One of the leading morning drive time talk radio shows in Colorado is The Jeff and Bill Show. The dominant voice in that pairing is Jeff Hunt, who has characterized himself as a “rock-ribbed, MAGA-loving conservative.” As he has done before, on the April 16 edition of the show Hunt casually spread a falsehood that undermines our civil society.
One of the segments of the show bore the title “Should Politicians Choose Their Voters?” It featured civic leaders John Brackney and Robyn Carnes, who spoke of their efforts to put an initiative on the Colorado ballot with respect to efforts to redraw congressional district maps. Before taking in what Hunt said, understand the background.
Last July the president of the United States directed the state of Texas to redraw its Congressional district maps so as to increase the number of Republicans who would win in the 2026 election. Here is how the AP reported the story:
President Donald Trump said Tuesday that he is pushing Texas Republicans to redraw the state’s congressional maps to create more House seats favorable to his party, part of a broader effort to help the GOP retain control of the chamber in next year’s midterm elections.
The president’s directive signals part of the strategy Trump is likely to take to avoid a repeat of his first term, when Democrats flipped the House just two years into his presidency. It comes shortly before the GOP-controlled Texas Legislature is scheduled to begin a special session next week during which it will consider new congressional maps to further marginalize Democrats in the state.
Asked as he departed the White House for Pittsburgh about the possibility of adding GOP-friendly districts around the country, Trump responded, “Texas will be the biggest one. And that’ll be five.”
Trump had a call earlier Tuesday with members of Texas’ Republican congressional delegation and told them the state Legislature would pursue five new winnable seats through redistricting, according to a person familiar the call who was not authorized to discuss it. The call was first reported by Punchbowl News.
California was the first Democratic-run state to respond to Texas’s gerrymandering effort. The following is from an August 2025 New York Times report:
Democrats in California moved this week to counter redistricting efforts by Texas Republicans with discussions of a new political map of their own drawn to help Democrats win as many as five of the state’s Republican U.S. House seats next year.
That would functionally offset the five Democratic House seats that Republicans have targeted in Texas.
The plan seemed far-fetched a few weeks ago but has been gaining momentum as a redistricting war that began in Texas threatens to spread across the country. California’s Democratic members of Congress and the state Legislature have been briefed in recent days. State lawmakers are planning to vote on the proposal the week of Aug. 18, and Gov. Gavin Newsom said he hopes to put a new map before voters in a special election on Nov. 4.
“If Republicans are going to play this game, California can fight and push back harder,” said Representative Robert Garcia, Democrat of Long Beach. “We’re not going to allow national congressional Republicans and Donald Trump to rig and gerrymander the map across the country and just sit by and do nothing.”
Illinois also swiftly considered redistricting in response to Texas, as CBS reported last August in a piece that referenced its governor in the headline: “Pritzker says redrawing Illinois district map “on the table” in response to Texas redistricting push.” Reuters gave a broader early read on what had begun to unfold in an August 5 piece headlined “Trump-led Texas redistricting gambit ignites national arms race to control Congress.”
Jeff Hunt knows all of this perfectly well. This is not necessarily true of the listeners who tune into his show. Many of them surely are molded by misrepresentations that he spews, such as in his introduction to the segment (emphasis added):
Well, we’re honored to have live in studio with us, Robyn Carnes, John Brackney, well-known civic activists, formerly elected officials, both of them, are teaming up on a project keeping Colorado’s communities represented and intact, initiatives, 327, 328. This has to do with the gerrymandering battles that you’re seeing out there, where you have some states like Illinois, California, radically gerrymandered for Democrats, and then Texas fighting back going, well, you’re going to gerrymandering? So will we! And so Texas is going to do their duty to keep it in as many Republican hands as possible.
Hunt precisely inverted the dynamic at play to further cultivate among his listeners dislike or worse toward Democrats. A person who enjoys a reputation as a civic leader who operates in good faith has a special duty to push back when an influential person with a powerful platform – a person like Jeff Hunt – makes such a brazen exhibition of bad faith. I have praised Brackney in this newsletter, most effusively in an edition I published in February 2025. His conduct in this circumstance came as a disappointment.
It is understandable that Brackney did not immediately respond to Hunt’s lie. After all, the interview had just started and it perhaps would have been awkward to disrupt the flow of the interview so early. Consider, though, a later exchange. Brackney explained that he and Carnes are pushing their ballot initiative as a response to one from Colorado Democrats. Hunt again suggested that Democrats had initiated the gerrymander battles as an underhanded means to “stop Trump!”
It would have been appropriate for Brackney to have taken this opportunity to set the record straight. He might have said something like, “In all fairness, this started with Trump. But two wrongs don’t make a right and the principle of fair districting is paramount.” He did not do so.
