La Plata County Republicans saw a huge increase in turnout for their caucus last week while participation in the Democrats’ caucus and assembly continues to decline.
Republicans more than doubled their turnout from 2020 amid a surge in energy while Democrats continue to see their voters turn to the state’s primaries instead of the party’s caucuses and assemblies. Heading into November’s general election, the executive committees of both parties are confident their voters will turnout and carry their candidates to victory.
Attendance at the Republican caucus March 2 was up 151% from the last election cycle in 2020, said Dave Peters, chair of the La Plata County GOP.
In 2020, 89 people attended the GOP’s local caucus. This year the number ballooned to 223. Turnout was still below the approximately 300 people who attended the first time Donald Trump ran for election, Peters said.
While engagement swelled for Republicans, participation declined for Democrats.
During Saturday’s combined caucus and assembly, Democrats had 145 preregistered participants, of whom cast 111 votes, said Anne Markward, third vice chair and communications lead for the La Plata County Democrats.
Participation dipped from 275 attendees in 2020 and 383 in 2018, Markward said.
“(Attendance) is going down ever since Colorado chose to have a presidential primary versus a caucus and an assembly as the first step,” Markward said. “... The numbers have been growing smaller every year.”
Herb Bowman, chair of the La Plata County Democrats, also attributed this year’s decline to the county party’s first-ever virtual caucus and other changes that have been made to the caucus process.
“There were a number of factors that made things different this year,” he said. “One obviously was Zoom. The other was that caucus and assembly were done together. And the third was that the state Legislature changed caucus rules so that much less is actually done at caucus.”
While participation was up for Republicans this year, the party has also seen a decline since Colorado switched to primaries instead of the caucus and assembly process for presidential candidates in 2020. In 2016, Colorado voters approved presidential primaries in which unaffiliated voters could cast a vote for one party.
The difference between primaries and the assembly and caucus process is that the state runs primaries while the two parties conduct assemblies and caucuses.
“Overall interest in caucuses, whether it’s Democrats or Republicans, really diminished after propositions 107 and 108 passed, which allowed for open (presidential) primaries,” Peters said.
Before this year, the La Plata County GOP had also seen attendance at its caucuses decline from an estimated 140 in 2018 to 89 in 2020.
Peters attributed this year’s support to Republican outreach efforts and an increase in interest in the Republican Party.
“A lot of people don’t understand what the primary process is and why they should attend and why it matters,” he said. “We had a pretty big outreach effort to explain to people that if you become a delegate (during the caucus), you’re actually deciding which candidates get onto the primary ballot. I think (voters) were better educated this time than in the past.”
Peters has also noticed more people attending the county GOP’s monthly meetings. In the past, 15 to 20 people showed up to the monthly meetings, but in the last year participation has grown to about 60 to 70.
“People are more concerned about the direction of the country and want to get involved,” he said.
Republican voters cited education, energy development and the La Plata County land-use code as driving forces behind their participation in the 2022 caucus, he said.
Markward ascribed higher turnout for Republicans and lower turnout for Democrats to the Democratic control of many national, state and local offices.
“Anytime you have a party that is putting up someone against the (current) elected official you have greater vibrancy, you have greater enthusiasm,” she said. “The most contested race for us was Congressional District 3 because it’s a Republican (Rep. Lauren Boebert). ... There’s a lot of interest about that race on our side.”
While the La Plata County Democrats may have had less participation than Republicans during the caucus process this year, the party’s executive committee feels confident voters will show up motivated come November for both local and state elections.
“We feel good,” Bowman said. “We feel that Colorado continues to go in the right direction and both national politics and Colorado’s politics favor us. Most importantly, we feel like we have the right candidates.”
Though Congressional District 3 now favors Republicans by 8.4 percentage points, according to an analysis by Politico, Bowman expressed optimism that Democrats could take the district, in part because Boebert continues to be a polarizing figure.
“State offices, local offices, we’re very, very confident,” Bowman said. “We’ve got great people.”
Peters shared a similar confidence that Republican candidates could sweep many of the offices up for grabs. He pointed to the redistricting of Colorado’s House District 59, currently represented by Rep. Barbara McLachlan, which favors Democrats by just 2.2 percentage points.
“We’ve got strong candidates (which) is one thing I’m bullish about,” Peters said. “The other is that people are really frustrated with the direction of our state and our country.”
He said independent voters will be key to deciding the 2022 elections.
“I really think that independent voters are very likely going to be turning to Republican candidates,” he said.
Both parties will be keeping an eye on the races for Congressional District 3, in which nine Democratic challengers are vying for a chance to run against Republican incumbent Lauren Boebert (or whoever wins the primary), and House District 59 where Shelli Shaw will run against Democratic incumbent McLachlan.
Locally, the race for La Plata County’s District 1 county commissioner seat is set to be the most competitive and closely watched race. Republican Brad Blake and Democrat Clyde Church, who have both served as county commissioner, will face off against independent candidate Jack Turner.
“I think this is going to look more like a presidential year for voter turnout,” Peters said.
ahannon@durangoherald.com
