One of the more interesting Primary Election stories that you might have missed happened in Yuma, Colorado, where Sheriff Chad Day lost his job in a Republican Primary to challenger Todd Combs.
Day will be out of a job just months after news reports detailing agreements to “deputize” a mega-rich GOP donor and his friends who were looking to take advantage of a loophole in the law that would allow them to carry a concealed weapon wherever they went. In exchange for adding billionaire hedge-fund manager Robert Mercer and pals — none of whom live anywhere near Yuma, Colorado — to a list of volunteer “posse” members with the Sheriff’s Department, Day received a shiny new Dodge Ram 1500 Limited pickup truck for his official use, as well as $20,000 worth of tasers and an apparent promise to get more money for new handguns. Day defended this decision by making absurd claims that Mercer and his buddies were an important part of some sort of undercover police operation against a Mexican drug cartel (we couldn’t possibly make this up).
Yuma County voters were apparently not pleased that Day was selling out their community for gifts from out-of-state billionaires, and they promptly voted him out of office. Day is also the current President of the Colorado County Sheriffs’ Association, which doesn’t reflect well on the rest of the state — fortunately he won’t be holding that title much longer.
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I hope you will follow up when there is a new sheriff, confirming if there actually is a departure of R
ichobert Mercer and perhaps finding out what he actually did while serving as a volunteer posse member.Day also shocked many several years ago when he testified for repealing the High Capacity Magazine ban stating "We need high capacity magazines to defend ourselves from the government." Yikes! With that view you can see why he was a favorite of the Rocky Mountain Gun Owners.
All in all, June 26th was a rather awful day for the RMGO.
It had donated $1000 to Day, and spent several hundred in ads for him.
Day's loss added to the misery RMGO experienced in Frank Francone's losing the HD22 bid, where it spent over $8000 in donations and expenditures.
Other RMGO financially-supported candidates were equally unsuccessful: Ray Garcia lost to Rep. Lois Landgraf (HD 21); Diane Holbert lost commissioner nomination in Douglas County and Chanlon Kintzley lost commissioner nomination in Larimer County.
The only bright spot for the RMGO was helping repulse Rep. Dan Thurlow's "long-shot" attempt to unseat Sen. Ray Scott in Grand Junction, where they committed about $4000.
With such a subpar success rate, one wonders where the fearsome reputation of the RMGO resides…perhaps it's just in the personal threats made by some after being stirred by RMGO's extremist rhetoric.
Then again Tony Sanchez won in SD 22.
The Dirty didn't have a primary opponent. And Brittany Pettersen will make mincemeat of him.
Never underestimate the ability of a Republican to lose even when running unopposed. Agreed about Brittany. She is going to be my state senator come January.
Daddy Neville is still the R candidate in SD-16. He's going to get ousted by Story, but like Sanchez they didn't outright fail to protect Neville.
That is correct. Story is the Democratic nominee for SD16 – and she probably will take out Daddy Neville. I had mistakenly written that she had beaten Neville in a primary. She did get 18,000 some votes in her primary, while Neville only got about 13,000 for his.
I do hope Yuma County seizes the keys to the shiny pickup quickly.
And the documents. And any other gifts.