Colorado legislative session reinforces once-purple state’s Democratic shift

By JESSE BEDAYN
Associated Press/Report for America

DENVER (AP) — Colorado’s chaotic legislative session this year underscores the once-purple state’s leftward shift. Republican’s historically small minority was relegated to grasping for power or resorting to obstruction while Democrats faced deep, internal rifts over just how progressive Colorado should be. Such dynamics may be commonplace in California or New York, where the defining fights often emerge between different Democratic Party factions while Republicans clamor for a word in edgewise. Colorado, however, holds a decades-old status as a battleground state that’s seesawed in political control, and this year’s Democratic majority caps a dramatic shift that’s seemingly left it’s purple hue to history.