Two big pieces of news came out today on Tom Tancredo’s Constitution Party campaign for Colorado Governor that seem to make a striking contrast.
First, campaign finance reports are in on the three major candidates in the race. The Associated Press reports,
Third-party gubernatorial candidate Tom Tancredo has outpaced the Colorado Republicans’ nominee, Dan Maes, in August fundraising and has almost the same sum in the bank as Democrat John Hickenlooper, a sign the race could be more competitive than previously thought.
Tancredo collected $200,485 to Maes’ $50,201, The Denver Post reported. Maes had almost $18,000 cash on hand, compared with more than $141,000 for Tancredo. Hickenlooper reported raising almost $404,000 in August and having more than $171,500 banked at the end of the month — surprisingly close to Tancredo, who was a last-minute addition to the race.
Although the poll numbers have not yet followed, Tancredo seems to be stealing the momentum away from Repbulican Dan Maes’ campaign. Two days ago IPR reported on over 20 Republican endorsements coming in for Tancredo’s candidacy. More analysis on this shift in the race can be found here.
However, less savory news came out today for Tancredo.
Tom Tancredo won’t be allowed to participate in Club 20′s gubernatorial debate on Saturday because of the group’s rules about third-party candidates.
Only Democrat John Hickenlooper and Republican Dan Maes will be on the stage, said Reeves Brown, director of the Western Slope civic group.
Apparently the Libertarians’ performances in the group’s 2006 debates were controversial, so Club 20 made a rule that a party must have at least 1% voter registration to participate. The Constitution Party does not meet this standard, so Tancredo is barred from participation. The last Rasmussen poll of the race had Tancredo at 14% support. The group does not appear to have a position on what criteria an independent candidate would have to meet in order to debate.
6 responses so far ↓
1 Erik G. // Sep 10, 2010 at 3:11 am
For what it’s worth…
I e-mailed Richard Winger over at Ballot Access News about the Club 20 story, and he relayed that he’s been in contact with the group and they’re weighing his (very effective, in my opinion) arguments while seeming open to changing their stance.
2 Richard Winger // Sep 10, 2010 at 10:38 am
Thanks, Erik, for your comment. You are right; Club 20 is re-thinking. One example is that in 1990, A Connecticut Party had only 1,770 registrants, which was only one-tenth of 1% of the Connecticut state registration total. Yet A Connecticut Party won the gubernatorial race.
3 Daniel Surman // Sep 10, 2010 at 10:57 am
The Connnecticut for Lieberman party would probably have been a similar situation to the above, no?
4 Richard Winger // Sep 10, 2010 at 11:33 am
That’s a very good point about the Connecticut for Lieberman Party. The state didn’t tally its registrations until the Oct. 30, 2007 tally, and at that time it only had 10 registered voters.
5 Cody Quirk // Sep 10, 2010 at 12:18 pm
They better change their minds, it will only come to bite them in the butt later on.
6 '..... just look at the activists ' [Lake] // Sep 10, 2010 at 12:23 pm
Nah, the establishment does not care if the ‘pain’ is mere discomfort. We’ve gotta make these pucks sweat and actually hurt. This will be forgotten by Thanksgiving. Sorry to say!
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