#PressPause: Colorado Secretary Of State Asks Media Not To Report Results On Election Night
DENVER (CBS4/AP) - Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold asked the national media to not report any results on any election results on Nov. 3, using the hashtag #PressPause.
"Our democracy cannot be held hostage to a ratings race. If you care about our democracy, you will protect it. Full Stop," Griswold tweeted.
"We are in the middle of a pandemic and the President of the United States has telegraphed that he may claim victory on election night, even when millions of ballots will not have been counted," she continued.
"Indisputable facts: 1. This is no normal election. A record number of Americans will be voting by mail. 2. Election 'night' will be dramatically different than ever before. We need an UNPRECEDENTED plan from the media for how they will cover an unprecedented election."
"That is why I am calling on national media networks to pledge to #PressPause for democracy and: 1. Make NO projections on election night 2. Announce NO election results on election night."
"In the coming days, I will ask election administrators, voting rights organizations, media ethicists, corporations, religious leaders, and all concerned Americans to stand with me in demanding media executives #PressPause for democracy," Griswold finished.
A few hours after the initial tweets went out, Griswold took to Twitter to clarify one of the tweets, which she said was deleted and edited in the initial thread. That edited tweet is included below:
Mail-in voting has recently been a target of the Trump administration, with the president claiming it would lead to fraud.
"There is a lot of misinformation about this election. Unfortunately a lot of it comes from the President of United States," Griswold said at a a virtual town hall Thursday.
Griswold, a Democrat, has praised Colorado's systems as being at the "forefront of accessible elections," saying it includes mail-in voting, which started in 2013.
Griswold encouraged mail-in voting due to the health risks of the coronavirus pandemic.
Colorado voters can also vote in-person at voting centers. The vast majority of voting in past elections has been by mail and by dropping off ballots at over 350 ballot drop boxes across the state.
In Colorado, ballots will be sent out between Oct. 9 and 16 to the state's more than 3.5 million active registered voters. Griswold urged voters to return their ballots by mail by Oct. 26. Ballots mailed after that date aren't guaranteed to be received by Election Day, Nov. 3, she said. Vote processing will begin 15 days before Election Day, Griswold said.
(© Copyright 2020 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. The Associated Press contributed to this report.)