Category Archives: Scott Gessler

UPDATE: Colorado Ethics Watch updates us on the question of a previous Secretary of State who took the entire $5,000 discretionary account balance in the form of a check:

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As reported in yesterday's Denver Post, the result of an independent investigation into Colorado Secretary of State Scott Gessler's alleged use of state funds to travel to partisan Republican events last year–including the Republican National Lawyers Association conference, immediately followed by the 2012 Republican National Convention in Tampa, Florida:

A plane ticket and $1,278.90 in expenses for the RNLA meeting were paid for with state funds. Gessler also attended the Republican National Convention while in Florida, but used campaign funds for expenses other than the plane ticket.

The report released Wednesday is a finding of fact, not a determination whether Gessler's actions were unethical.

Here are some details in the report from Heartland Investigative Group:

The investigation revealed that Secretary Gessler did attend and was a speaker at the Republican National Lawyers Association National Election Seminar in Sarasota, Florida on August 24th to 25th. The plane ticket and his expenses were paid out of the discretionary fund allotted annually to the Secretary of State in the amount of $5,000.00. The total amount paid out of the discretionary fund for his attendance at the Republican National Lawyers Association meeting was $1278.90. The plane ticket was $498.78…

It appears that Secretary Gessler did attend the Republican National Convention in Tampa, Florida, and his expenses were paid from his campaign funds, with the exception of his plane ticket. The cost of his plane ticket to Tampa does not appear to have been prorated between the Republican National Lawyers Association meeting and his attendance at the Republican National Convention. This ticket was paid for entirely from the discretionary fund.

Like we said, this investigative report on behalf of the Independent Ethics Commission does not rule on the legality (or morality) of its findings–that's for the IEC and the court of public opinion to decide. What the report does confirm are facts not really disputed: that Gessler did attend the Republican National Lawyers Association conference using state funds, and that he did use campaign funds to attend the Republican National Convention, with the exception of the plane ticket, the cost of which wasn't pro-rated between the two events.

Of course, if you don't think the RNLA conference was an appropriate use of state funds to begin with, pro-rating expenses between it and the obviously political RNC doesn't really matter. As the investigator reported:

I requested further information from the RNLA and received a response indicating that Secretary Gessler was not a member of the RNLA at the time he spoke at the RNLA National Election Seminar in August of 2012. Secretary Gessler was formally a member of RNLA up until 2006. The response states that the RNLA seminars are generally open to all attorneys regardless of party affiliation… [Pols emphasis]

Try not to giggle, folks. They apparently said it with a straight face–we'll see what the IEC thinks. 

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Full story: Fact: Gessler Used State Funds To Attend GOP Events

SUNDAY UPDATE #3: FOX 31's Eli Stokols reports:

The flier from that new group, which isn’t even registered with the state but lists its address as that of the Hackstaff Law Group, Gessler’s old firm, is a revealing microcosm, just the latest display of a ham-handed political operation on the right. [Pols emphasis]

Beyond the half-shade of separation between the group and the polarizing Secretary of State, the flier itself is almost ridiculous in its hyperbole, stating: “Felons, illegal aliens — even the deceased – could cast ballots!”

If that were the case, H.B. 1303 likely wouldn’t have the support of the Colorado County Clerks Associations, which represents roughly 75 percent of the state’s clerks, more than half of whom are Republicans…

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SUNDAY UPDATE #2: Via Junction Daily Blog, confirmation now that the same mailer was sent into La Plata County targeting another Republican clerk, Tiffany Lee Parker. The La Plata County mailing uses the same verbiage, the same Hackstaff Law Firm return address, and the same altered photo of a line of voters with African-American faces digitally removed.

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SUNDAY UPDATE: The Grand Junction Sentinel's Charles Ashby reports:

While the bill makes several changes to voter registration laws, such as allowing for registering up to Election Day, it doesn’t change how those registrations are done and how voters are verified as eligible to cast ballots, Reiner said.

The flier, however, claims the measure would open the door to “illegal aliens” and the deceased to cast ballots.

Reiner said that’s just nonsense.

“The reality of it is it still requires somebody to bring either their driver’s license, their Colorado ID or the last four digits of their Social Security number and it’s verified in our system,” Reiner said. “With the bill, that doesn’t change.”

…The measure has the support of nearly all county clerks in the state, most of whom are Republicans like Reiner. It is being pushed by the Colorado County Clerk’s Association and its executive director, Donetta Davidson.

Also, a commenter this morning appears to have identified something that, if true, is quite shocking and could add another ugly dimension to this story. If you look closely at the center of the second page of the mailing, at the photo of the voting line, you see two women who look strangely alike. A look at the original photo reveals what happened:

We're astonished to even report this, but it's undeniable: they have Photoshopped out the African-American woman in the original photo. They also appear to have removed an African-American man standing behind her (see photos in comments below).

In the ugliest off-year that anyone we know can remember in Colorado politics, it appears we have hit yet another new low–and this one just makes you shake your head, folks. The worst adjectives you can think of really might actually apply to the deplorable gutter politics on display here. Original post follows.

