A blue wave is coming.

On Nov. 6, Colorado voters are poised to award the Democrats a political trifecta: control of the office of governor, state House and Senate. The available data and political science of the moment — recent election results, female and unaffiliated voter participation and the strength of the Democrat’s bench — all point to a blue wave this year.

This is not necessarily good news for the Democrats.

Three of the last four governors have been Democrats; in the past three presidential elections Coloradans have supported the Democratic candidate.

The only caveat is how President Donald Trump’s “new” party faces its first test at the polls. Does Trump’s popularity with his base turnout these voters in Colorado for generic Republican candidates? What, if any, impact will Brett Kavanaugh’s confirmation to the Supreme Court have on energizing Republican voters?

What we do know is this: Democrats, unaffiliated voters, and women were already highly energized.

In the primary, 133,000 more people voted in the Democratic governor’s primary than the Republican primary and Jared Polis received 43,000 more votes than Walker Stapleton.

Women who cast Democratic ballots made up the largest voting bloc with 95,000 more women voting than men. Interestingly, about 225 more women cast Republican ballots than men, signifying a disparate level of enthusiasm with the Republican ballot. With respect to unaffiliated voters, even in Republican urban and rural counties such as Douglas and Weld, more unaffiliated voters opted for the Democratic primary ballot.

In the last six months of this year, the total number of active registered Republican voters declined. There are also 103,409 more active women voters than men.

Meanwhile, Democratic voters have remained steady and unaffiliated voters have increased.

In the first nine months of the year, 186,000 new people registered to vote, compared with 146,600 in the same period during 2014; 58 percent of these voters were people between the ages of 18-40. This is a key demographic age and all accounts indicate that they are rejecting the Trump and Republican platform, however, they are challenging to accurately predict because they are more difficult to poll.

Finally, candidates matter.

The Democratic candidate for governor, Jared Polis, has done a better job defining himself and his positions.

Polis, a successful businessman has shown that he is not the one dimensional liberal that Republican ads portray. Polis has run a smart, well organized campaign.

And there’s the money.

There is no doubt that we have too much money in politics, in all politics, everywhere, but the fact is Polis will outspend his Republican opponent.

Stapleton, himself, has moved too far to the Trump right in order to secure the nomination and it doesn’t reflect Colorado’s centrist base. Trump has now endorsed Stapleton. Other than running negative ads, Stapleton hasn’t effectively shown why Colorado voters should support him.

As in all things, follow the money. Republicans and their traditional advocacy groups are hedging their strategy by going all in with an attorney general candidate and state senate candidates with the goal of hanging on to the state Senate.

Republicans hold a one seat majority in the Senate and five races will determine the outcome. The GOP needs only two wins here. However, four of the five races are in the greater Denver metropolitan area and all five Democratic candidates are women.

Democrats have a 37 to 28 majority in the state House that they will easily maintain.

If there is a strong Democratic turnout like we saw in the primary, Colorado could see a tsunami with significant down ballot ramifications.

Why could this be bad news for Democrats?

When one party has held a trifecta, it hasn’t been for very long.

Both parties have misinterpreted election results and overreached. They failed to work across party lines and took positions inconsistent with Colorado’s historically moderate voice.

This has resulted in a dramatic swing at the polls as evidenced by the short-lived trifectas in the past 20 years. Republicans held it from 1999 to 2000 and from 2003 to 2004; Democrats maintained it from 2007 to 2010 and 2013 to 2015.

Unless the Democrats can control the urge to reshape Colorado’s landscape without bringing their Republican colleagues along, they won’t hold the trifecta for long. Worse yet, they may set in motion a significant 2020 backlash.

The lesson is clear: good ideas come from both parties and we can’t solve our problems with the same thinking we used when they were created.

Doug Friednash is a Denver native, a partner with the lawfirm Brownstein Hyatt Farber and Schreck and the former chief of staff for Gov. John Hickenlooper.

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