Scott Gessler

Scott Gessler is the former Secretary of State of Colorado, having served from 2011 to 2015. He is a former business owner and elections attorney. Gessler is a member of the Republican Party.

Early life, education, and early career

Scott Gessler was born in Detroit, Michigan, his parents moved many times during his childhood but settled in a small suburb outside of Chicago, Illinois. He attended public schools and graduated from Riverside-Brookfield High School in 1983, where he excelled in extracurriculars. After high school, Gessler attended Yale University, where he obtained his bachelor's degree,^[1] he would continue to the University of Michigan Law School where he received his Juris Doctorate.^[2] Gessler later received an MBA at Northwestern University,^[3] after doing so, he began his career as a federal prosecutor for the United States Department of Justice in Washington, D.C., and served as a reservist in the United States Army for sixteen years.^[4] After Gessler returned from serving in the Army, he re-located to Denver, Colorado where he began working for a small law practice, where he specialized in election law. In 2002, Gessler fought against gerrymandering in Colorado House and Senate districts.

Personal life

Scott Gessler is married to his wife Kristi, together they have two daughters and reside in Denver.^[5]

Government

Gessler announced his candidacy for Colorado Secretary of State in late 2009, he did not face any opposition in the Republican party primary elections. In the general election, Gessler challenged Bernie Buescher, a popular Democratic incumbent^[6] and Amanda Campbell, who was a member of the Constitution Party. Gessler won the election with over 49% of the vote.^[7]

In 2011, Secretary of State Gessler filed an order requiring Denver County not to mail ballots to those who did not vote in 2010 and failed to respond to numerous mailings from the county clerks. Though counties had never mailed to these inactive voters for statewide November elections, both Pueblo and Denver, which are heavily Democratic counties, decided this would be the first time they would mail to inactive voters causing some to accuse Gessler of making the order for political reasons.^[8][9][10]

In the lead-up to the 2012 elections, Gessler sent letters to voters who also showed proof of non-citizenship at their recent driver's license application. The letter asked the registered voters to confirm their citizenship. Many non-citizens voluntarily removed themselves from the rolls. Although Gessler never removed or threatened to remove anyone from the voter rolls, many liberal groups complained of his efforts to purge voters. He countered the criticisms of the campaign by saying his office "had spent $1.1m registering Colorado voters, an initiative which netted more Democrats than Republicans, and that the state's electoral roll was cleaner than ever. He compared his campaign to installing fire alarms. 'Even if a building has no history of fires, it's something you do.'"^[11]

Ethics investigation

An investigation and hearing conducted by the Colorado Independent Ethics Commission resulted in a unanimous 5-0 vote finding that Gessler violated the state discretionary fund statute by spending roughly $2000 in government money on a political event, the Republican National Lawyers Association meeting in Sarasota, Florida in August 2012.^[12][13] Gessler appealed the findings in court; however, a Denver District Court judge ruled in favor of the Commission and ultimately found Gessler guilty.^[14]

References

External links

• Official website