DENVER, Sept. 11 (UPI) -- Two Democratic state senators in Colorado were punished in Tuesday's recall election for their support of gun control measures.
Senate President John Morse, who represents the Colorado Springs area, and Angela Giron, who represents a Pueblo County district, were the first Colorado lawmakers to be recalled by voters, The Denver Post reported. Both will be replaced by Republicans, but the Democrats will remain in the majority in the Senate, although by only one vote.
Morse played a key role in backing legislation requiring background checks for all gun purchases and limiting the size of magazines. Gun control opponents tried to get recall votes on four legislators but succeeded in getting elections only on Morse and Giron.
Giron in her concession speech said she is not sorry she supported the gun legislation.
"I'm a fighter," she said. "We will win in the end, because we are on the right side."
Supporters of the recall called the results a victory for accountability.
"Coloradans ... sent a clear message that politicians who blatantly ignore their constituents will be held accountable," Dustin Zvonek, the state director of Americans for Prosperity, said. "Perhaps this will serve as a lesson that one-party rule in Denver doesn't give the majority license to take things to extremes or run roughshod over the values and rights of Coloradans who just happen, for the moment, to be in the minority."
