Among the 3,738 Colorado voters withdrawing their registration from June 28 through July 14, more than half have been Democrats, according to numbers released by Colorado Secretary of State Wayne Williams on Monday.
The spike in voter registration withdrawals came after President Donald Trump’s elections commission requested data on every voter in every state.
To put this in context, there were an average of 134 de-registrations per week between the week that started Feb. 27 and the week that started June 26. Then 825 people withdrew their registration the week of July 3 and another 2,773 withdrew the week of July 10.
In an interview with the conservative site Breitbart News, Kris Kobach, the Kansas secretary of state who is heading the presidential commission, suggested that Coloradans who withdrew their registration might be felons or non-citizens who voted illegally and wanted to cover their tracks. As Colorado Politics reported, local elections officials of both parties condemned these remarks as untrue and unhelpful.
In Colorado, 2,037 Democrats have withdrawn their registration, along with 1,255 unaffiliated voters and 367 Republicans.
There were also 40 withdrawals from Greens, 34 from Libertarians, 4 from the American Constitution Party and 1 from the Unity Party of Colorado, leaving a total of 3,726,504 Colorado voters, all according to the Secretary of State.
The Trump administration has since asked states not to share voter information just yet, pending a decision on a lawsuit filed by the Electronic Privacy Information Center.
As Erica has previously pointed out, if you’re one of the voters who've un-registered to protect your information, you'll have to re-register in time to vote in this fall’s municipal elections and next spring’s primary elections. If you’re concerned about safety, there’s also an option to become a confidential voter.
