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The empty pail: The first step up the mountain
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The empty pail: The first step up the mountain

By Drake Hunter | Commentary, Rocky Mountain Voice “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.”~ Matthew 4:17 ~ “Jack and Jill went up the hill to fetch a pail of water…” Continuing with last devotion’s rhyme, we often remember the fall… but rarely ask the deeper question: What if they made it to the top… but never learned how to draw from the well? Because in the life of following Jesus, the issue is not whether we’ve started the climb—it’s whether we are being formed and becoming who we need to be as we go to do what God needs us to do. The first step toward becoming the person or leader you aspire to be is recognizing the mountain climb—the mountain of life—beginning with the one who gives life, now and always. When Jesus began His ministry, He didn’t start with a detaile...
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If the state can take property without a conviction, no property is safe
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Rocky Mountain Voice, Commentary, State, Top Stories

If the state can take property without a conviction, no property is safe

By Rep. Ken DeGraaf | Guest Commentary, Rocky Mountain Voice Civil asset forfeiture began as a narrow exception in colonial maritime law, not as a general tool of domestic policing. In those early admiralty cases, the government often had jurisdiction over the ship or cargo, but not over the owner. The vessel might be in port, but the owner could be overseas, unknown, or beyond the reach of the court. In that circumstance, proceeding against the property itself—an action in rem—was often the only practical way to enforce customs law.  Justice Neil Gorsuch recently highlighted this history in his concurrence in Culley v. Marshall and asked the obvious question: if the government today has full jurisdiction over the person—if it can arrest, charge, and prosecute them directly—...
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Trump’s DOJ joins xAI suit against Colorado AI law as Weiser agrees to halt enforcement
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Trump’s DOJ joins xAI suit against Colorado AI law as Weiser agrees to halt enforcement

By Shaina Cole | Contributing Writer, Rocky Mountain Voice The Colorado attorney general agreed last week to stop enforcing the state's landmark artificial intelligence law. Not because a court told him to. Because he agreed to it himself. That voluntary freeze, formalized in a joint filing with plaintiff xAI LLC, came the same afternoon the U.S. Department of Justice moved to join the lawsuit challenging SB24-205 — Colorado's AI consumer protection law set to take effect June 30.  Chief Judge Daniel D. Domenico granted both the intervention and the standstill within hours. The scheduling conference set for June 16 is gone. Case deadlines are suspended. The courtroom is waiting on a legislature that has 16 days left in its session and a replacement bill that still hasn't ...
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Peters’ defense says Barrett used facts that were never in evidence
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Peters’ defense says Barrett used facts that were never in evidence

By Jen Schumann | Rocky Mountain Voice The state said Judge Matthew Barrett's sentencing remarks about Tina Peters were harsh words from the bench, not evidence of bias. Peters' legal team answered with a different question: how did the judge know she appeared on podcasts? Where did he get the words "snake oil" and "junk"? The state's response did not touch that argument. The judge being asked to step aside will decide it. Three filings hit the Mesa County docket between late Thursday and Friday morning. District Attorney Dan Rubinstein's office opposed Peters' motion to disqualify Barrett. Her attorneys replied by introducing a theory the state never touched—that Barrett's sentencing comments relied on an "extrajudicial source," meaning information the judge obtained from out...
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Take back Colorado starts local: Brandon Wark on the fight ahead
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Take back Colorado starts local: Brandon Wark on the fight ahead

By RMV Staff As another contentious session winds toward its May 13 close, a familiar question is surfacing among voters: Can the state's direction actually be changed — and if so, how? In the latest episode of Unleashed, Heidi Ganahl sits down with Brandon Wark, founder of Free State Colorado and one of the most trusted voices covering the State Capitol, to unpack what just happened under the gold dome and what it means for 2026. https://youtu.be/YbE8jSDBl8k?si=_SR9H1mLqIpRljzI Listen on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/episode/1va71RcfXCn6Tcq03hBRcg?si=N2g-kLW_S9u2AJs_jqSwIA  Watch on Rumble: https://rumble.com/v78s3vw-unleashed-with-heidi-ganahl-take-back-colorado-starts-local-brandon-wark-on.html A tough session and bigger concerns A third-ge...
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Colorado parents packed the hearing room. Democrats didn’t ask a single question.
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Colorado parents packed the hearing room. Democrats didn’t ask a single question.

