PUEBLO, Colo. — Gov. Jared Polis (D) is up for reelection on Tuesday.
But unless you’re reading the local news, you might not have heard anything about it. That’s at least partly because the race is not very competitive. Polis is projected to defeat Republican challenger Heidi Ganahl by a wide margin.
Polis, the first openly gay man to be elected governor of a state, has quietly become one of the more unique figures in Democratic politics.
A former member of the Congressional Progressive Caucus during his decade in the House of Representatives, Polis has won praise from progressives for expanding kindergarten in Colorado and creating a universal preschool program. But he also has gotten credit from conservatives for opposing income taxes and eschewing the strict COVID-19 public health policies of some other Democratic-led states.
HuffPost caught up with Polis briefly before he spoke at a political rally in a historic train station in Pueblo on Oct. 30. We discussed his efforts to reduce the cost of living in Colorado, his policy response to the pandemic, and whether he supports a second term for President Joe Biden.
Below is a transcript of that interview, condensed and lightly edited for clarity.
Polling suggests you’re on track to defeat your Republican challenger Heidi Ganahl by double digits. Why do you have such broad appeal across the ideological spectrum?
I want to stay focused on the results. For my State of the State speech about a year ago, I sang a variation of a famous Paul Simon song, “50 ways to save you money.” And we got over 100 things done to save people money.
Because whether people are a Republican or a Democrat, they want government to do what we can to reduce fees and costs, free preschool and kindergarten, capping the out-of-pocket cost of insulin, cut the income tax, cut the property — just practical things that people want to meet the moment, which is, “Costs are going up. We want you to do something about it.” We did our best to get ahead of it.
A lot of conservatives have praised you for differing from other Democrats in your approach to COVID-19 restrictions and mandates. That includes rejecting calls for a state-level vaccine mandate. Explain to me your thinking on that and whether you think other Democrats might have made mistakes by going too far in the other direction.
We’ve leaned into individual responsibility in Colorado, which is very consistent with our culture as a state. We’re a fiercely independent state that values our freedom. And people make the right choices when you do your best to get good information to them. So we focused on getting good information about the benefits of the vaccine and the importance of mask-wearing.
But we really trusted individuals and communities because we’re also a very diverse state, and there are areas that experienced the pandemic that are as diverse as Boulder, Pueblo and Sterling, and they handled it in different ways. And we really supported all the ways, because on the ground there were people with goodwill trying to do the best they could to balance the public support needed to take the steps necessary to protect people’s lives.
I ask in part because in September, President Biden got out there and said, “The pandemic is over.” And then the White House downplayed the remarks.
We ended all the health measures a year before that announcement. Because we felt that people have the information they need to make their own smart choices about whether to go out to concerts, whether to wear masks, whether to be vaccinated. We have one of the higher vaccination rates in the country, and as a direct result, we have the eighth-lowest death rate in the country from COVID. [The state currently ranks a bit higher in COVID-19 deaths per capita.]
Did some Democrats make mistakes though by keeping schools closed too long or by firing city and state employees who declined to get vaccinated?
I would focus on how some Republicans leaned into empowering those that had false information or misinformation about [vaccines.] So we always spoke directly to the people of Colorado every week with the best, up-to-date scientific information so people could protect themselves. And then we leaned into individual responsibility.
So we had a great tourism season in 2020. Our outdoor areas, our ski areas had a record year.
We were earlier with our kids back to school. Many schools wore masks — not all. But many of them wanted to do that for the comfort of their teachers to come back — big metropolitan districts did. But we were really focused on getting our kids back to school early.
Democrats face a backlash for implementing some criminal justice reform policies, like restricting cash bail and decriminalizing hard drugs, that people blame for driving or worsening the current crime wave. Do the critics have a point?
Some of the highest crime states in the country happen to be Republican states. But it really is a national trend.
In Colorado, me and the Democrats and Republicans — in a bipartisan way — are solving it. In addition to 50 ways to save people money, we also have a plan to make Colorado one of the 10 safest states. And we’re doing that through a record investment in policing, and in youth diversion programs, especially to help police departments and sheriff’s departments recruit and retain law enforcement, which is the biggest challenge right now. It’s a challenge across many sectors, but especially in law enforcement.
Do you see tackling income inequality as part of your mission as governor of Colorado?
We look at saving people money. It’s items like free and universal preschool, which starts this year, and universal kindergarten. When you look at preschool and kindergarten, if you’re very low income, you already got it in most cases. Who didn’t get it? The middle class. The wealthy could afford it.
So we wanted to make it universal to make sure every child, no matter where they live in the state, no matter the economic needs of their parents, can get that strong start.
Some people think that TABOR [a Colorado law requiring a referendum anytime the legislature wants to raise revenue above a preset level] handcuffs the state by limiting the ability to raise more progressive revenue. How do you feel about that?
That didn’t stop us from doing universal full-day kindergarten. We went to the ballot when we did preschool. It got 67.8% of the vote.
As HuffPost was asking Polis about TABOR, Colorado state Treasurer Dave Young was railing against the law in his remarks to the assembled Democrats. “We’ve got to replace TABOR with a rational tax policy so that everybody pays their fair share!” he declared to applause from the crowd.
Polis responded to Young in real-time.
He’s talking about it abstractly, but what it means is that you go to the voters, and the voters have been very good about approving funds for things that are needed in our state like universal preschool.
Do you still believe there should be no income taxes?
Yeah, I am not a fan of the income tax. We have the opportunity to cut the income tax on the ballot this year. I support that. It’s difficult to get tax cuts out of the legislature for the income tax. So we go directly to the people of Colorado, and hopefully we’ll get that in November.
Do you support Biden’s reelection?
Well, you’re getting ahead of yourself there.
OK, would you support him if he announced that he’s running for a second term?
I support whoever can stop Donald Trump, who I view as an existential threat to our democracy.
Have you shifted at all to the center from your time in the House?
I am who I am. I enjoyed serving in the House for 10 years. I was in the New Democrat Coalition, the Liberty Caucus, the Progressive Caucus. I worked across all groups I could to get things done.
