Democrat Morse likely will keep state Senate seat

It was reported late last week by The Denver Post and Colorado Pols that a close election in Colorado Senate District 11 may flip to the Republicans as provisional ballots are counted.

It’s probably not going to happen, says Brian Magrath, executive director of the Colorado Democratic Senate Campaign Fund.

He told The Colorado Independent that, while there are about 5,000 provisional ballots still to be certified and counted in El Paso County, it is likely that less than 1,000 of those are from SD11, now held by Democrat John Morse.

“Even in El Paso County, provisional ballots tend to swing Democratic,” he said. “I’m not too worried about it,” he added.

All ballots and vote counts have to be certified by Friday, but El Paso County Clerk Bob Balink told the Colorado Springs Gazette he may have an updated count as early as tomorrow.

El Paso County elections manager Liz Olsen told us the county will begin counting provisional ballots tomorrow, but that she doesn’t necessarily expect results to be released until later in the week.

Currently, Morse leads Owen Hill by 252 votes. That margin would need to close to about 75 to trigger an automatic recount.

Scot Kersgaard has been managing editor of a political newspaper, editor and co-owner of a ski town newspaper, executive editor of eight high-tech magazines (where he worked with current Apple CEO Tim Cook), deputy press secretary to a U.S. Senator, and an outdoors columnist at the Rocky Mountain News. He has an English degree from the University of Washington. He was awarded a fellowship to study internet journalism at the University of Maryland's Knight Center for Specialized Journalism. He was student body president in college. He spends his free time hiking and skiing.