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Look out Scott McInnis. Move over Dan Maes. There’s another Republican entering the race to become Colorado governor: Joe Gschwendtner.
Never heard of him? He owns Consortium3, a Castle Rock consulting firm that specializes in “profit recovery services” for businesses. Before that, Gschwendtner owned two Denver-area businesses—a specialty foods company and Midwest Rubber and Supply Company.
He wants to govern the state like a CEO, according to the Denver Business Journal, which notes that Gschwendtner would reverse several laws signed by Democratic Governor Bill Ritter, including the one mandating that utilities get 30 percent of their power from renewable sources by 2020. He says he wants to “re-open Colorado for business” and suggests strategies for helping the state come to grips with budgetary shortfalls, such as selling off swaths of state land to the private sector, according to The Colorado Independent.
“I’m not suggesting liquidation,” he says, “but we have a billion dollars of property…Maybe we can look at some of this stuff and say, ‘Maybe we can sell this to private business.'” He also chimes in on the abortion issue, stating that he believes life begins at conception.
As for the Democrat in the race, Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper, he’s now facing an attack ad that compares him to Ritter. The ad by the Republican Governors Association states, “Hickenlooper and Ritter are politicians of the same stripe, raising taxes, killing jobs,” according to CBS4, which analyzes the ad.