Too few extra signatures and a late start in hiring professional help most likely are the reasons Republican Marc Holtzman may not make the primary ballot for governor.
Holtzman, who needed at least 10,500 valid signatures – 1,500 in each of the state’s seven congressional districts – submitted 21,094. Dan Kennedy, president of Kennedy Enterprises in Colorado Springs, said he was hired only three weeks ago to supplement volunteers’ efforts and that his company gathered about half of the signatures.
Dan Smith, a former University of Denver political science professor, blamed the campaign.
“You should get two to three times as many signatures as you need,” said Smith, who is now at the University of Florida. “That speaks volumes about problems in his ground campaign and possibly being a political neophyte in the political arena.”
But Holtzman defended his campaign organization.
“We are supremely confident that we have supplied more than enough signatures,” Holtzman said Friday, adding that the improper disqualification of some petition gatherers caused him to fall short.
However, only 226 signatures were disqualified solely because the circulator wasn’t a registered Republican, according to a computer-assisted analysis of secretary of state records.
In the 1st and 7th congressional districts, the two districts where Holtzman fell hundreds short, only 17 and 13 signatures, respectively, were disqualified solely because of circulators’ party registration.
The bulk of the disqualifications in those districts occurred because non-Republicans signed the petition, according to the data.
Kennedy said that Secretary of State Gigi Dennis may have been more aggressive in disqualifying signatures because of her own party affiliation – also Republican.
There have been rumors that Dennis might join Bob Beauprez on the ticket, but her spokeswoman, Dana Williams, said Dennis hasn’t been approached by Beauprez and that politics would never affect petition certification.
“Bob Beauprez has not contacted her – it’s truly a rumor,” Williams said.
Staff writer Chris Frates contributed to this report.
Staff writer Arthur Kane can be reached at 303-820-1626 or akane@denverpost.com.
