April 12, 2019 11:37 AM UTC

Get More Smarter on Friday (April 12)

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• by: Colorado Pols

The Denver Nuggets start their playoff run on Saturday at home against the San Antonio Spurs. It’s time “Get More Smarter.” If you think we missed something important, please include the link in the comments below (here’s a good example). If you are more of a visual learner, check out The Get More Smarter Show.

TOP OF MIND TODAY…

► President Trump is affirming threats to release immigrant detainees into the home districts of prominent Democrats as punishment for not letting him build his big border wall. As the Washington Post reports:

Trump said Friday that his administration is giving “strong considerations” to a plan to release immigrant detainees into “sanctuary cities,” blaming Democrats for what he characterized as an unwillingness to change immigration laws.

His comments on Twitter followed a Washington Post report that the administration had been eyeing districts of political adversaries, including that of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), to release detainees.

“The Radical Left always seems to have an Open Borders, Open Arms policy – so this should make them very happy!” Trump wrote.

His tweets suggested that the plan, which immigration officials had rejected in November and February, was again viable.

Never underestimate the ability of President Trump to sink lower than you ever thought possible. As Chris Cillizza writes for CNN:

The fact that this would even be considered speaks volumes about how Trump (and Miller) view not only the ongoing crisis at the border, but human beings more generally. [Pols emphasis]

Because this is, at heart, a story about people. People who tried to enter the country illegally, yes. But people nonetheless. And what the President of the United States wanted to do to these human beings was turn them, literally speaking, into political pawns. Ship them somewhere so that they could, maybe, accomplish a political goal of his — and, if not that, then just make things more uncomfortable for his political opponents…

…Only by seeing certain people as lesser or a threat can you treat them like political pawns on your broader chessboard.

And when you see people as something less than, well, people you can rationalize treating them in ways that no person should be treated. That’s where we are with President Trump on immigration. There is no bottom. He just keeps going lower and lower. [Pols emphasis]

► The Denver Post endorses Denver Mayor Michael Hancock for re-election:

Ballots for the city’s spring election will arrive in mailboxes next week, and we hope voters consider how very much is on the horizon in Denver to be excited about….

…Hancock’s administration and City Council have stood up to developers, even if at times we wish they had reacted more quickly: rejecting slot-home developments; closing a loophole that allowed developers of multi-family houses on small lots to not provide off-street parking; setting an ambitious goal for affordable housing, meeting it early and then creating a multi-million dollar fund to keep the progress going. We see the mayor’s leadership in creating Denver Day Works, a program that sets aside city work for day laborers, and in his commitment to creating new shelter beds, improving existing shelter spaces and building a daytime facility with showers and other resources.

More needs to be done, but Hancock is ready and willing to meet the challenges of a booming city and he is the only candidate ready to meet the challenges if this nation faces an economic downturn.

► What are Republican recall attempts in Colorado really about? Making money, of course.
 
 
Get even more smarter after the jump…

IN CASE YOU ARE STANDING NEAR A WATER COOLER…

► The re-election campaign for Senator Cory Gardner (R-Yuma) announced Q1 fundraising totals on Thursday. Gardner’s $2 million quarter is curiously unremarkable.

► As E&E News reports without sarcasm, Sen. Gardner is working on a 2020 re-election strategy centered around his environmental protection “work.”

“We’ve had some very good successes, and we’ll continue to tout that environmental record,” Gardner told E&E News.

Actual environmental groups don’t see things the same way, however:

“Coloradans have demonstrated over and over that they want leaders who don’t just have rhetoric on protecting public lands and moving forward on wind and solar energy, they want to see action on that,” said Pete Maysmith, senior vice president of campaigns at the League of Conservation Voters.

The group, which overwhelmingly backs Democrats for elections, gives Gardner a 10% rating on its environmental voting scorecard.

“Sen. Gardner’s fallen woefully short of the mark, and he’s going to have to answer to the voters in 2020,” Maysmith said.

Talk about tilting toward (cancer-causing) windmills.

► University of Colorado Regents are blaming a North Dakota newspaper for rushing a decision about the sole finalist to be CU’s new President. From the Denver Post:

University of Colorado officials say a North Dakota newspaper article forced them to rush their public unveiling of presidential finalist Mark R. Kennedy, with one regent suggesting the former Republican congressman’s background hadn’t yet been sufficiently reviewed.

“We need the press and the public to do the job in vetting him,” Regent Linda Shoemaker, D-Boulder, said in an interview Thursday.

The announcement Wednesday that CU’s Board of Regents unanimously had recommended Kennedy — the 61-year-old president of the University of North Dakota — as sole finalist to succeed President Bruce Benson drew immediate criticism over his votes in Congress against gay marriage and to restrict abortion rights in the early 2000s…

…CU System spokesperson Ken McConnellogue said the vetting will continue over the next few weeks, culminating with Kennedy’s plan to tour all four CU campuses and meet with faculty, staff, students and alumni between April 22 and 26. The regents will vote on whether to hire Kennedy following those visits.

“We need the press and the public to do the job in vetting him.” Seriously?

► Former FBI Director James Comey is pushing back against assertions from Attorney General William Barr that government agencies were “spying” on the Trump campaign in 2016. When asked about Russian disinformation campaigns, Comey says he is currently more worried about muddying of the waters by the Trump administration.

► The Denver Post reports on an Executive Order signed by Gov. Jared Polis to establish a commission to research and support employee-owned businesses.

► The Washington Post has a handy little tool for helping to understand which Democratic Presidential candidates could be considered “viable” in 2020.

► Colorado native David Bernhardt is officially the new Secretary of Interior.

► Republicans are hoping that voters will buy into their “Democrats are socialists” arguments ahead of the 2020 election cycle. But as Politico reports, this strategy didn’t work in 2018:

In Pennsylvania last year, Republicans tagged Democrats up and down the ticket as socialists or sympathetic to socialism: Gov. Tom Wolf, congressional candidates and state representative hopefuls all got the hammer-and-sickle treatment. The strategy was deliberate and coordinated, emanating from the state’s Republican Party chairman, Val DiGiorgio.

But come Election Day, Democrats flipped three House seats and 16 more in the state General Assembly. Wolf easily won reelection, as did Democratic Sen. Bob Casey…

…The election in Pennsylvania serves as a case study of a campaign strategy that could prove critical to Trump’s reelection — or undoing — in 2020.

► Colorado Public Radio profiles the man who will be responsible for implementing new oil and gas regulations approved by the Colorado legislature.

► Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell is apparently getting tired of trying to defend President Trump’s terrible nominees for various cabinet-level positions — nominees like Herman Cain.

► Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, or so the saying goes.

Your Daily Dose Of ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ 

► Colorado Republican Party officials are working hard to convince themselves that President Trump is not an albatross on their 2020 election hopes.

► Will the Mueller Report be revealed this weekend? The Onion has an idea:

ICYMI

► Everyone has a First Amendment right to make a complete ass of themselves. Some in Colorado just seem to do it more than others.

► Colorado Republican Party Chairman Ken Buck was asked about the Neville Clan profiting from recall elections. He punted.

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