CU to host GOP debate — but students not welcome

Brooke Fox | college.usatoday.com

A knight in shining armor decorates the apartment where seven University of Colorado Boulder students meet to talk about a topic that has many up in the arms: The Oct. 28 GOP debate being held at the school's more than 11,000-seat arena, the Coors Event Center, is only making some 50 seats available to students.

“It really feels like they don’t feel like our vote or input is important at all," says University of Colorado student William Raley. “It’s almost that they’re like ‘This is a private event, it doesn’t concern you.’”

The debate, which will focus on the economy, spurred the informal meeting and the new group behind it: the bipartisan Student Voices Count. It has posted a petition on Change.org that asks CU, the Republican National Committee (RNC) and CNBC for more student tickets. It currently has more than 500 signatures.

Student Voices -- which has also taken to social media with a Thunderclap campaign and started a Facebook event page -- joins others concerned about the lack of student representation. CU’s student government has passed a resolution to call for UC, the RNC and CNBC to "drastically increase the number of tickets" for both students and faculty, and ProgressNow Colorado also has an online petition that now has more than 1,000 signatures.

"There's no reason why there can't be (more tickets). The venue seats over 11,000 people," says Amy Runyon-Harms, the executive director of ProgressNow Colorado.

Other students, faculty and community members have taken to social media to voice their frustrations as well.

When the GOP republican debate is hosted on your campus but they only allocate 50 seats for students<<<<< — Colin Daniels (@colindaniels32) October 1, 2015

The GOP wants to keep CU-Boulder students from the debate being held on their campus. Sign to support the students https://t.co/rmd6j8q5Me — Alex, but online (@Alex_but_online) October 1, 2015

The efforts are being backed by Democratic Colorado Congressman Jared Polis, who wrote letters to the chairman of the RNC, Reince Priebus, the chairman of CNBC, Mark Hoffman, as well as CU Chancellor Phil Distefano.

In his letter, reports CU's Daily Camera, Polis responded in part to the contention by Ryan Huff, CU's chief spokesperson, that one reason for the limited seating was due to the amount of space being taken up by CNBC's staging, lights and cameras.

"I'm no expert," Polis wrote, "but I've never seen video cameras so big that it requires taking up thousands of seats in an arena to get good shots from multiple angles."

But Huff also tells USA TODAY College that the school had asked for more school tickets even before students had begun to organize and voice their frustration.

“We agree with the students, we’re putting out that request. But we’re also cognizant that this is not our event,” he says. “We are not producing this event so we are merely the site host. ... We don’t have control over ticketing.”

#studentvoicescount Only 100 tickets for students at a 10,000+ person venue at CU? Insulting.http://t.co/l5c2b5cCB4 — Jared Polis (@jaredpolis) September 29, 2015

Please give us a chance to watch this amazing part of history that is happening on our campus! #studentvoicescount @CUBoulder @GOP @thehill — Student Voices Count (@StudentvoicesCU) September 30, 2015

@jaredpolis Seems they are not really interested in the student vote. — Hprynne (@HPrynne) September 29, 2015

Huff said that the university does stand to benefit in terms of marketing CU to the nation, as well as potentially bringing other benefits to students.

“I know that we’ll be doing events such as lectures with professors, we’re looking to get CNBC journalists into our classrooms to talk about their jobs and what it takes to put on a debate,” says Huff. “So even if students can’t attend the event itself there will be many other opportunities for volunteering, for watch parties, for academic lectures around this. We hope that this will be a worthwhile experience for our students even if they can’t physically be at the debate.”

But Student Voices Count isn't buying it. Member Makayla Syphrit says, "In general, the point of having a debate in different locations is to engage the local community and reach for a wider voting range, and by not including students, it loses the power and authenticity of the actual debate."

"You can’t take something as big as the (on-campus) Coors Event Center and the promise of a giant political event and rip it away from campus and say, ‘It doesn’t matter, stay out of it,’” says Raley. “A place is not just a physical location. If you’re going to come to … a college campus, you can’t just be physically on a college campus, you have to engage and represent the community.”

“Future legislation is going to affect us, and so we have a right to listen to it and be informed about it,” adds Syphrit. “We aren’t going stop until we are at least reasoned with. We want to be heard.”



Brooke Fox is a University of Colorado student and a fall 2015 USA TODAY College correspondent.

This story originally appeared on the USA TODAY College blog, a news source produced for college students by student journalists. The blog closed in September of 2017.