A coalition of Colorado conservatives is banding together to unseat their state’s delegation to the Republican National Convention.
As a #NeverTrump plot based in Colorado seeks to stop Trump from winning on the first ballot, Trump and Ted Cruz supporters are uniting to un-seat the 37 pro-Cruz delegates who earned tickets to Cleveland after a caucus system that shut out presidential voting by regular citizens. Trump is heading to Colorado Friday to speak at the Western Conservative Summit.
Breitbart News has learned that activists have filed a formal challenge to the Republican National Convention to contest all 37 Colorado at-large delegates and alternates, including 34 who were elected, hoping to fill those seats with new people, including four of the contestants.
The challenge is based on the massive ballot errors and inconsistencies that threw the Colorado caucus into chaos and even prompted the chairwoman of the Boulder County GOP to say that the caucus might need to be done over.
#NeverTrump supporter Marilyn Marks, who is representing the contestants, told Breitbart News that a hearing will be held in Cleveland to determine whether Colorado will be un-seated.
“We got a two and a half page response from the Committee just a couple hours ago,” Marks said, citing a response from the Committee on Contest within the Republican National Convention, which she does not yet have permission to release. Marks quoted the response as saying, “The manner in which the CRC selected its at-large delegates and alternates is hardly a model of excellence…The Committee has serious concerns about the chosen balloting processes…”
“They upheld the election, saying there was insufficient evidence of material errors that would affect the outcome of the election,” Marks said. “They absolutely left the door open for an appeal. We will file an appeal.”
“There is a tentative time set for a hearing on July 10 in Cleveland, which is a Sunday, and we are confident that we have more than sufficient evidence of material errors that did affect the outcome of the election. We look forward to presenting that to the Committee at the hearing,” Marks said.
“I am not a contestant here. We have two Trump supporters, two Cruz supporters…I am personally a #NeverTrump person. However, as you know, the election process was unfair, illegal, and didn’t comply with the rules. Even though I am a NeverTrump person, everyone has a right to a fair process,” Marks added.
Kendal Unruh, the Colorado delegate leading the “Free the Delegates” movement to un-bind Trump delegates on the first ballot to cost him the nomination in Cleveland, pushed back against the challenge.
“Any convention has some problems,” Unruh told Breitbart News. “It’s human beings, it’s all volunteers, there are going to be some errors. I anybody had the most problems it was the Cruz slate.”
“We won regardless,” Unruh said. “If you want to complain after the fact…it’s sour grapes. This is silly. The people they’re challenging worked very hard. I know that because we were running the slates. The people [who are contesting the results] did not work hard.”
The formal challenge focuses on the merits of the ballot errors, not the politics surrounding Trump.
“This contest arises from widespread, pervasive Rules violations that resulted in the improper selection and certification of all Colorado at-large delegates and alternates,” according to the text of the formal challenge. The challenge reads:
This contest focuses primarily on the balloting irregularities and errors created by delegates marking materially noncompliant printed ballots, inaccurate tabulations, erroneous and incomplete candidate lists, unequal treatment of candidates, votes counted for ineligible candidates, and voter confusion. The combination of significant violations of election rules and the chaotic environment of the convention resulted in a materially inaccurate, unfair, and reckless election and certification of at-large delegates that must not stand.
Kyle Kohli, communications director for the Colorado Republican Committee, told Breitbart News that the state party is actively fighting the effort to un-seat their delegation.
“We expect to prevail in the event of an appeal,” Kohli said.
Jeff Hunt, the organizer of this weekend’s Summit where Trump will speak, told Breitbart News that the state party chairman is backing Trump.
“I do think it’s going to be a coming-together moment,” Hunt said of his summit, noting that some on both sides of the Trump battle lobbied unsuccessfully to get certain speakers removed. “The person introducing Donald Trump is Steve House, the chairman of the Republican Party, so after everything that happened he will be the one introducing Mr. Trump and giving him a nice firm handshake. So I think that is a good sign that the party here is ready to move forward and unite in defeating Hillary Clinton.”
Gabriel Schwartz, a lawyer and Trump supporter who helped organize the pro-Trump protest at the Colorado State Capitol after the caucus fiasco, told Breitbart News that the delegation should be unseated if it will not back the party’s presumptive nominee.
“My take on it is pretty simple, the people across America have spoken, and they want Donald J. Trump, not Ted Cruz or Marco Rubio or anyone else, and if you didn’t have a rigged system you’d have seen a Trump delegation from Colorado,” Schwartz said, noting that he received an email about the un-seating plan but has not been actively involved in it.
“Look, if you’re going to Cleveland as a Ted Cruzer, why bother? You should be unseated and let Trump people go. Why are you going if you don’t support your nominee?” Schwartz said. “It blows my mind that these people even want to go. If you’re NeverTrump why are you going to Cleveland? To cause more division when we need unity?”
“I hope Mr. Trump is welcomed by a unified Colorado crowd tomorrow at the summit, I hope he raises a lot of money at Mike Shanahan’s house, and I hope we rise up as Republicans to defeat Hillary Clinton,” Schwartz added.
“It was all politicians who got the delegates [at the Colorado caucus]. It wasn’t we the people, people like me or you. Cruz people rigged it and got in,” Schwartz added.
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