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Full story: Hardball: Hackstaff Gessler Mailer Targets GOP County Clerks

(Promoted by Colorado Pols)

In an In an editorial yesterday,, The Denver Post praised all the provisions of the election-modernization bill that just passed the State House, but the newspaper questioned the timeline on the implementation of election-day voter registration.

The Post Editorial stated that the "Internet technology specialist" in the Secretary of State's office had an unspecified "problem" with the timeline proposed in the bill, which envisions offering election-day registration starting in the coordinated election this November and primary election in June.

The Post advised that "more time should be allowed for development and testing of same-day registration technology," and the newspaper threw out the completely unsupported suggestion that "consideration" should be given to "disallowing voter registration very close to or on Election Day in the first years of using the technology." [BigMedia emphasis]

It's not clear what problem the Secretary of State's internet expert has with the legislation's timeline, or whether even he thinks it should operate for "years" before it would be trustworthy (somehow I doubt it), but, in any case, The Post should have offered more evidence to support its view. As it is, readers are left thinking The Post irresponsibly relied on just one opinion. One expert, even a reputable one, shouldn't carry the day, just because he happens to agree with the editorial writer.

And as it turns out, there's more to the story.

For the next two elections, prior to the gubernatorial in 2014, the clerks will employ the exact same technology that they currently use to process "address changes" through election day as well as "emergency registrations," Boulder County Clerk and Recorder Hillary Hall told me.

In effect, clerks across Colorado have already processed thousands of same-day registrations on or before election day, using existing technology. Their system, which has been in use since 2008, was live (with backup systems in place) during the last election with all 64 counties participating, Hall said.

In the longer term, a "more seamless" interface is needed, because of the volume increase that's expected in the bigger elections, but it's not required for the next two elections, Hall said, adding that she's confident, based on experience and technical advice, that the new interface will be ready for the 2014 election, which is about a year-and-a-half away. The congressional election would be a good test for the technology leading up to the 2016 presidential election, Hall said.

"It's an ideal time to begin, as we're building to the next presidential," Hall said.

Full story: Post editorial provides insufficient evidence that timeline for election-day registration is too short

A pair of fascinating audio clips sent to us today, timely as debate continues on the Colorado Voter Access and Modernized Elections Act, House Bill 1303. The first clip is Colorado Secretary of State Scott Gessler speaking last January in defense of the SCORE statewide voter registration database. You might recall that last year, the online voter registration interface to SCORE broke down a couple of times–due to capacity issues immediately prior to the registration deadline, and a misconfiguration of a mobile registration portal. Gessler came in for substantial criticism after those failures, so his report back in January was important. According to Gessler, despite these "glitches," the system was an "astronomical success."

The second two clips (all separated by beeps on the audio track) are both of Gessler speaking last Monday in opposition to House Bill 1303. Gessler seems miffed about the criticism he received regarding the trouble with SCORE last October, which he claims to be "proud of"–especially since this is the system to be relied upon even more under House Bill 1303's provisions for voter registration up through Election Day.

But Gessler is between a rock and a hard place–he opposes House Bill 1303, so in the context of his testimony he has no choice but to identify "points of failure" that could be a problem. The same "quarter million people" that amounted to an "astronomical success" last fall could be a disaster now! County clerks offices in chaos! The problems from last fall somehow "compounded" as a result! Gessler concludes by insisting he wasn't given enough funding in this bill to adequately test the system to handle the pressure.

When you put these clips together, the contradiction is painfully obvious. Despite all of Gessler's "testing" before 2012, "glitches" occurred–but the system was still an "astronomical success."

Today, that potential for "glitches" is a dealbreaker? It's nonsense, folks.

Full story: Gessler Loves SCORE, Except When He Doesn’t

(Promoted by Colorado Pols)

Scott Gessler.

On KOA's Mike Rosen show this morning, Secretary of State Scott Gessler amped up his attacks on The Denver Post, saying, among other things, that the newspaper is "ideologically skewed in one direction, and that's where they devote their resources."

Tell that to ColoradoPols, Mr, Secretary of State. But it gets worse.

In response to Rosen's assertion that Post news coverage of Gessler channels "Democrat talking points" and gives "lip service to the other side," Gessler said:

"I think that's true lately. I think part of it depends on who the reporter is who covers my office. So this article today is written by a guy Joey Bunch. He's new on the beat. So we'll see how well he works. I'm sort of optimistic that he will be a lot fairer than what we've seen in the past."

I asked the collective wisdom on Twitter if anyone thinks Post reporter Joey Bunch will be "a lot fairer" to Gessler than the Post's previous Gessler-beat reporters , Tim Hoover and Sara Barnett.

No one replied, but I can tell you that Hoover (who's writing editorials) and Barnett (who's gone) are widely considered stars in Denver journalism circles.

Gessler implied that The Post has an institutional bias against him, saying:

"You know, I think The Denver Post is just ideologically skewed in one direction, and that's where they devote their resources."

And he expects The Post to get fully behind former Senate Majority Leader Ken Gordon, who's running against Gessler.

"I'll be running against Ken Gordon and his largest corporate donor, which is The Denver Post," Gessler told an approving Rosen.

Gessler's comments today go beyond the usual darts he's thrown at The Post and other media outlets in the past. He's trashing specific Post reporters, as well as the entire institution. 

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Full story: Gessler says Denver Post out to get him and other conservatives