Tony Exum
DemocraticQ1 What advisory mechanisms will you implement to ensure that evidence and scientific findings play a crucial role in your policymaking process?
“As years of experience as a state lawmaker has taught me: we need to know a little bit about a lot of different things, a lot of information about a few things, and rely on experts for the rest because we can’t know everything about everything. Experto credite, and they should have an active and critical role.
Whenever I have a question on some topic with which I am not familiar, I ask the experts and other people I trust on those issues, and give great weight to their testimony when making my own decisions about what legislation to craft or support with my votes.”
Q2 Colorado farmers are facing multiple threats, amidst water scarcity and rising prices for fertilizer and other imported materials. As agriculture is our #1 export sector, in what ways do you imagine using your role to support evidence-based advancements to protect and support our farmers and natural resources in the years ahead?
“If we listen to the experts, Colorado is only a few years away from facing a serious water crisis unless we act diligently now. We need to educate the public about the 2023 Colorado Water Plan and ensure the legislature continues supporting its full implementation.
With water scarcity growing, we need smart-growth policies, including stronger conservation standards for new development and demand-management programs which protect our limited water resources. We should also learn from other Western states which have confronted similar challenges with fewer resources, including innovative approaches to managing unprecedented drought.
Colorado should expand the responsible use of water markets and alternative transfer mechanisms to improve water allocation while reducing “buy and dry” pressures on agricultural communities. Protecting Colorado agriculture means protecting both our farmers and the water resources they depend on.”
Q3 America has a growing AI industry, supporting cutting-edge innovation but raising issues of resource use, privacy, and economics. What is the right balance of costs and benefits for new data center construction in Colorado, and how would your policies accomplish that balance?
“Some regulation of artificial intelligence will need to come from the federal government, but there is also much we can – and should – do at the state level. Colorado has already established guardrails for AI in areas such as housing and transportation, including prohibiting AI from setting rents and requiring human review and an appeals process for certain AI-driven decisions. More can and will be done as the technology evolves.
When it comes to data centers, I believe Colorado should welcome the jobs and economic investment they can bring – but not at the expense of existing ratepayers, taxpayers, or our water and energy resources. Data centers should help pay their fair share of the infrastructure and resources they require, while meeting strong standards for efficiency and environmental responsibility. We tried to establish additional data-center regulations this year but could not agree on the best path forward. We’ll certainly try again next year, because there is too much at stake to do nothing.”
Q4 Colorado has experienced a lingering measles outbreak since March of 2025. What evidence-based policies do you support to improve community and preventive health for your constituents, for infectious diseases and other threats?
“Early in 2025, anticipating there might be unwise changes made to federal policy related to vaccine schedules and recommendations, we in the Colorado legislature passed a bill (HB25-1027) directing the State Board of Health, when adopting rules establishing immunization requirements, to take into consideration not only the recommendations of the CDC’s advisory committee on immunization practices, but also the recommendations of the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Academy of Family Physicians, the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, and the American College of Physicians. We went out of our way to make sure our state recommendations followed the best wisdom of medical professionals. I was glad to be a Yes vote on that bill.”
Q5 What are your opinions on the current state of science literacy, and how could K-12 education standards be adapted to form a better public understanding of and relationship building in science?
“In August 1960, the Science News Letter asked presidential candidates John F. Kennedy and Richard M. Nixon for their views on science and technology.
Kennedy focused on how technological advances have improved production capabilities and general efficiency, but also caused disruptions to labor and employment. His answer was prescient, since we’ve seen the same thing happen over the last few decades with the rise of computers, the internet, and now AI advancements. Kennedy’s answer deserves renewed attention.
But Nixon’s answer is the most relevant here, and deserves extended quotation:
“Nothing could be more obvious than the impact of science and technology on our national life – indeed, on our very survival.
“But because our attention is focused so largely on the dramatic and the spectacular – on satellites and missiles and space exploration – we may tend to lose sight of the almost routine interrelation of scientific advance and our day-to-day lives: in the fields of health and nutrition, communications of every form, business and industry, and all the processes of an abundant and productive living standard. …
“We need scientific education for the general public. If our national scientific effort is to be maintained, the American people must have deeper motivations than simply a desire for immediate practical benefits. This new age will require of the public generally a high degree of scientific literacy and the blending of science into our total culture and way of life. …
“It is not a question of making every citizen into a scientist: what we must try to do is provide for the nonscientists the insight and understanding with respect to science that we have historically sought to give all our citizens in the general field of the humanities. What we need is continued public support for basic research.”
I whole-heartedly agree.”