State GOP Chair Dave Williams knows opting out of the open primary will kill the Republican Party, and yet he still supports it. In 2021 I attended a debate on whether the State Central Committee (SCC), the Party’s governing body, should vote to opt out of the open primary that was passed by voters and went into effect during the 2018 mid-terms. Leading the YES side of the opt out debate was Dave Williams (before he was elected GOP Chair). It was the first time the SCC would vote on the issue.
Making his case to opt out, Williams said that about 40% of unaffiliateds vote the Republican primary ballot, and, he asserted, that means they are nearly guaranteed to vote Republican in the general election. I put down my pen and thought to myself, “What? He’s just destroyed his own argument!” Yet Williams didn’t realize that obvious take-away. Since registered Republicans are only about 23% of Colorado’s electorate and unaffiliateds dominate at 48%, Dave should have switched sides right then and admitted we desperately need those Republican-leaning unaffiliateds to win elections. But he didn’t.
Instead, a large and vocal tribe of Republicans, Dave Williams acolytes mostly, have been trying to destroy the ability of unaffiliateds to vote in the primary, insisting that only Republicans should be able to vote in a GOP primary. This is doubtless philosophically true, but mathematical hari-kari in the real world. If indeed about 40% of unaffiliateds vote Republican as Williams contended, he and the Colorado GOP leadership leading the call for the opt-out want to eliminate about 746,640 potential unaffiliateds votes for Republicans (unaffiliateds number about 1,866,600 according to the Secretary of State website as of 8/1/24).
A Party divided
This is the boiling volcanic core of the current Republican civil war. The opt-outers relentlessly belittle the unaffiliateds instead of embracing them, insisting they must register as Republican if they want to vote the primary ballot. One little problem: if the opt-out succeeds, there will be no Republican primary ballot. Those nearly two million unaffiliated voters will receive only the Democrat primary ballot. Even the 900,000 or so registered Republicans will not receive a Republican primary ballot or be able to vote Republican at a polling place. They will get no Republican ballot with no Republican candidates – from county commissioner and sheriff races all the way up to senator, representative and governor. Only Democrats will appear on the unaffiliated primary ballot. The Republican Party will have simply vanished.
Is deserting the playing field and leaving it wide open to the rival team a realistic way to grow the Republican Party – or is it a really certain way to lose more elections?
Many Republicans, even SCC members and elected officials, think that voting for the opt out will return us to the closed Republican primary of yesteryear. But that’s not the case. The terms of the open primary are governed by CRS 1-4-702 which states that if a political party opts out, primary nominations for all offices (except president) can only take place at “assemblies or conventions.”
So how will the 900,000 Colorado Republicans actually vote? Do Williams and those who echo his talking points think every registered Republican will be able to attend every assembly that must be held for every primary office in every jurisdiction in the state in order to vote? How will the Party pay for all these assemblies for hundreds of elective offices across the state? Every registered Republican can vote now without forking over assembly badge fees to pay for the meetings, without paying a babysitter, or filling their tanks with gas to drive to numerous primary assemblies for a multitude of local, state and national offices.
Williams ran for chair on the pledge he would close the primary. But he needs 75% of the SCC membership to opt out, as stipulated by the law. At last September’s SCC meeting he and his opt-out supporters got 65% of the vote. At the same time, they tried to pass a new bylaw that would count SCC members who didn’t vote or were absent as yes votes for the opt out. The Party “leadership,” those stalwart devotees of election integrity, wanted to actually disenfranchise their own members. This disgraceful vote-steal ploy was eventually voted down. Unfortunately, Williams and his palace guard don’t hesitate to go full authoritarian to get their way.
At the April State Convention, Williams convinced delegates to approve a similar scheme; a resolution that ordered the SCC members to vote for the opt out at the next SCC meeting.
The opt out vote was scheduled for the 8/31 meeting; however, it was removed from the agenda after Williams said they would not take it up because there’s “probably enough controversy for us to deal with…” Williams nevertheless defended the resolution of the Pueblo Convention that ordered the SCC to vote to opt out, stating to enthusiastic applause, “The state delegates directed this body to pass the opt out. We will be having a vote before the end of my term to effectuate that change, and once we do that, we will notify the proper authorities…”.
But a major glitch piped up from a powerful quarter. Longtime respected Bylaws Committee Chair, Douglas County GOP District Captain and SCC Bonus Member, attorney John Fielding, stepped to the microphone and noted, “I am about to make myself unpopular but, speaking personally and not on the behalf of the Bylaws Committee, I must respectfully disagree with Chairman Williams.” Fielding explained that the resolution of the Convention delegates back in the spring demanding the SCC to vote yes on the opt out “is invalid because it violates Colorado election law,” specifically the opt out statute itself (CRS 1-4-702) that “gives this body (the SCC) the exclusive power to opt out.” According to the law, the Convention delegates have no jurisdiction no matter what Dave Williams says or what resolutions he has urged be passed to the contrary.
Why Republicans lose
Those who want the open primary gone like to blame Republican losses on the 2018 open primary law, but both parties were losing voters to the unaffiliated ranks long before that. The GOP has been losing elections ever since the wealthy Gang of Four radical Democrat plotters – current Governor Jared Polis, Pat Stryker, Rutt Bridges and Tim Gill – put their determined financial muscle and The Blueprint behind defeating Republicans statewide over a decade ago.
I voted against the open primary but am also against the opt out. I and the rest of us who realize winning requires that we add Republican voters, not lose them, are demonized as establishment, RINOS, and worse by the Purity Patrol that has ruled the state GOP since Williams was elected chair. I don’t understand their disdain, even animosity, against the unaffiliateds who are on our side and whose votes can help us win elections. Preventing the Republican-leaning unaffiliateds from voting Republican in the primary is suicide, as Dave Williams accidentally acknowledged in that debate a few years ago. And according to the aforementioned Bylaws Committee Chair, attorney John Fielding, “The opt out will go a long way toward destroying the Party for a very long time.”
Are the opt-outers so wedded to their Republicans-only exclusive club that they would rather be whittled down to a lonely island of malcontents than become a dynamic force for America-first prosperity and patriotic resurgence in Colorado?
This Party must welcome unaffiliateds and give them reasons to vote Republican. The uncommitted must be wooed, not vilified. Under Dave Williams, our best candidates have been attacked and savaged by the very Party that is supposed to support them. He has labeled fellow Republicans upset by his fiery-eyed Jesus “God Hates Pride” email as child molesters who favor sexual mutilation of young people – totally outrageous. He claims anyone who disagrees with him is anti-Trump, another preposterous lie.
Some in the Party reject the idea of changing horses so close to this critical election. But our congressional candidates have called for Williams to resign, knowing they will get little to no help from him to win their races. I have horses, and I can tell you it’s time to stop riding a horse when it goes lame and is near collapse. I hope SCC members who want this Party to have a chance at the big races will realize at long last that to reject 746,640 potential Republican votes from the unaffiliated makes no sense whatsoever. Math is hard, and so is reality, but both must be embraced. We need fresh horses to win.
Joy Overbeck is a Colorado journalist and longtime Douglas County Republican Precinct Leader whose work has appeared at Townhall.com, Complete Colorado, Rocky Mountain Voice, American Thinker, The Washington Times, The Federalist and elsewhere. Follow her on Facebook and on Twitter (X) @joyoverbeck1
