September 25, 2017 12:14 PM UTC

Get More Smarter on Monday (September 25)

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• by: Colorado Pols

Coloradans are not going to back President Trump over the Denver Broncos. It’s time to 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…

► Arizona Sen. John McCain may have torpedoed Republican efforts to repeal Obamacare, but the rhetoric out of Washington D.C. suggests that the Senate might still try to force a vote this week. Senate Republicans made some changes to the Graham-Cassidy legislation that is the topic of debate this week, but as the Washington Post reports, it’s probably not enough to get the bill across the finish line:

The Republican senators at the forefront of the latest effort to undo the Affordable Care Act proposed Monday sending more health-care dollars to the states of key holdouts, hoping to keep their bill viable as it faced a wall of resistance on Capitol Hill.

Republican Sens. Bill Cassidy (La.) and Lindsey O. Graham (S.C.) have given Alaska and Maine — two of whose GOP senators, Lisa Murkowski (Alaska) and Susan Collins (Maine), respectively — have expressed concerns but not yet declared how they would vote on the measure.

But there was little evidence Monday that the changes would secure enough votes for the legislation’s passage. Sen. Rand Paul (Ky.), who is one of two GOP senators against the bill, reiterated his opposition to the updated measure, and the other lawmaker, Sen. John McCain (Ariz.), has objected to it on the grounds that there has been no bipartisan outreach…

…A vote by Collins or any other senator would be enough to defeat the bill, since no Democrats are expected to support it. Republicans hold a 52-to-48 advantage in the Senate and can lose only two votes from their party and still pass legislation with the help of a tiebreaking vote from Vice President Pence.

► Senator Cory Gardner (R-Yuma) was quoted by the New York Times on Friday telling his fellow caucus members that Republican “donors are furious” over the GOP’s inability to move healthcare legislation forward; Gardner was a guest on the CBS show “Face the Nation” on Sunday, where he was asked twice to comment about the idea that repealing Obamacare was more about appeasing major donors than anything else. Gardner did as Gardner does by ducking both questions.

► State Treasurer Walker Stapleton finally made his announcement that he will seek the Republican nomination for Governor in 2018.

► Governor John Hickenlooper responds to Republican legislators who have been voicing their opposition to a “special session” called for next week. In short: We’ll see you on Monday.

► Check out the latest episode of “The Get More Smarter Show,” featuring an in-depth interview with Joe Neguse, Democratic candidate for Congress in CD-2.

Get even more smarter after the jump…

IN CASE YOU ARE STANDING NEAR A WATER COOLER…

► Colorado Republicans will not scrap the GOP Primary in 2018 after calling a meeting to discuss the issue that nobody bothered to attend. As Ernest Luning reports for the publication formerly known as the Colorado Statesman:

Unaffiliated voters will be able to cast ballots next year in Colorado’s Republican primary.

GOP leaders on Saturday failed to approve a proposal to cancel the 2018 primary election rather than allow unaffiliated voters to participate…

…Under a provision in Proposition 108, either major party can “opt out” of holding a primary and instead nominate candidates to the November ballot solely using the caucus and assembly process — something Democrats say they didn’t even consider.

Technically, the question couldn’t have passed at the state GOP’s meeting at a high school in Englewood, because there weren’t enough Republicans present to approve opting out — even if the vote had been unanimous. The law requires three-quarters of a major party’s central committee to vote in favor of canceling the primary, but only 62 percent of the body showed up, making it impossible to reach the threshold.

Instead, Republicans held what amounted to a non-binding straw poll on scrapping the primary, and that went down 67-33. Another proposal calling on the state GOP to sue to overturn Proposition 108 on constitutional grounds failed by an identical margin.

► Colorado officials were informed on Friday that our state was one of many that was targeted by Russians attempting to influence the 2016 election results.

► The Denver Republican Party joined their peers in Jefferson County by demanding that Republicans repeal Obamacare immediately or find replacement Members of Congress.

► North Korea says that President Trump effectively declared war on their country via Twitter. From CNN:

North Korea’s Foreign Minister Ri Yong Ho on Monday accused US President Donald Trump of declaring war on his country by tweeting over the weekend that North Korea “won’t be around much longer.”

“Last weekend Trump claimed that our leadership wouldn’t be around much longer and declared a war on our country,” Ri said, according to an official translation of his remarks to reporters in New York.

“Since the United States declared war on our country, we will have every right to make all self-defensive counter measures, including the right to shoot down the United States strategic bombers at any time even when they are not yet inside the aerospace border of our country,” Ri said.

State Department spokesperson Katina Adams responded to the comments, telling CNN, “the United States has not ‘declared war’ on North Korea. We continue to seek a peaceful denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula,” Adams said. She also defended the right of the US to conduct flyovers in international airspace: “No nation has the right to fire on other nations’ aircraft or ships in international airspace or waters.”

As the New York Times reports, top aides to President Trump would like His Hairness to stop calling the North Korean leader “Rocket Man.”

► German Chancellor Angela Merkel was re-elected for a fourth term over the weekend, but there are some ominous signs from Germany’s election results. 

► The University of Colorado will ignore Education Secretary Betsy DeVos when it comes to investigations of sexual assault on campus.  

► You can have your cake and support gay marriage, too.

► The City of Denver will host a Marijuana Management Symposium in late October.

► Former Republican Congressman Tom Tancredo is still deliberating on whether to run for Governor in 2018. In the meantime, Tancredo continues to exchange barbs with Rep. Mike Coffman, the man who succeeded him in CD-6. And now, there’s this:

EXCLUSIVE: Coffman asks Tancredo to challenge him in #CO6 primary, instead of “one of his white supremacist friends.”#9NEWS #COpolitics pic.twitter.com/EfGxxhsCOh

— Brandon Rittiman (@BrandonRittiman) September 25, 2017

Tancredo probably won’t challenge Coffman in a GOP Primary in 2018, but Republicans are speaking out about their desire for someone to take a run at Coffman.

Your Daily Dose Of ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ 

► The world did not end over the weekend.

► Former New York Congressman Anthony Weiner has been sentenced to 21 months in prison as a result of a long-running sexting scandal.

ICYMI

► Did we mention that there is a new episode of “The Get More Smarter Show“? It’s true! Check out our in-depth interview with Joe Neguse, Democratic candidate for Congress in CD-2.

Click here for The Get More Smarter Show. You can also Get More Smarter by liking Colorado Pols on Facebook!