Lt. Gov. Donna Lynne (D-Colorado) dropped off thousands of petitions signatures at the Colorado Secretary of State’s office on Monday, hoping to have enough to get a spot on the ballot for the June primary.
Colorado law requires candidates to gather 1,500 valid signatures from each of the state’s seven congressional districts to get on the ballot. The signatures must belong to registered voters who are members of the candidate’s own party.
Lynne’s campaign claims to have turned in thousands more signatures than former state Sen. Mike Johnston, the first Democrat to submit a petition for governor.
He qualified for a spot on the ballot, but barely made it in Colorado’s 5th district. He turned in more than 2,300 signatures and scraped by with only 1,543 of them checking out as valid.
Lynne’s campaign wouldn’t share how many of its signatures came from which district, but says it’s confident she’ll qualify as well.
However, state law puts her at a disadvantage: if a voter signs a petition for more than one candidate, only the candidate who turns in their petition first gets to use that person’s signature to qualify for a spot on the ballot.
Colorado’s primary is coming up June 26 and will allow independent voters to participate for the first time.
