Are there too many Grumpy Old Men Voters in Colorado?

By Mike O’Donnell | Guest Commentary, Rocky Mountain Voice

Every ten years the U.S. Census Bureau organizes a count of all the residents of the United States. This count includes citizens as well as non-citizens, and even those experiencing homelessness.

The Census Bureau also provides annual updates to the decennial numbers using surveys as well as by tapping into government information they can easily access like data on births and deaths, federal tax returns, medicare enrollments, and statistics from the Social Security Administration.

These annual updates serve many purposes and, in my case, one of them is to provide feedback on how accurate the Colorado voter roll is.

Colorado switched to mail-in ballots in 2013 and is one of only eight states that conducts mail-in elections. Presumably this was done because as Coloradans grew fatter and lazier, it became too much trouble to visit a polling place, stand in line, show ID, and vote in person. 

In 2020, Colorado added automatic voter registration to the mix because by then some Coloradans had grown even fatter and lazier and it was way too much trouble for them to even register to vote so the state decided to do that for them. Anytime a Colorado resident has an initial interaction with a state agency, from age 15 and up, primarily the DMV, they are automatically added to the voter roll and then the onus falls on them to get off their keister and spend a stamp to opt-out of being on the voter roll. 

Universal voting by mail is less secure than voting in-person for many, many reasons, one of the obvious ones being that the mail isn’t 100% reliable. It has, however, allowed legions of individuals who would otherwise never be bothered to cast a vote in an election to be influenced by someone and do so, or even sell their ballot to raise some cash, as allegedly happened in 2020. 

When comparing Colorado’s voter roll data with Census estimate numbers, it is important to remember that because Census numbers include non-citizens, they should always be much higher than the comparable age-group statistics of active voters on the Colorado voter roll.

I decided to check if that, indeed, was the case by looking at Colorado’s Census estimates for July 2024 and comparing that with data from the publicly available July 1, 2024 Colorado voter roll.

A few notes to begin with. Various sources suggest that 9.6% of Colorado residents, some 563,000 people in 2023, were foreign born and an estimated 45% of those, 253,000, were naturalized citizens (like me). Federal data also shows that out of about 12 million green card holders nationally, some 150,000 live in Colorado and although two-thirds of them are eligible to apply for citizenship only between 14,000 and 15,000 do so in the state each year. 

This leaves at least 160,000 Colorado residents, probably a chunk more by now, on temporary visas or potentially living in the state illegally. 

The July 2024 Census estimate shows 4,588,572 Coloradans aged 20 or older were living in the state that year. (The Census population age categories don’t separate out 18 and 19 year olds from the others so my focus was only on those 20 and up.)

The July 1 2024 Colorado public voter roll shows 3,776,408 active registrants aged 20 or older and Secretary of State data indicates that there were also 16,642 “confidential” registrants whose information was excluded from the publicly available version of the voter roll. 

Comparison of Colorado Census estimates (July 2024) and active voter registrations by age group. Source: Mike O’Donnell.

The gap between the Census estimate and the voter roll was thus 795,522. This is probably a big disappointment to the Colorado’s Secretary of State, who would prefer that at least 100% of Colorado residents were registered to vote, but it does show that not everyone eligible to register, chooses to be registered, and it appears that most of the 310,000 odd residents ineligible to vote in Colorado, choose not to be registered as well. 

I might add, parenthetically, that I know some do. I submitted a FOIA request to the U.S. Citizens & Immigration Services in late 2021 asking them to tell me if any green card holder applying for citizenship in Colorado had answered positively to a question on the citizenship application that asks “have you ever previously registered to vote”, and, well over a year later, I received an answer back that some acknowledged they had, although the number was not significant.

Although the comparison between the Census data and the voter roll shows no widespread evidence of large numbers of illegal immigrants registered to vote in Colorado, it does lend itself to two interesting observations and one major concern.

The observations: active participation in the electoral process in Colorado increases with age AND women are more electorally active than men in every age group up until age 75. 

The concern: the Colorado voter roll contains way too many men aged 80 and older suggesting that some serious clean up is needed to remove deceased or otherwise long absent individuals in those age groups. 

Also, given the prevalence of cognitive decline as individuals age in the United States (look at the example of our last commander in chief), I also find it a little bit of a stretch to accept that almost 100% of Coloradans over the age of 80 are capable of making informed political decisions on their own. 

Nonetheless, the bottom line is that on the premise that 9.6% of Colorado residents are foreign born, there appears to be no widespread evidence that a huge number of non-citizens are registered to vote in Colorado. BUT there are definite concerns about there being too many older male Coloradans registered to vote.

Wouldn’t it be great if it was possible to have a cleaner voter roll in Colorado? Better yet, let’s get rid of vote-by-mail and automatic voter registration, and require proper ID (not a utility bill) to vote in person.

Mike O’Donnell is a small business advocate, nonprofit executive and economic development leader based in Kirk, Colorado. He currently serves as Executive Director of Prairie Rose Development Corp., a mission-driven lender supporting underserved entrepreneurs across the state.

Editor’s note: Opinions expressed in commentary pieces are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the management of the Rocky Mountain Voice, but even so we support the constitutional right of the author to express those opinions.