Root Routledge
Root Routledge (Democratic Party) ran for election to the U.S. House to represent Colorado's 3rd Congressional District. He did not appear on the ballot for the Democratic primary on June 30, 2020.
Routledge completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey in 2020. Click here to read the survey answers.
Biography
Root Routledge was born in Vancouver, British Columbia. He served in the U.S. Air Force from 1968 to 1972. Routledge earned a bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering from Washington State University in 1968, a master's degree in statistics from Colorado State University in 1976, an MBA from the University of Montana in 1984, and a Ph.D in industrial engineering from Oregon State University in 1991. His career experience includes founding and running a private consulting firm, Alpine Analytics, in 1991.[1]
Elections
2020
See also: Colorado's 3rd Congressional District election, 2020
Colorado's 3rd Congressional District election, 2020 (June 30 Democratic primary)
Colorado's 3rd Congressional District election, 2020 (June 30 Republican primary)
General election
General election for U.S. House Colorado District 3
Lauren Boebert defeated Diane Mitsch Bush, John Keil, and Critter Milton in the general election for U.S. House Colorado District 3 on November 3, 2020.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ |  | Lauren Boebert (R) | 51.4 | 220,634 |
 | Diane Mitsch Bush (D) | 45.2 | 194,122 | |
| John Keil (L) | 2.4 | 10,298 | ||
 | Critter Milton (Unity Party) | 1.0 | 4,265 | |
| Total votes: 429,319 | |||
 = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
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Withdrawn or disqualified candidates
- Robert Moser (Independent)
Democratic primary election
Democratic primary for U.S. House Colorado District 3
Diane Mitsch Bush defeated James Iacino in the Democratic primary for U.S. House Colorado District 3 on June 30, 2020.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ | | Diane Mitsch Bush | 61.3 | 65,377 |
 | James Iacino | 38.7 | 41,200 | |
| Total votes: 106,577 | |||
| = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
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Withdrawn or disqualified candidates
- Root Routledge (D)
- Donald Valdez (D)
Republican primary election
Republican primary for U.S. House Colorado District 3
Lauren Boebert defeated incumbent Scott Tipton in the Republican primary for U.S. House Colorado District 3 on June 30, 2020.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ | | Lauren Boebert | 54.6 | 58,678 |
 | Scott Tipton | 45.4 | 48,805 | |
| Total votes: 107,483 | |||
| = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
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Libertarian convention
Libertarian convention for U.S. House Colorado District 3
John Keil advanced from the Libertarian convention for U.S. House Colorado District 3 on April 13, 2020.
Candidate | ||
| ✔ | John Keil (L) | |
| ||||
| = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
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Unity Party convention
Unity Party convention for U.S. House Colorado District 3
Critter Milton advanced from the Unity Party convention for U.S. House Colorado District 3 on April 4, 2020.
Candidate | ||
| ✔ | | Critter Milton (Unity Party) |
| ||||
| = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
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Campaign themes
2020
Ballotpedia survey responses
See also: Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection
Root Routledge completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey in 2020. The survey questions appear in bold and are followed by Routledge's responses. Candidates are asked three required questions for this survey, but they may answer additional optional questions as well.
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Root's low-budget "climate insurgency" campaign is focused on four strategic issues that are crucial to a viable future for our country and our planet: Healthy Democracy, Healthy Population, Healthy Environment, and Healthy Economy. These are "gateway" issues that represent strategic threats to a viable future if not addressed with the scope and urgency of the problems in a comprehensive way. The climate emergency must have central focus.
Root supports Bernie Sanders for President and Colorado progressive candidate Andrew Romanoff for U.S. Senate. Root is for Medicare For All, Green New Deal, price on carbon, a just economy for all with living wages, free public education through college, and elimination of student education debt. In particular, as a Western Colorado candidate, he is concerned with rural healthcare access issues, water resource conservation, and climate impacts on agriculture.
