Liberal group spends millions on Colo.

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By Matthew Cella

A secretive coalition of wealthy liberal political donors in Colorado has channeled millions of dollars this year to "progressive" causes and seeks to help turn over the highly contested swing state to Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama, records show.

The Colorado Democracy Alliance (CoDA) has been credited with helping Democrats reclaim the governor's office in 2006 after an eight-year Republican run, bolster their majorities in the state legislature and capture a previously Republican-held U.S. House seat in a state where Democratic registration ranks third behind that of Republicans and the unaffiliated.

Colorado voted for George W. Bush in 2000 and 2004, but many political analysts consider its nine electoral votes to be up for grabs this year. Last week, Mr. Obama led Republican presidential candidate Sen. John McCain in Colorado by about five percentage points, according to the RealClearPolitics Web site, which tracks all polls.

According to documents made public last week and statements by CoDA leaders, the organization has enlisted both wealthy donors who have contributed millions of dollars to targeted campaigns and nonprofit groups that support what its leaders term "progressive" causes, bypassing funding limits on candidate committees.

Key CoDA benefactors include billionaire Pat Stryker, heiress to a $6 billion international medical equipment supply company; and millionaire businessmen Tim Gill, a computer software entrepreneur and gay rights activist who created the Quark software program, and Rutt Bridges, a geophysicist and software entrepreneur. They have been listed as members of CoDA's board of directors and are major contributors.

"It was really done well," said Jon Caldara, head of the conservative Colorado-based Independence Institute, a nonpartisan, nonprofit public policy research organization. "It's a blueprint of how a handful of rich guys and unions have given their money to organizations that have particular jobs instead of giving it to candidates."

Mr. Caldara said he received the CoDA documents outlining the campaign effort earlier this year from an anonymous source. The 2008 campaign effort is based on the group's successes in 2006 and includes a $12 million media plan aimed at supporting Democratic candidates in the presidential election, the U.S. Senate race and a bid for a House seat in the state's 4th Congressional District.

The media plan, marked "confidential" by its author, outlines a wide range of television, radio, outdoor and direct-mail advertising financed through a variety of independent nonprofit political groups. The plan - a copy of which was obtained by The Washington Times - was prepared by Denver-based political strategist Dominic DelPapa for Al Yates, identified on the plan as a member of CoDA.

"The budget we submitted makes a whole series of 'blue sky' assumptions that represent little more than our own thinking about what a successful 527 operation for the presidential, U.S. Senate and [congressional district] elections might look like," Mr. DelPapa wrote.

He said the figures were based on "very rough projections" and some were "slightly more robust than the minimal competitive investment because we felt it advisable to project what a potentially winning budget would look like."