGesing) October 14, 2015

Of course, for a man like Jim Webb, who has seen his share of war, what’s a few cameras? After all, he let the debate audience know what he does with his enemies in combat. But for a pacifist-leaning 74-year-old Bernie Sanders, the inexorable camera-and-mike-swinging portion of the presidential press corps may have been his most angst-inducing foe of the night, trumping even Hillary’s rare but pointed oratorical stabs on stage a few minutes earlier.

There were different shades of madness, however. Webb managed to get into the room first and was immediately swarmed. Once Bernie Sanders came to spin, reporters and camera crews could literally “Feel the Bern” – that’s how closely they beleaguered the Vermont senator.

Lincoln Chafee and Chloe Nguyen. Photo: Lars Gesing/�鶹��Ѱ��News Corps

And then there was Lincoln Chafee. After his dreadful debate performance, he almost had to ask reporters to ask questions a few minutes in. Chloe Nguyen of the Scholastic News Kids Press Corps smelled an opening and stepped up to the plate.

Also among the power lineup of debate spinners was Debbie Wassermann Schultz, the chairwoman of the Democratic National Committee. When she made rounds in the room before the debate, she sported a navy blue hat with a rather clear message: “America is already great.” (cc: The Donald Trump)

Hillary Clinton, by the way, was the only member of the candidate quintet not to show up and address reporters at all. Instead she let some of her campaign surrogates take a victory lap.

But as the Washington punditry and national reporters (including this one) quickly hailed Clinton as the night’s big winner after her forceful and combative performance on stage, another question came up.

Who put the spin on whom?

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The man who told Barack Obama he had won the presidency

Anonymous — Sun, 11 Oct 2015 06:00:00 +0000

The man who told Barack Obama he had won the presidency Anonymous (not verified) Sun, 10/11/2015 - 00:00 Lars Gesing

In our Anecdotal Evidence column, movers and shakers share personal stories of how intriguing (and often odd) campaigning in their respective swing state can be.

Steve Schale – Obama’s 2008 Florida campaign director

Steve Schale. Photo: Lars Gesing/�鶹��Ѱ��News Corps

“In 2008 the Obama team agreed to start the last full campaign day in Florida. We went to Jacksonville. It was the morning when he found out his grandmother had passed away. Barack Obama gave probably one of the two or three worst speeches of his life. He forgot what county he was in, he was just reading off the teleprompter.

“Every day for the last 13 days of the campaign, we would get a daily update of how we were doing with the early votes. The morning of the last day, we got the final update of all the people who had voted. In terms of Republicans versus Democrats, we were ahead by about 400,000 Democrats, which was a larger margin than John Kerry lost Florida by. So basically, we had won. Unless something weird was going on, we had won. And if we had won Florida, then we had won.

“Every day I would email these numbers to Robert Gibbs, who was then the campaign press secretary, so he could talk to the reporters. That last day I told Gibbs, and he came up to me right after the event. Obama was walking around backstage like he had been hit with a frying pan. Gibbs goes, ‘Hey man, why don’t you cheer him up? Why don’t you tell him what you told me?’

“So we go back into this little room. I give Obama my phone and try to explain to him these numbers. He asked, ‘What does that mean?’ I told him it means we had won Florida. David Axelrod was in the room, and he said something like, ‘We won!’

“We walk out of the room, and Obama went, ‘You did a good job. Don’t screw it up!’

“That whole campaign, I never thought we were going to lose. I was convinced we had a good plan, a good staff. It was the only campaign I ever worked on where the plan we wrote literally played out exactly like we thought it would. I never doubted we were going to win even though we were down four or five points at one time.

“But after that, I felt so nervous I couldn’t talk. I just told this guy we had won Florida and that he is probably going to be president. I thought, ‘What if I screw this up? What if I was wrong?’ They threw me out of the war room on Election Day. I was a wreck. I was pacing in the parking lot of the hotel where our victory party was, thinking ‘Oh my God? What if we lose? He is always going to remember this guy who told him we were going to win.'”

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How third parties messed up the 2000 Flori-duh election

Anonymous — Tue, 06 Oct 2015 06:00:00 +0000

How third parties messed up the 2000 Flori-duh election Anonymous (not verified) Tue, 10/06/2015 - 00:00 Lars Gesing

In our Anecdotal Evidence column, movers and shakers share personal stories of how intriguing (and often odd) campaigning in their respective swing state can be.