By Shaina Cole | Contributing Writer, Rocky Mountain Voice Twenty Coloradans showed up. Zero came to oppose. The resolution died anyway. By the time the House State, Civic, Military, and Veterans Affairs Committee finished Monday night, HCR 26-1004 was postponed indefinitely after a vote of 8 to 3.  Parents waited hours for their three minutes at the microphone. When it was over, the majority moved on to the next bill. The resolution was constitutionally modest.  It proposed inserting explicit language into the Colorado Constitution recognizing parents' right to direct the upbringing, education and care of their children. Sponsors argued throughout the hearing that the amendment would leave existing child abuse and neglect protections intact — the state would s...
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Stomping out stage 4 brain cancer: A Colorado story of grapes, grace and glioblastoma
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Stomping out stage 4 brain cancer: A Colorado story of grapes, grace and glioblastoma

By Drake Hunter | Commentary, Rocky Mountain Voice Sometimes the greatest miracle isn’t healing—it’s a night off. For families walking the road of stage 4 glioblastoma brain cancer, even a few hours of rest can feel like a return to life. The weight is constant. The uncertainty is relentless. And caregiving, while sacred, can quietly drain every ounce of strength a person has. Recently, my wife Sherrie and I experienced something we hadn’t felt in a long time—margin. Breathing room. A moment to simply be human again. And it came through a story that could only be described as providential. Where the story began What makes this story remarkable is how it started—not through a formal organization or a well-funded campaign, but through a simple blog. When I began writ...
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Before Peters is resentenced, Barrett must decide whether he keeps the case
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Before Peters is resentenced, Barrett must decide whether he keeps the case

By Jen Schumann | Rocky Mountain Voice A Mesa County judge has ordered the state’s attorneys to respond to a motion seeking his removal from the Tina Peters case, setting up a legal fight that will determine who presides over her resentencing—and who decides whether she remains in prison while that process unfolds. In an April 22 order, District Court Judge Matthew Barrett directed the state to file a response “as soon as practicable,” with a deadline of April 27. The order does not resolve the issue. It moves it forward. Now the court must decide whether Barrett can remain on the case—and nothing else in district court moves until that question is answered. 2026-0422 ACTION TAKEN_VERIFIED MOTION TO DISQUALIFY JUDGE MATTHEW BARRETT - People Respond by 4-27Download ...
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A missing email and a federal paper trail: Colorado weighs discipline in Guggenheim case
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A missing email and a federal paper trail: Colorado weighs discipline in Guggenheim case

By Jen Schumann | Rocky Mountain Voice Rich Guggenheim says an email exists that would end his case. The Colorado Department of Agriculture says it does not. The dispute centers on a message Guggenheim says was sent to him in early December by Gabriel Leverance, a grant accountant at CDA, instructing him to approve a USDA-funded Cooperative Agricultural Pest Survey report—the report he had previously kicked back and now at the center of the discipline the department is weighing against him. Guggenheim says he requested records twice under CORA that he believes should have included the email. At an April 15 disciplinary hearing, he told the department’s deputy commissioner: “I know it exists, because I’m the recipient of that email, and I’m not getting it in a CORA reques...
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Weiser’s record: 27,000 complaints. 17 settlements.
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Weiser’s record: 27,000 complaints. 17 settlements.

By Shaina Cole | Contributing Writer, Rocky Mountain Voice When a Coloradan files a consumer complaint with the attorney general's office — a contractor who vanished with a deposit, a lender charging illegal interest, a landlord who pocketed a security deposit without cause — the office receives it, logs it and adds it to a database. The complaint may help build a future case. It informs trend reports. For the person who filed it, that is usually where it ends. Coloradans filed a record 26,993 complaints with Attorney General Phil Weiser's Consumer Protection Section last fiscal year. That's nearly three times the number filed when Weiser took office in 2019. His March 2026 press release describes the growth as "over 200 percent." His office's own annual figures put the actual increa...
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