Editor's note: KUNC is publishing unedited interviews with the Republican, Democratic, and unaffiliated gubernatorial candidates so the public can view their answers in a transparent and unfiltered manner. Their answers may include statements that are not supported by evidence.
Colorado voters will choose a new governor this year, with Gov. Jared Polis term-limited and unable to seek a third term. Ahead of the November 3 general election, KUNC is interviewing the Democratic, Republican and unaffiliated candidates running to replace him.
Next in our general-election series is Democratic candidate Phil Weiser, Colorado’s attorney general since 2019. KUNC host Marty Lenz spoke with him about regulating data centers and Flock cameras, working with the Trump administration, and how he would govern differently from Polis.
Marty Lenz: Attorney General Weiser, for many young Coloradans, buying a home, starting a family, or even staying in the state feels a bit out of reach. At the same time, rising Medicaid costs are putting more pressure on Colorado's budget. As governor, how would you make the state more affordable without shifting more costs onto residents?
Phil Weiser: Marty, I am very aware of this because I continue to hear from Coloradans just how much they are pained by how hard it is to live here. Housing cost is top of mind for me, and we need a multi-pronged strategy. First, we got to start building more starter homes. Young people, teachers, law enforcement officers used to be able to afford to buy homes here, not anymore.
We're going to change that by changing the economics of the equation, making those homes cheaper to build, making it quicker to build them. We're going to go after corporate landlords who are colluding on rents, jacking up rents as well. And we're going to focus on health care because for a lot of people, health care is breaking their budget, putting them into medical debt. This is work I'm all in on. As Attorney General, I've been a protector of consumers. I've taken on companies who prey on people. As governor, that work will continue.
Lenz: As of late, Flock license plate cameras and data centers, and even more recently, have become major points of debate in the state. From your vantage point, what role should the state play in regulating each, and what should remain up to local communities?
Weiser: One of the important areas that we need to find, always balance, is how we have guardrails at the state level, and what's termed the local level. Let me start with data centers because I'm hearing more and more concerns from people. There needs to be a protection so communities don't feel like these data centers have been shoved down their throats. They're able to be heard. They're able to make sure they have a say.
We also need to make sure on data centers that our electricity rates are not getting hiked up because we're paying for these data centers. We need to make sure we've locked that down. And finally, we've got key protections for clean energy, for water, and data centers can't undermine those as well. So those are the types of guardrails. One of my first priorities, in fact, my first priority, will be getting a bill from the legislature addressing this issue of data centers, and yes, there will be some local decisions, but they need to be state guardrails so that we're all protected.
With respect to Flock cameras, this is also something that's likely to get talked about next spring, and we've got to work together. The state has some ability to, again, determine where are there guardrails, like who's getting access to this information, where is it being recorded. If it's being recorded, for example, where people are getting access to abortion care, and we're potentially threatening women who come here from another state, that's not our values. We shouldn't make that possible. So we can and we should be smart about guardrails, knowing that within those guardrails there'll be local decisions as well.
Lenz: Colorado's next governor is going to have to work with the Trump administration. I know you're very self-aware; you've sued the administration a few times. Name an issue where you think Colorado should cooperate with the federal government, and give just one where you think the state should push back.
Weiser: Well, right now we're cooperating with the federal government around water. Actually, it's Nevada who's brought a lawsuit, not Colorado, with respect to the Interior Department's decision around the Colorado River. For Colorado, water is life, and we're going to need, ultimately, a new model for how we manage water in the Colorado River. Currently, the federal government has made an important principle clear: that the lower basin states can’t continue to overuse, to use more water than they're entitled to.
That's going to be a core principle to how we build a broader commitment. And the fact that the federal government, Colorado, are aligned on that issue, that's welcome, and I will work with the federal government when they are aligned on the law and doing things that serve Colorado.
But here's an example, Marty, where they're doing things that disserve Colorado and that are lawless. The attacks on our elections — it's just jaw-dropping to me that a federal government is disregarding the Constitution. The Constitution says states determine the time, the place, and the manner of elections; that means the federal government cannot try to tell the postal service not to deliver ballots. But yet, that's happened multiple times. I've sued multiple times. We keep winning. We're going to protect our elections in Colorado.
Lenz: You've been serving in the current administration under Gov. Jared Polis. How would you shape your administration differently than how Gov. Polis has shaped it, and what he's done? And on that note, too, you already know that the state legislature is very blue. You know that if you win, people will see Colorado as being even more blue. I want to ask from your perch: Will you have the ability to push back against a state legislature for whom you share the same party, and do you think the state legislature needs to be pushed back upon?
Weiser: Jared Polis has been willing to take the side of social media companies and veto legislation that would hold those companies to account in ways that would protect our kids. I championed a bill that was going to make it very clear: if you're a social media company, and you see someone on your platform selling guns or fentanyl to young people, you have a responsibility to do something, to kick that person off your platform, to cooperate with law enforcement. I'm going to sign that bill that Jared Polis vetoed because I believe social media companies have acted in ways that harm our kids. That's why I sued Meta, and we got an historic settlement protecting kids. We also need legislation that will protect our kids, and I'm going to fight for it, and I'm going to sign it.
Coloradans are common sense people. Coloradans understand what it means for us to have a democratic republic where we listen to one another and we work together to solve problems. For me, I've got some basic foundations, starting with, before I mentioned, the Constitution and living under the rule of law.
I actually was opposed to every Democrat in the state legislature when there was a lawsuit that was challenging our Taxpayer Bill of Rights. That was a lawsuit that I had the responsibilities, the Attorney General, to defend. I believe in defending the law. I'm not going to stand back when it comes to core values, and so, if the legislature is doing things that I believe are wrong for Colorado, I will make clear that we need to stand up for our core principles.
I also believe I'm going to have influence to help shape a culture — a culture where all of us really work hard to listen to all of us, where I can say, for me to be on board with legislation, have we sat down and listened to the people who it's going to affect? Because that's, for me, a foundational principle. Let's make sure we listen to people who legislation affects before we pass public policy. Let's make sure we work together, get the best public policy. That’s the type of leadership I'll bring to Colorado.