Aubrey Jewett – Political Scientist, University of Central Florida

Aubrey Jewett with a voting punchcard ballot from the 2000 presidential election. Photo: Lars Gesing/�鶹��Ѱ��News Corps

“Florida changed it’s constitution in 1998 in an attempt to be more fair to minor political parties. Our voters approved a proposal to make ballot access equal for all parties. Before that, minor parties had to jump through a lot more hoops, and it tended to keep them off the ballot. But when we leveled the playing field, one of the unforeseen consequences was that we had 10 presidential nominees on the general election ballot in Florida that year, including the Green Party with Ralph Nader and the Reform Party, which Pat Buchanan ran for.

“Our election supervisors in each of Florida’s 67 counties had to figure out how to list the candidates on the ballot. They came up with several innovative ways to do that. Most of our big, urban counties had a punch-card system, which was considered to be high-tech when it was adopted in the late 60s and early 70s but by 2000 was very low tech, cumbersome and created a lot of problems.

“Several supervisors of elections across the state began to list the candidates for president on one page and continued on the next page. Corrine Brown was running for re-election to Congress that year. She ran ads, ‘Vote for Gore, vote for Brown,’ tying the Democratic ticket together. Well, wouldn’t you know… Al Gore was listed on the first page in Duval County. But when you turned the page, there was another candidate running for president whose last name was Browne (Libertarian Harry Browne). So Duval County had a very high number of invalidated ballots from over-voting, which happens when you have more than one vote for a presidential candidate on a ballot. In Duval County, they had something like 20,000 such votes, and many of them voted for Gore on the front page and for Browne (!) on the second page.

“We had another example of creative placement in Palm Beach County. That was what was known as the butterfly ballot. Standard procedure says you should list all candidates on one page, from top to bottom. But in Palm Beach, the supervisor of elections thought, ‘I’ve got a lot of seniors and they may have vision problems. If I list all 10 candidates on one side, it is going to be awfully small font.’ What she came up with was she alternated lines between the left and the right side. Thousands of people then either punched for two candidates or at least thought they were voting for Al Gore. Instead they accidentally voted for Pat Buchanan.

“It all came about because of an attempt to be fair to third parties.”

***

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Presidential candidates: the house guests who won’t leave

Anonymous — Sat, 03 Oct 2015 06:00:00 +0000

Presidential candidates: the house guests who won’t leave Anonymous (not verified) Sat, 10/03/2015 - 00:00 Lars Gesing

In our Anecdotal Evidence column, movers and shakers share personal stories of how intriguing (and often odd) campaigning in their respective swing state can be.

Adam Smith – Political Editor, Tampa Bay Times

Adam Smith. Photo: Lars Gesing/�鶹��Ѱ��News Corps

“2008 was a crazy cycle. Florida scheduled an early primary. But with so much emphasis on states such as Iowa, it was part of the Obama campaign’s strategy to get other candidates to pledge to not campaign in Florida, to basically boycott the Florida Democratic primary. It may have cost Hillary the election. And the Obama campaign since admitted that is was part of a strategy because they knew Hillary was going to be very strong in Florida – as a woman who had a lot of ties here.

I remember standing outside a fundraiser. Obama came here to raise money, but they had pledged to never talk to voters. It was just bizarre. I think Hillary agreed to the pledge because her view was, ‘If we don’t do it, every time we go to Iowa and New Hampshire, all the activists and all the reporters will say ‘You are snubbing Iowa and New Hampshire by not agreeing to this deal.” It was a stupid move. (Click here for more information on the Florida Democratic primary that year.)

“In the same cycle, on the Republican side, you had Rudy Giuliani, John McCain and Mitt Romney. Giuliani had this view that he was going to completely blow off Iowa and New Hampshire and was going to bet all his money on Florida. He basically moved here, and he was winning for a long time. But people just got sick of him. He was like the house guest who wouldn’t leave. Charlie Christ, who was then a very popular Republican governor, had promised he was going to endorse Giuliani. Then he personally told Romney and Giuliani that he was going to stay neutral. Days before the election, he endorsed McCain.”

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Florida’s political geography is a roadway puzzle

Anonymous — Thu, 01 Oct 2015 06:00:00 +0000

Florida’s political geography is a roadway puzzle Anonymous (not verified) Thu, 10/01/2015 - 00:00 Lars Gesing

In our Anecdotal Evidence column, movers and shakers share personal stories of how intriguing (and often odd) campaigning in their respective swing state can be.

