Here is your first look at “Rocky Mountain Heist,” the movie about how the political right thinks the political left took control of Colorado. The documentary will be available on TV in a matter of days, and a website for it, www.rockymountainheist.com, went live this afternoon.
Citizens United, the conservative group that brought the landmark campaign finance case to the U.S. Supreme Court in 2010, won the right to put out the movie before the Nov. 4 election without disclosing its financial backers from a federal appeals court in Denver this week. The Virginia-based non-profit successfully argued it deserved the same protections as other media sources and shouldn’t have to adhere to state campaign finance rules on electioneering.
The trailer gives a glimpse of a lot of familiar conservative faces from Colorado politics: former U.S. Rep. Tom Tancredo, a two-time candidate for governor; Weld County District Attorney Ken Buck, who’s running for Congress this year; Jon Caldara, the president of the Independence Institute; and Laura Carno, a Republican strategist and founder of the local nonprofit I Am Created Equal.
The movie also has a familiar Colorado voice: national political blogger and commentator Michelle Malkin, .
“Liberty-loving Americans, you must watch our film exposing how a small group of wealthy liberals overtook Colorado,” she said in a statement released by Citizens United. “They used every scheme possible to impose a backward agenda and they transformed the place I love into a testing ground for their liberal ideology.”
“Rocky Mountain Heist” was written and directed by Jason Killian Meath, the filmmaker who slammed Mitt Romney in “King of Bain” in 2012 with funding from a Super PAC aligned with Newt Gingrich.
“Our cameras caught people coming out of every corner who wanted to take their state back,” stated Meath. “It was amazing how fed up Coloradans had become with the state they thought they knew.”
The movie is produced by David N. Bossie, president of Citizens United, which has made 23 other movies before taking on the topic of Colorado.
What was the result of the “Rocky Mountain Heist,” according to Citizen United?
“Now, homelessness is at an all-time high, marijuana is smoked in once family-friendly parks, gun control is rampant and the state’s energy industry is under constant assault,” the group said in announcing the trailer Wednesday. “Unfortunately, the State of Colorado is now a perfect example of President Obama’s promise to ‘fundamentally transform America.’”
I’m guessing it’s not a feel-good movie.
Michael Huttner, the founderother Progress Now Colorado and the current spokesman for Making Colorado Great (the political group campaigning against GOP gubernatorial nominee Bob Beauprez), had no comment about the film. Gov. John Hickenlooper is featured in the trailer, and it’s likely the Democratic governor is prominent in the movie, as well. His campaign has bypassed offers to comment on the movie this week.
Citizens United will air ads for the movie, but the ads themselves can’t attack a candidate or disclosing who’s paying for the ads will come back into play. Jeff Marschner, the spokesman for Citizens United, said the trailer released Wednesday won’t be used as an ad. It’s on Youtube.
Colorado Ethics Watch joined with other organizations opposing Citizens United’s request. Opponents claimed victory in that the movie can’t be a pretext to run anonymously funded attack ads that ostensibly promote the movie.
“We are pleased that the Tenth Circuit rejected Citizens United’s invitation to throw out Colorado’s electioneering disclosure law,” to be exempt from disclosure laws,” said Luis Toro, the director of Ethics Watch. “No one ever questioned Citizens United’s right to spend unlimited corporate cash making their ‘movie.’ If they want to spend money on ads about candidates right before the election, however, they must follow the same disclosure laws as everyone else. Thatap exactly what the Tenth Circuit said (Tuesday).”
