DENVER – The campaigns for Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton will closely watch Colorado on Tuesday, as Democrats prepare for a highly-divided caucus.
Colorado is considered by many to be a bellwether state, and one that is up in the air for Super Tuesday, when 11 states hold Democratic caucuses or primaries.
With Clinton having an edge in at least seven of those states – many in the South – and having recently won her first test in the West with Nevada, Sanders supporters feel a weight to perform well in Colorado.
“It will show how well organized his grass-roots campaign is, as well as show the level of passion his supporters have for him based on turnout in the caucuses and the percent that he wins by,” said Ana Moran, a senior at Fort Lewis College and a Sanders organizer.
In a sign that Sanders hopes to win the state, his campaign on late Friday announced that he would stop Sunday in Fort Collins at Colorado State University. Two weeks ago, the self-proclaimed Democratic socialist packed a hall at the Colorado Convention Center with 18,000 people, the campaign said.
Despite Clinton’s attempts to portray Sanders as a one-issue candidate, Sanders’ supporters point to an array of issues close to the candidate, beyond his familiar calls to crack down on banks and the wealthy.
In the West, both Sanders and Clinton have pushed immigration reform and gun control as major issues. The respective campaigns also have fought to distinguish themselves with minority voters, including blacks and Latinos.
“This is really a people-powered campaign, so we’re making sure that folks that we know and communicate with and understand are out there,” Sanders campaign state director Dulce Saenz told The Durango Herald on Tuesday, after a rally at the state Capitol, where a handful of lawmakers endorsed Sanders.
Saenz comes from outside the establishment “political class,” having worked for years on environmental, immigration and education issues. In many ways, she is symbolic of the Sanders campaign itself.
“Candidates betray you, issues don’t,” she said.
The Sanders campaign, organized in Colorado since December, has drawn on an initial network of at least 80,000 supporters to assist with volunteer efforts, including phone-banking, canvassing and voter registration.
Saenz said in recent weeks she has seen “in-the-closet Berners” come out in support of Sanders. Three state lawmakers and a former speaker of the Colorado House joined Sanders’ supporters at Tuesday’s rally.
“A few weeks ago, I woke up in the middle of the night, and I realized I had caught the ‘bern,’” former Speaker Terrance Carroll, a Democrat, said to cheers. “... I had a fever of some sort, night sweats, I had some shakes. But it turned out, I had a ‘bern,’ and that ‘bern’ came from Sen. Bernie Sanders.”
With Colorado being a closed caucus – meaning voters had to be registered with a party by Jan. 4 to participate – campaigns are left to work within that universe.
Both campaigns have run television commercials to reach voters, though it seems only Sanders will benefit from a visit to the state before Tuesday. Clinton did not have any immediate plans to hold a pre-caucus rally.
Sanders would benefit from high turnout Tuesday. In 2008, about 120,000 Coloradans showed up to caucus when Barack Obama defeated Clinton by a wide margin. State party leaders are not expecting turnout to match the stunning 2008 number.
Clinton has been bolstered by establishment support, earning endorsements from at least 90 Colorado Democrats, including high-profile politicians such as Gov. John Hickenlooper, former U.S. Sen. and past Interior Secretary Ken Salazar and Denver Mayor Michael Hancock.
Clinton also has paraded national Democratic leaders around Colorado, including husband and former President Bill Clinton and daughter Chelsea Clinton.
Her campaign has been organized in Colorado since early September.
“We need someone who is tough,” Hickenlooper said Thursday to a small crowd at a rally in Denver’s Civic Center Park. “Every time she’s knocked down, she gets right back up and she gets back to work.”
Kathleen Adams has been a leader for Clinton in Durango, where campaign operatives have used her house as an informal headquarters.
“We have an equal, if not a better organized system,” Adams said. “Colorado is extremely important. I’ve got my nose to the grindstone.”
But because of Colorado’s caucus system, the true outcome of the race won’t be felt until the State Convention and Assembly on April 16.
There are 78 delegates at stake, including 12 superdelegates, who are usually high-ranking officials free to support any candidate.
The preference poll Tuesday will serve as more of a snapshot in time that will likely project the outcome of the race, said Democratic Party Chairman Rick Palacio.
“We’re not going to call who won on Super Tuesday,” Palacio said. “But I think you’ll have a very clear vision of who had the most caucus attendees.”
pmarcus@durangoherald.com
This story was updated to inclusde Bernie Sanders’ visit to the state on Sunday.
