The state supported Hillary Clinton for president even as other swing states from Ohio to Florida went for Donald Trump;
Still, many Colorado voters showed they weren’t happy with their choices, no surprise given the state backed Democrat Bernie Sanders and Republican Ted Cruz during the presidential primary.
Gary Johnson, the Libertarian candidate for president, notched 4 percent support as a two-thirds of voters told the AP in an exit poll that they did not see either Clinton or Trump as trustworthy.
As of 12:30 a.m. Wednesday, returns showed an estimated 2 percent of Colorado voters skipped the presidential race. That’s more than twice the undervote of 0.9 percent of 2008 and the largest since at least 2004.
Even before Election Day, there were signs of frustration.
In the Democratic stronghold of Denver, 7 percent of ballots as of Monday had been automatically diverted by counting machines to teams of election judges — most often a sign that a voter had written-in a candidate rather than vote for someone on the ballot, as well as a step that catches overvotes.
Thatap more than double the normal rate, officials said.
In El Paso County, a Republican bastion, the diversion rate was high, too, about 5 percent, said Clerk and Recorder Chuck Broerman.
“Itap garbage — there’s not any good candidates,” said Lexie Clark, 20, who cast a ballot at the University of Colorado at Boulder.
Clark considered writing a different candidate on her ballot, but ultimately she voted for Clinton. “In the end, I went for Hillary because I knew writing in a (different choice) would only end up lending a stronger force to Trump,” she said.
But on the congressional level, Colorado appeared immune to any kind of national wave, whether for Democrats or Republicans. Every federal lawmaker up for re-election won.
U.S. Sen. Michael Bennet defeated Republican challenger Darryl Glenn. U.S. Rep. Scott Tipton, R-Cortez, was up 55 percent to 40 percent against Democrat Gail Schwartz with 49 percent reporting.
Republican U.S. Rep. Mike Coffman beat Democrat Morgan Carroll — but even he was unhappy with the choices. Coffman, fighting to keep an Aurora-area swing seat in GOP hands, said he wouldn’t support Trump, but refused to reveal his choice for president through the end of the campaign.
A major dynamic this election was the growth in independents, now the largest voting bloc in the state.
Four years ago, there were more Republicans than either Democrats or independents, but the GOP has lost its lead as new residents — often younger and liberal — have flooded the state and settled in urban areas like Denver.
“Our trajectory has culturally become much more progressive,” said Lori Weigel, a partner at Public ap Strategies, a Republican polling firm. She cited Colorado’s past decision to legalize marijuana and a vote Tuesday in support of a medical aid in dying measure
“Itap like we picked up our state and moved it almost further west, almost to the Pacific coast,” Weigel said.
Colorado added more than 100,000 new residents between 2014 and 2015 alone, and Denver is one of the country’s fastest-growing cities.
“Itap changing the make-up of the electorate,” Michael Fortney, a Colorado Republican strategist. “You see metro Denver growing and rural Colorado either stagnant or shrinking. As coal jobs are going away, we’re adding tech jobs.”
The change has made it even harder for candidates to rally voters — as they no longer can rely on simple partisanship to get their people to the polls.
It also favors candidates or campaigns with the resources to put canvassers on the ground or data-crunchers on the computer — an advantage that only could get bigger.
Colorado voters approved a ballot measure, Proposition 107, which forces Colorado to hold a presidential primary starting in 2020 — while also giving unaffiliated voters the chance to cast a ballot in either the Republican or Democratic primaries.
Advocates argue that adding independents to the mix could pressure the parties into selecting more moderate candidates. But opponents said the new rule favors big-money politicians and hurts grassroots or ideological activists.
Another change voters made to Colorado’s political landscape was Amendment 71, a.k.a. “Raise the Bar.”
With passage of the amendment, activists now must jump through more hoops to put initiatives on the ballot. It also makes it harder to pass them — going forward, ballot measures must get support from 55 percent or more of voters, instead of a bare majority.
Staff writer John Frank contributed to this report.
