The one question you (apparently) can’t ask a politician.
Note: This piece references a specific candidate for elected office. As such, The Krich Report offered to publish his response. You can read the response here.
Is it reasonable to expect a candidate for local office to be open and honest about whether he supports a controversial, high-profile national politician?
Or is it perfectly okay for him to refuse to answer that question?
The issue came up this week as I was researching the three candidates for county commissioner here in La Plata County. As I would with any race, I visited each candidate’s website, read through their campaign literature, perused the endorsements each candidate had received, and noted which yard signs my neighbors had on display. Sometimes that’s enough for me to make an educated decision. But in the case of this race, I had one more question that I felt would be helpful to me in understanding who these candidates are, what they believe in, and what kind of commissioner they would be.
And the question was:
Do you support Lauren Boebert (R) or Adam Frisch (D) in Colorado’s third Congressional district race?
It seemed like a simple enough question. It could be answered with just a one-word reply if time were tight. There’s no subtle nuance that would require a detailed explanation, no research required to be confident in your answer. Anyone with a brain knows whether or not they are voting for Lauren Boebert – certainly anyone who takes an interest in politics.
And here’s why I wanted to know the answer to that question. The job of county commissioner has a say in a wide variety of policies that are highly relevant to the daily lives of folks who live here. County commissioners help revise and approve the land use code that decides whether housing subdivisions can be built or big box stores can come to town. County commissioners play a role in determining how we treat our homeless population, where they will be allowed to camp, and what kind of resources we will deploy to take care of them. County commissioners supervise all of the county government functions and are responsible for passing the county budget.
Is the job political? Yes, sometimes. Other times it’s just boring and wonky. But either way, it’s helpful for me to know whether the person I’m voting for is on the side of Lauren Boebert or on the side of… well, everything that I believe in. You know, things like democracy, decency, and honesty.
Tell me whether you support Lauren Boebert, and I know whether I want you representing me in elected office. It’s that simple.
Now, I could have sent each candidate a dozen other questions on local policy issues, but frankly, I know these folks are busy in the final weeks of a campaign, and I didn’t want them to have to write me six pages about whether grocery stores should be able to sell wine and liquor, or what their solution might be to the affordable housing crisis in our area, or whether they think the City should be allowed to keep excess lodgers’ tax revenue. Those answers would have been informative, and if I asked enough questions like that I probably could have come to a decision on which candidate I like the best. But that’s a lot of work when one question can tell me pretty much everything I need to know.
But according to one of the three candidates, Jack Turner, my question about Boebert/Frisch was off limits. And he was pretty adamant about it.
Now, I get that in a county that is fairly evenly divided between liberals and conservatives, no candidate wants to risk pissing off half the voters, especially any undecided voters who may swing the election. This could be a close race, decided by as little as a few hundred votes, and with an Independent candidate in the mix with the traditional Republican and Democrat candidates, it’s anyone’s guess how things will shake out.
But here’s the thing. Being a county commissioner is all about making tough decisions that not everyone is going to agree with. If you decide to put a homeless camp in a location close to town so those folks can have access to support services and public transportation, you’re going to piss off a lot of people – homeowners, business owners, etc. – who don’t want the homeless right on their doorsteps and sidewalks. Wherever you stand on land use codes, you are by definition going to have people who are either pro- or anti-development who are going to disagree with you. Take any issue, and it’s going to involve a tough decision that, as a county commissioner, you are going to have to stand behind in the face of significant opposition.
So when you tell me you don’t want to share publicly whether you support Lauren Boebert, what I hear is that you don’t want to stand behind a position that you know will lose you votes. You can put a whole bunch of lipstick on why you’re taking that stance, but to any intelligent voter it’s pretty obvious what your angle is.
In the course of our e-mail exchange, Jack insisted that I print his answer in full if I referenced it at all. Here it is, unedited, copied and pasted from his e-mail.
“I most definitely know who I'm planning to vote for in the Dist. 3 Congressional race, but I'm keeping that personal. I have nothing to hide, but both political parties are looking for a reason to tag me with the opposition's party label. The Dems are saying I'm a closet Republican and the GOP is proclaiming that I'm a secret Democrat (both are entirely wrong). I will work for the best interests of La Plata County with whoever is elected to the Dist. 3 Congressional race as well as the all other Colorado elected officials whether I voted for them or not.”
He also insisted – twice – that he had answered my question and that it would be inaccurate for me to say that he hadn't.
But would it be? My question was whether he was voting for Boebert or Frisch. He responded. But did he answer the question? The two are not the same.
So was this a fair question to expect a candidate to answer? I think so. Voters have good reason to want to know what a candidate thinks of Lauren Boebert. More importantly, voters have a right to be skeptical of a candidate who doesn’t provide a straightforward answer. It’s his right to keep his views private, but I think most of my readers are smart enough to see this for what it is – an attempt to avoid a divisive question for fear of losing the support of either side.
When you run for political office, you by definition give up a certain amount of privacy. And it goes without saying that you give up the right to keep your political views private.
Independence is a noble quality in a candidate if it allows him to take the right stance regardless of politics. But how is it useful if it means he won’t be straight with voters about whether he rejects or supports a congresswoman who defends the January 6th insurrectionists, who mocks a Muslim colleague, and who foments anger and hate among her base?
I’m as Independent as they come, and if I were running for office I’d have no problem telling you I’m voting against Lauren Boebert.
The Krich Report invited Jack Turner to respond, and he graciously agreed. You can read his response here.