Dario Moreno – Political Scientist, Florida International University

Dario Moreno. Photo: Lars Gesing/�鶹��Ѱ��News Corps

“The Northern part of the state – along I-10 from Pensacola to Jacksonville – is basically South Alabama, very Southern, very conservative. The southern part of the state – Miami-Dade, Broward, Palm Beach – is very liberal. That region has a lot of influence from the Northeast, from states such as New York, New Jersey. People are moving down here. They follow the I-95,

“And then the people on the southwest side of the state are very Republican and conservative. They came from Michigan, Indiana and Ohio. They followed the I-75 down.

“The I-4, which goes from Tampa Bay to Daytona, is really the swing area. it’s the central part of the state, and it is where most state elections are decided.”

***

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The Virginia cocktail party theory

Anonymous — Tue, 29 Sep 2015 06:00:00 +0000

The Virginia cocktail party theory Anonymous (not verified) Tue, 09/29/2015 - 00:00 Lars Gesing

In our Anecdotal Evidence column, movers and shakers share personal stories of how intriguing (and often odd) presidential campaigning in their respective swing state can be.

Frank Leone – Attorney and Virginia DNC Member

Frank Leone. Photo: Lars Gesing/�鶹��Ѱ��News Corps

“Larry Sabato was my major adviser at the University of Virginia. We talked about Virginia politics. He had the cocktail-party theory.

“Virginia is primarily a suburban state. Suburban voters like people who they would have at their cocktail parties. The example at that time, which was back in the 70s, was John Warner, our senator, who was married to Liz Taylor. So John Warner might come to your cocktail party and bring Liz Taylor. You definitely want Liz Taylor at your cocktail party.

“The Democrat was a guy named Andrew Miller, the attorney general. He was fine, but not very interesting.

“Henry Howell was the Democratic candidate who was running for governor in the 70s. He was really populist, he would talk really loud, he would spit and spill mustard on his tie. You don’t want him at your cocktail party. You want John Dalton, who was a lawyer from Richmond and a much more sedate guy who at least wouldn’t scare people.”

***

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Anecdotal Evidence, make-a-wish edition: What Pope Francis teaches us about curing gridlock

Anonymous — Wed, 23 Sep 2015 06:00:00 +0000

Anecdotal Evidence, make-a-wish edition: What Pope Francis teaches us about curing gridlock Anonymous (not verified) Wed, 09/23/2015 - 00:00 Lars Gesing

In our Anecdotal Evidence column, movers and shakers share usually personal stories of how intriguing (and often odd) campaigning in their respective swing state can be. But since everyone is talking about the Pope these days, we applied his principles to politics.

John Davis – North Carolina Political Commentator

John Davis. Photo: Lars Gesing/�鶹��Ѱ��News Corps

“Everybody in Washington, D.C. – 435 members of the House, 100 senators and our president, they all believe they are principled people. We don’t need any more principled people in Washington, we need principled compromise. The whole problem is you got principled conservatives and principled liberals in separate corners of the room, refusing to talk to anybody.

“Government is the problem because government is made up of people who put ideological principles ahead of getting things done. You’ve got all these members from safe Republican districts and from safe Democratic districts who tell them, ‘You better not go up there and talk with the Republican. You better stick with your principles.’ So nothing get’s done, and everybody is mad. The very people complaining about nothing getting done are the people creating the problem with nothing getting done.

“How to fix it? A few years ago, it was almost like somewhere out of nowhere came this Argentine Jesuit priest and became Pope. And this guy starts saying: The church should be like a field hospital. We should not be asking people where they stand on abortion or same-sex marriage or women in the priesthood when they come to us. We should reach out and give mercy to people who are in need. This Pope is revolutionizing the world.

“Somebody needs to come along who has the ability to say, ‘There’s something greater than the church, and it’s mercy. And there is something greater than our individual ideals and priorities. A new greater good is needed in the United States. Someone needs to come along who is focused on one thing rather than 12 things. If I were running for president today, I would be a single-issue candidate: Fix the government. Because you are not fixing anything else – no entitlements, health care or education, job or the debt – until you fix the government. And you are not going to fix the government until people who don’t agree with each other start getting together and agree on principled compromise.

“The best way to describe principled compromise is what you do when you are get married. I like to say: Marriage is when two become one, and then you spend the rest of your life arguing about which one. That’s what principled compromise is: All of a sudden two families are stuck together for life.”

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