Green Billionaire Aims to Take Over Colorado’s Legislature

By Published on July 9, 2016

Billionaire anti-fracking activist Tom Steyer has dramatically increased his political donations in four key legislative races in Colorado in an effort to push the state away from fossil fuels, according to federal and state campaign finance records.

Steyer made three $200 personal contributions to Democrats in crucial state Senate races. Democratic senatorial candidates Rachel ZenzingerJenise May, and Daniel Kagan were the recipients of Steyer’s largesse. May and Kagan are running for open seats, while Zenzinger is trying to unseat an incumbent Republican.

Big money donors like Steyer can contribute a maximum of $200 in Colorado to state House or Senate candidates during the primaries, and another $200 during the general, for a total of $400 during the entirety of an election. Colorado’s primary was June 28.

Steyer has directed nearly all of his donations toward his super PAC, NextGen Climate. He has spent more than $13 million through the group so far this election year, according to OpenSecrets.org.

Steyer’s newfound generosity marks a significant departure from the California billionaire’s donation efforts in 2014, when he gave money to Colorado’s Democratic Party and to Democratic Gov. John Hickenlooper’s re-election campaign. He avoided giving money to individual Senate candidates.

Simon Lomax, an energy analyst at Colorado-based Independence Institute, told The Daily Caller News Foundation Steyer’s mostly “symbolic contributions” are a warning shot to the political establishment that he is “getting much more deeply involved in Colorado politics than ever before.”

“This isn’t just about Colorado’s role in the presidential election and other key federal races. It’s about using the state legislature to impose his extremely costly beliefs about energy on our state,” Lomax added. “Like the rest of the environmental left, this California billionaire believes he can make an example out of Colorado for other states and the federal government to follow.”

Steyer wants a bigger majority in the state House, which is currently controlled by the Democrats – he also dumped $200 on Democratic candidate Tony Exum’s campaign.

The Democratic moneyman’s overall campaign contributions, as well as his spending on research and polling, has ratcheted up 57 percent from the 2014 election cycle, when he tried to sink $8 million into former Democratic U.S. Sen. Mark Udall’s losing campaign.

The mega-wealthy environmentalist is pushing to make major gains up and down the Centennial State’s legislature. Revelations Steyer plowed money into individual candidacies lends a degree of credence to claims he is looking to fundamentally change the Colorado’s political landscape.

“It’s an extraordinary amount of money for research and polling, which is typically a modest percentage of your overall campaign spending,” political analyst Floyd Ciruli said in an interview last month. “He’s getting into the granular kind of research that could be used in different races up and down the ballot, including the state legislature and congressional seats.”

The shift in tactics comes after NextGen Climate said in April it plans to deploy its considerable resources across hundreds of college campuses to get students out to vote. The group plans on dumping $25 million in to a campaign to push young people toward green energy solutions.

As justification for its ramp up in donations, NextGen Climate pointed to a June, 2015, poll showing 73 percent of young voters believe the U.S. should receive 50 percent of its energy from solar panels and windmills, among other renewable sources, by 2030.

The U.S. Geological Survey officials announced in June western Colorado has 40 times more natural gas than previously thought, likely prompting Steyer’s increased presence in the state.

Western Colorado, as it turns out, is capable of producing nearly 66.3 trillion cubic feet of gas. That’s a massive uptick from the 1.6 trillion cubic feet estimated in 2003, research shows.

U.S. Department of Energy data show one trillion cubic feet of natural gas is enough to heat 15 million homes for a year, which means, of course, that 40 times that number will probably warm close to hundreds of millions of homes.

 

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Copyright 2016 The Daily Caller News Foundation

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