Poll: Young Coloradans likely to vote on affordable housing, civil rights

Coloradans trust their state government more than the federal government and civil rights issues that are “ripping at the fabric” of other states seem to have more of a consensus in Colorado, according to polling from the African American Research Collaborative.

The results of a poll commissioned by the American Civil Liberties Union of Colorado were released Tuesday. The survey asked 1,223 Colorado residents, 95% registered voters, about politics and was conducted Aug. 11-26 over the phone and online. It had a margin of error of 2.8%.  Black and Latino Coloradans were oversampled, and their margins of error were 5.1% compared to the 4.9% of white Coloradans surveyed.

Colorado is unique in several ways, according to political strategist and AARC CEO Henry Fernandez.

“Coloradans see voting as an essential element of making change and believe voting in statewide elections is useful to correct for recent problems at the federal level but have concerns about whether elected officials will look out for people like them,” Fernandez wrote.

When it comes to trust in federal, 44% of respondents chose “disgusted” of the words provided to describe federal politics — the highest percentage of the words selected. For state government, 34% chose “hopeful,” although 30% also said they were “disgusted” with state government and 25% said they were “hopeful” with federal politics.

The group that conducted the survey asks questions of voters across the country, and while Coloradans have listed affordable housing and inflation on their lists of top issues as other voters have in other states, an affordable housing ballot initiative drew bipartisan support in the survey.

“The popularity of that affordable housing initiative is striking, which I think really goes to the kind of consensus that there’s an affordable housing crisis,” Fernandez said. Rent is a big issue in urban areas, but the concern isn’t limited to those areas, according to the polling.

Survey respondents scored the affordable housing ballot initiative as a 7.43 (mean score out of 10), which reflects the level of support the ACLU saw for the measure at 77%. They scored seeing it as a reason to vote at 7.48.

On the issue of housing affordability and homelessness, 37% of respondents identified it as a “crisis” and 43% as a “major issue, but not a crisis.” More Black people and Latinos said it was a crisis as did city residents, compared with 4% of respondents who said it was not a problem.

Although the survey did not use the term “critical race theory,” one of the questions asked whether an accurate history of racial discrimination should be taught in schools, “even if it makes some people uncomfortable.” Of all the respondents, 82% agreed, including 82% of whites, 82% of Latinos and 89% of Black people. The results crossed party lines with 91% of Democrats and 68% of Republicans agreeing.

“That really stood out,” Fernandez said.

Another point that came as a surprise to some of the pollsters is Coloradans’ support of whether schools becoming increasingly hostile to LGBTQ+ students (including some banning LGBTQ student organizations) would push respondents to go out and vote in the upcoming election. The answer was a clear yes with 45% of white respondents agreeing compared to 39% of Latinos and 41% of Black respondents.

“It’s not that people are tacitly accepting of pro-civil rights realities that are already existent in Colorado, but they are willing to vote to protect the LGBTQ community … particularly for younger voters,” Fernandez said.

The survey asked questions related to race and discrimination as well as policies passed and being considered to protect undocumented immigrants and reducing mass incarceration.

The majority of respondents reported that they believe that “elected officials are not doing enough to fight back against racism and discrimination,” with 57% of white respondents, 67% of Latinos and 77% of Black respondents. Liberals viewed this more as a problem at 81% compared with 68% of moderates and 30% of conservatives.

Various messages were tested in the survey about policing and social services, and the message that stated that communities shouldn’t have to choose between police and social services and need to have well‐funded social services and police departments received the highest mark at 7.82 out of 10.

It “takes it out of a politically charged way of talking about this and instead says that Coloradans deserve both high quality accountable policing and should put resources into social services and youth services and the like that are proven to reduce crime,” Fernandez said.

The survey asked respondents to rate concerns about other messages and encouraging them to vote, and a memo from the ACLU said “messages that juxtaposed concerns about the federal government’s shift away from protecting rights with the ability to elect state and local officials who would protect Coloradans’ rights also performed well.”

The strongest support was for: “Our democracy is threatened. We must vote for local elected officials who will ensure fair, transparent elections and reject partisan lies about voter fraud,” at 7.49, followed by messages regarding threats from an extremist Supreme Court at 7.45 and the Supreme Court forcing abortion decisions to states so state elections will now decide abortion rights at 7.43.

Respondents also rated their top issues with inflation coming in first at 40% of respondents, then the economy at 31%, mass shootings and gun violence at 20%, affordable housing and rent at 19% and homelessness at 18%.

For young adults, mass shootings and gun violence came in second at 29% and K-12 education at 21%. Black people rated mass shootings and gun violence as a secondary concern as well at 25% followed by discrimination and racism at 24%.

Ultimately, the poll showed that younger voters, who are less likely to turn out in midterm elections, are more motivated to vote when issues of affordable housing, K-12 education and LGBTQ rights are on the ballot, Fernandez said.

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