On Monday, Ethics Watch filed a Colorado Open Records Act (CORA) request with the Colorado Senate Minority Office (SMO), seeking records regarding the office's e-mail contact list. A Denver Post report raised suspicions that the Penry for Governor campaign may have received an e-mail list from the SMO, whose budget is paid for with government funds. Colorado law prohibits state resources from being used to promote candidates for public office.

The Denver Post reported that nonpartisan state legislative employees received e-mails at their state government accounts from the Penry campaign. The Post report raised questions how these employees ended up on a campaign e-mail list. While sending e-mails to such accounts is not illegal, Section 1-45-117 of the Colorado Revised Statutes prohibits state agencies from making contributions to campaigns. Ethics Watch's CORA is intended to determine whether the SMO was the source of the e-mail list.

Yesterday, the SMO submitted a partial response to the CORA. Ethics Watch has submitted a letter to the SMO's counsel addressing questions raised in the SMO's response and has filed a follow-up CORA request. Copies of these documents can be viewed on the right hand side of this page.