Gov. Polis and his lacky lawmakers passed a law making it mandatory to include false language, also known as lies, in ballot language for citizen initiatives that reduce our taxes, and now a federal lawsuit has been filed to make them stop it.
Advance Colorado filed the federal lawsuit this week against the state for violating the First Amendment in compelling untrue speech be included on the ballot.
“It’s time for the courts to tell the legislature to mind its own business and to stop promoting misinformation,” said Michael Fields, Advance Colorado president.
“The initiative process exists in Colorado to ensure that citizens have a voice when it comes to enacting policy reforms in areas where the legislature has failed to act,” Fields said.
“Politicians at the Capitol have unconstitutionally stacked the deck against citizen-driven ballot initiatives that reduce taxes, and Advance Colorado is suing to ensure that ballot initiatives generated by citizens are described accurately on the ballot and not subject to compelled speech or government-enforced lies,” Fields said
Another lawsuit!
Today, we filed a federal lawsuit to stop the Governor and legislators from mandating false ballot language for citizen initiatives. #copolitics #coleg pic.twitter.com/BfmHdJJGmR
— Michael Fields (@MichaelCLFields) August 7, 2023
The Colorado Sun says the Democrat law passed in 2021 was “intended to make it harder to persuade Colorado voters to cut their taxes” by mandating that at least three programs or services be listed that could be affected if taxpayers got to keep more of their hard-earned money.
The Sun explains:
Not all state tax cuts immediately reduce the amount of money that can be spent on state programs and services in Colorado. That’s because TABOR also caps the amount of government growth and spending each year to the annual increase in inflation and population. It requires that any tax revenue collected above that cap be refunded to taxpayers, thus making it unavailable for state programs and services.
In other words, spending on programs and services is not reduced in years when the TABOR cap is exceeded — and the cap has been exceeded repeatedly in recent years and revenue is forecast to exceed the cap through at least the next several fiscal years.
This brilliant lawsuit names Polis and Secretary of State Jena Griswold as defendants. Stay tuned!
Meanwhile, Fields also reports excellent progress in Advance Colorado’s effort to cap skyrocketing property taxes.
We’ve already collected over 70,000 signatures in just the first 25 days! Coloradans want real property tax reform. #copolitics #coleg https://t.co/Z8zkvYOTuL
— Michael Fields (@MichaelCLFields) August 7, 2023