BRACKNEY
Gerrymandering is, by definition, tough stuff. Political parties have been doing this in America from the founding of America on. And so, if it is tough stuff, do we want to be doing it every year, every legislative cycle, or do we want to do it every census, every ten years?
I think Colorado’s got it figured out. That redistricting commission is as fair as anything else. It worked in Colorado. Four and four is pretty cool. Seven and one? That is so obscene, Jeff! No, seriously, open in space. I don’t care if you’re a Democrat. Actually, one of the things I want to work with, and I know a lot of them, is conservative Democrats or constitutional Democrats or people that just believe in fundamental fairness, they know it’s wrong to take away…
HUNT
We have to stop Donald Trump! This is a way to stop him! You’re not a fan of Donald Trump!
BRACKNEY
I am not a fan of Donald Trump. I’m not. But it still doesn’t mean that he shouldn’t have a fair chance to compete. If you disagree on substance, me and Donald Trump, that’s fine.
Disagree on process, and you hate each other forever. Everybody wants a fair race, as Robyn was talking about. Everyone wants a fair process. And when you don’t get it, you make enemies for life.
HUNT
Who are the Democrats pushing this? You said, is this going to end up on our ballot this November, at least their effort, or how are they going about it?
BRACKNEY
This is part of the national Democratic initiative with statewide leadership. It’s the political insiders just trying to get an extra three votes to control Congress.
Rather than provide context to increase listeners’ understanding, Brackney actually reinforced the false notion that Colorado’s Democrats, like their counterparts purportedly in other states, are pursuing an underhanded scheme to wrest control of Congress away from the Republican party. In fact, as Colorado Public Radio (CPR) and others reported February 18, Coloradans for a Level Playing Field took the step as a defensive response:
The group Coloradans for a Level Playing Field wants to put an initiative on the 2026 ballot that would allow the state to draw new Congressional maps for 2028 and 2030.
If voters approve, the state would join the redistricting tit-for-tat going on across the country after President Donald Trump urged Texas to redraw its congressional map to help Republicans retain control of the House in 2026. Several other Red and Blue states have followed or plan on following suit, such as Missouri, North Carolina, California and Virginia.
“No one wanted to have to take this action,” said Curtis Hubbard, spokesperson for Coloradans for a Level Playing Field, adding independent commissions that make such decisions are ideal. “But with Donald Trump and his MAGA Republican allies actively working to rig congressional elections, which could result in them gaining up to 27 seats, Colorado has to join other states in countering the power grab.”
Although it did not name the radio personalities, the September 1, 2025 edition of Decency and Sense also included material from the Jeff and Bill Show. The focus of that essay was one of the show’s frequent guests, state Rep. Brandi Bradley, who had recently taken an opportunity to make false and disparaging statements about her Democratic counterparts. Below is a highly relevant excerpt:
Referring to Democrats, Rep. Bradley remarked in her radio appearance:
“There’s a reason they don’t want fair elections. But listen, they didn’t think we were gonna get as much as we get on social media. I have so many followers with the stuff that you guys put out there and social conservative radio. We are getting out to the people of Colorado and they didn’t expect that. And we’re going to win at the polls next year. I promise you that.”
As I stated there and repeat here, it is perfectly fine as a host or guest to make honest arguments on radio programs or other media that have a decided ideological or partisan tilt. It is not fine at all to spread falsehoods through such outlets, and especially not to do so for the purpose of deceiving the audience and ginning up animus toward one’s rivals or other targets.
As I have many times done, in that same essay I advocated for the Pro-Truth Pledge. I respectfully urge the John Brackneys of the world to take the pledge and commit not only to share and honor truth but also to encourage truth, including by asking for corrections from people “even if they are my allies.”
Below is the Pledge in full.
Verify: fact-check information to confirm it is true before accepting and sharing it
Balance: share the whole truth, even if some aspects do not support my opinion
Cite: share my sources so that others can verify my information
Clarify: distinguish between my opinion and the facts
Acknowledge: acknowledge when others share true information, even when we disagree otherwise
Reevaluate: reevaluate if my information is challenged, retract it if I cannot verify it
Defend: defend others when they come under attack for sharing true information, even when we disagree otherwise
Align: align my opinions and my actions with true information
Fix: ask people to retract information that reliable sources have disproved even if they are my allies
Educate: compassionately inform those around me to stop using unreliable sources even if these sources support my opinion
Defer: recognize the opinions of experts as more likely to be accurate when the facts are disputed
Celebrate: celebrate those who retract incorrect statements and update their beliefs toward the truth
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