Root is a scientifically educated systems engineer and experienced systems problem-solver, who has worked for the US Forest Service, Weyerhaeuser R&D, and Hewlett Packard, before becoming a consultant in industrial and environmental data analytics. He has a deep understanding of the science of climate stability, climate impacts, and climate policy.
Root, age 73, has 3 grandchildren and is passionate about fighting for a viable future with a lead on climate.- Strategic focus and lead on our climate crisis. House bills HR 763 Energy Innovation and Carbon Dividend Act, HRes 109 Green New Deal - Intersectional, infrastructure job creation, climate justice.
- Medicare For All. House bill HR 1384, companion House bill with Bernie's Senate MFA bill. Healthcare is a moral human right. Completely transforming the way we pay for healthcare.
- Protect our environment and public lands, especially in Western Colorado (with 29 counties, CD3 is the largest district in the country that is not an entire state). A comprehensive GND takes on the fossil fuel industry, and provides millions of well-paying jobs.
Healthy Population - Medicare For All, expanded and improved, comprehensive universal single payer healthcare. Everyone in; no one out. Progressive financing: de-concentrates elite capital (the 1%); addresses income inequality (99%).
Healthy Democracy - HR1 For the People Act. Fixing the corruption of our democracy; election justice and integrity; money out of politics, public financing and campaign finance transparency. Overturn the disastrous Supreme Court "Citizens United" decision. Restore VRA; voter access "one-person; one-vote". Secure our election system; incorporate election quality assurance measures.
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is the most amazing political phenomenon in recent history. She has taken on the entrenched high-ranking Democratic establishment incumbent, and beaten him. She then struck her own path in Congress, rejecting the "tow-the-line" establishment power structure; and has fought for ordinary people, our environment and climate, our health, and our future. She and her young new colleagues have introduced amazing legislation, especially the House Resolution directing the government to take an integrated system-wide perspective and response to our climate crisis, with a just transformation (climate justice) to a viable future - HRes 109 - The Green New Deal. She is a tough working-class girl from the Bronx, who is a fighter and a visionary. As a freshman representative, I would seek out her advice and mentoring to quickly get up to speed as a new Congress member. In fact, I'd want an office near her and the "Squad".
Link: The book can be found from obvious links on my campaign website: http://www.RootForCitizenCongressman.org/
or directly on my eNewspaper, 4th Edition: http://www.TheUnheardHerald.com/2017-11-07.StrategicVisionForAViableFuture.html (pdf link with accompanying webpage material),
Love people, work well alone or on teams, have led many such teams in industry and government. Well praised educator, scholastically and teaching. Know how to work with people of widely differing background and capabilities. Love human diversity; have 3 black grandchildren.
Experience problem solver, complex systems problems. Diverse hands-on experience in industry and government:
Was on Industrial Engineering faculty at Oregon State U (engineering economics); also taught at Colorado State U (statistics), Washington State U (MBA Quantitative Methods) and Oregon Institute of Technology (quality technology). Prior to PhD at age 44, worked for 20 years in leading organizations: Hewlett Packard, Weyerhaeuser and U.S. Forest Service in a variety of functions, including R&D, manufacturing, quality assurance and supplier quality management, metrology and inspection, materials and logistics, long range planning, operations research, environmental research and natural resource management.
Since founding Alpine Analytics in 1991, Routledge has focused his energies as an industrial consultant and trainer on the needs of engineers, scientists and managers from over 100 organizations covering several industries, including: Automotive Industry; Chemical and Hydrocarbon Process Industries; Computer, Electronic and Software Industries; Consumer and Building Products Industries; Defense Industry; Energy and Transportation Service Industries; Environmental Regulation and Reclamation Industry; Food, Drug and Medical Device Industries; Forest Products Industry; Metals and Materials Production and Forming Industries; Service Industries (Legal/Medical); Sustainability, Climate/Energy and Environmental Issues. He has also been involved with Engineers Without Borders.
