Messenger: Coloradans for Fairness
Candidate: Beth Martinez Humenik
Contest: Senate District 24
Affiliation: R
Date delivered: Sept. 8, 2018
Click here for message
Message type: door literature
Message tone: negative
About the message:
This mailer from super PAC Coloradans for Fairness says Republican state Sen. Beth Martinez Humenik voted for a pay raised for lawmakers, but voted against raises for teachers and for moving money from public to private schools.
Here's a look at the measures cited:
- Amendments to the state budget are cited for claims that she voted to raise her pay and against pay raises for teachers. It's accurate that Senate Republicans defeated an effort to raise teacher pay, based on this story from Colorado Politics (read to the bottom). But it's unclear which amendment would have raised pay for lawmakers.
- Martinez Humenik did vote for a 2017 bill to allow people to deduct private school tuition from their taxes. It would have paid for the deduction with $50 million from public schools. The bill died in the House.
- She voted for a pension reform bill, which does cut benefits for public employees (including teachers). Her Democratic opponent, state Rep. Faith Winter, also voted for the bill.
About the messenger:
Coloradans for Fairness is an independent spending committee or super PAC supporting Democratic candidates for state Senate. As an independent spending committee, the group may take unlimited donations and spend unlimited amounts, but it is not supposed to coordinate with candidates or political parties.
The messenger's money:
Coloradans for Fairness received $1.1 million from nonprofit The Sixteen Thirty Fund; $200,000 from the National Democratic Redistricting Committee, which is chaired by former U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder; $150,000 from Education Reform Now Advocacy; $100,000 from the Green Advocacy Project, which advocates for clean energy; $50,000 from Environment America; as well as large donations from a range of Colorado businesses, including Anadarko, Anheuser Busch, PhARMA and others.
