A class-action lawsuit filed Thursday in federal court seeks to overturn a Colorado law barring prison parolees from voting.
The law goes a step further than the Colorado Constitution, which does not prohibit voting for people on parole, said Norman Mueller, who filed the action as a volunteer lawyer for the Colorado American Civil Liberties Union.
“It disenfranchises more people than the constitution allows,” Mueller said.
Kristin Hubbell, spokeswoman for the Colorado attorney general, said parole is considered to be part of a prison term and that voting by prisoners is forbidden by the constitution.
“Someone can’t vote while they are incarcerated, while they are in jail, and parole is considered part of that prison term,” she said.
The ACLU filed the action on behalf of parolees and two nonprofit advocacy groups. The lead plaintiff in the lawsuit is Michael Danielson, a Fort Collins resident who is on parole for drug and theft charges.
Danielson, 49, was released in 2003 and runs a ministry to help people who’ve recently gotten out of prison. He said he gives food, clothing, transportation and help finding work. Without such help, many just out of jail find themselves right back in trouble, Danielson said.
Giving parolees the right to vote is one more way of pulling people at the fringe of society back to the center, he said.
“The right to vote is essential to making a parolee feel he is part of the community,” said Danielson, who is director of Church of the Remnant Ministries. “I think it’s another push toward being a productive citizen.”
About 6,000 people in Colorado are on parole, according to the lawsuit.
The lawsuit names Gigi Dennis, the Colorado secretary of state, as a defendant.
According to a research paper published by Northwestern University’s Institute for Policy Research, more than 4.7 million citizens nationwide or 2 percent of voting-age citizens are barred from voting because they are serving time or are ex-convicts.
The professors who wrote the paper examined the political consequences of denying felons the right to vote and said that in the presidential election of 2000, Al Gore would have beaten George W. Bush if those released from prison had had the right to vote.
Staff writer Alicia Caldwell can be reached at 303-820-1930 or acaldwell@denverpost.com.