As a 6-grader science nerd kid (1958/59, age 12) in Seattle, the big thing that happened was the launch of Sputnik. We had telescopes, radios and electronics and were making our own rockets as our country was deciding how to respond.
Then the Cuban Missile Crisis (October, 1962, age 16). I knew kids who quit high school and joined the Army to fight our enemies because of the perceived threat and emotional response of many.
The next has to be the assassination of President John F Kennedy, (November, 1963, age 17). I was in band practice when the announcement came over the loudspeaker. All students were in horror and crying.
After that, the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution (August 1964, age 17), throwing our country into the Vietnam War. People I knew quit college to join the military; or were getting drafted. The war heated up and raged on; I graduated from college in 1968, right into this raging war; would be drafted, but couldn't be an officer as a non-citizen. So, I got my U.S. Citizenship in 1968, and joined the U.S. Air Force, fighting this war from 1968 to 1972.
Kinjah is now 25 years old, and an up-and-coming Hiphop/Rap musician/lyricist, under his handle "Rize Tha Rebel"
The House is a deliberative body, which discusses, argues, debates, and inquires about factors that influence the best policy for our country. It is a body where individual representatives can express their view and lead on issues important for our collective future. A member of the House is not only a representative for their respective district; but a national position as well, since so many local issues are affected by national policy.
If elected, I'm not going to Washington to "reach across the goddamn aisle"! That metaphor implies everyone leads with their ideology, and the solution to the ineffective stagnation in Congress is some sort of compromised blend of ideologies - just to get something-anything-done. That's not the goal. It ignores the new political landscape of the next 10 years; and it misconstrues the scope and urgency of what we are up against. Republicans always lead with their capitalist ideology - all solutions to anything must be packaged with their mantra of "privatization, smaller government, less regulation," meaning "let the rich oligarchs, plutocrats and corporate executives decide everything," driven by their sole purpose of grown money for those who already have the most money-the more the better, the faster the better. This Business As Usual (BAU) approach is what is destroying our planet. Republicans do not hold the answers for our nightmare of problems; they are not the ones to look to for solutions.
One of my fellow candidate competitors is a professional politician, and tries to sell her knowledge of lower-level (county and state) legislative processes and her ability to "reach across the aisle" as an experienced politician as the gem of her candidacy. "I get along with everyone." But, "everyone," including her, does this job for the first time at some point in their lives. One learns how to be part of the legislative and political process. What's important is one's ability to properly define and address problems; and their ability to be simultaneously tough and respectful. What's important is one's ability to lead others to a proper understanding of policy problems and the best way to successfully address them. It's far past time to entertain BAU ideological approaches that have demonstrated their manifest failure in protecting our future.
But that cannot be divorced from a system-wide intersectional perspective, because everything is interconnected and related to everything else. Yes, we need to take on the fossil fuel industry for their corruption and criminal malfeasance in preventing earlier action. Yes, we need to drive carbon emissions down to zero, and drive carbon out of our economy. Yes, we need massive investments and research into climate mitigation and alternative energy sources, for all sectors of the economy; especially the major sectors: electrical generation; transportation; and our building infrastructure. We need a massive Federal infrastructure and jobs creation effort to accomplish this.
That was the first major personal story I heard on the campaign trail, where Medicare For All would have fully protected their financial situation while providing for all the medical care they needed. The lady even had to travel five hours to a city on the Front Range, where she could be treated. So, transportation was a big issue, because the drugs made her sleepy and increased the risk of an accident during her weekly lengthy trips. Also, there was the costs for a place to stay for the two days she would get her treatments.
Note: Ballotpedia reserves the right to edit Candidate Connection survey responses. Any edits made by Ballotpedia will be clearly marked with [brackets] for the public. If the candidate disagrees with an edit, he or she may request the full removal of the survey response from Ballotpedia.org. Ballotpedia does not edit or correct typographical errors unless the candidate's campaign requests it.
See also
2020 Elections
External links
Footnotes
- ↑ ’’Information submitted to Ballotpedia through the Candidate Connection survey on February 7, 2020’’
