There’s one main reason I’m disappointed that the Count My Vote citizen initiative petition, at least for now, is not going to be on the November ballot for voters to decide:
I’m sick and tired of writing about this!
Give me a break, people!
For five long years I’ve been writing about the CMV/SB54 law and the crazy – and I really mean crazy – hardcore Republican folks who oppose the dual pathway for candidates to get on a party’s primary ballot.
The opponents to the dual-path process make no sense.
I’m serious.
They make no sense.
For the 2018 petition and SB54 both allow the current caucus/delegate/convention route to take place.
And we’ve seen dozens, if not hundreds, of Republican candidates decide, on their own, to take just the delegate/convention route and let the GOP-loving county and state delegates decide their fates.
The voter signature route – where only registered Republican voters can sign your petition – has also been used.
And used by some of the most Republican candidates around – like U.S. Sen. Mike Lee and Gov. Gary Herbert.
Yes, both men also went to the delegate convention. And both men were advanced by delegates – Lee to the final ballot and Herbert to a primary.
The Keep My Voice folks who successfully got 600 or so signees to the Count My Vote petition to change their minds and take their names off did nothing except frustrate the 135,000 voters who SIGNED the CMV petition in the first place.
So, 600 people override the wishes of 135,000 people and the 63 percent of Utah voters who told our pollster Dan Jones & Associates in a new poll that they support CMV and would vote for it in November.
Those numbers clearly reflect the banality of the CMV/SB54 fight within the top ranks of the Utah Republican Party – where a small group of the 180-member state Central Committee continue to battle against CMV/SB54 to the detriment of most Utahns, to the detriment of most registered Utah Republicans.
Jones’ polling shows that 53 percent of Republicans support Count My Vote and SB54.
Only 29 percent of Republicans in the whole state are against the dual pathway law and petition.
Let’s see – where is it written that the majority must rule, but with protection for the rights of the minority?
Oh, yeah. The U.S. Constitution.
So to hell with what 53 percent of Utah Republicans want, let’s do what the 29 percent want, instead.
SB54 has been upheld in EVERY court challenge by the extremists of the state Republican Party.
Twice in Utah federal court.
Once in the Utah Supreme Court.
Once in the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals.
Soon, I believe, the whole 10-member appeals court will refuse to hear the “en banc” case.
Then the extremists – who have found a sugar-daddy to pay their court costs – will ask the U.S. Supreme Court.
That high court will refuse to hear it, also.
And then the extremists will try, in some manner (as long as their money holds out) to sue again in Utah federal court and/or state court.
But the real next battle – if CMV stays off of the November ballot – will be in the Republican-controlled Utah Legislature.
There, KMV and the hardliners will cajole, threaten and otherwise make life miserable for Republican House and Senate members, trying to get them to repeal SB54.
Yes, let’s go back to only the caucus/delegate/convention process, which time after time has shown the delegates pick candidates who are later REJECTED by the 630,000 eligible rank-and-file GOP voters in the closed Republican primary.
If it is not repealed, then the extremists will pass some kind of stupid internal party bylaw that says ANY candidate who takes the still-legal signature gathering route will be kicked out of the party.
All so 4,000 state delegates – who are picked by maybe 45,000 caucus-goers – can choose candidates who, the SB54-allowed primary results show, DON’T want, for the signature candidates seem to always win big.
That’s because 630,000 registered Republicans can make up their own minds about a primary candidate, and not have to “trust” the 4,000 delegates to do it for them.
It’s all nuts, stupid and unfair.
And now I’m going to have to write about this mess for two years or more, if CMV doesn’t get on the ballot this November.
Sigh.
Sad, just sad.
