Tuesday's primaries in Colorado pit insurgent challengers against Democratic establishment figures across several high-profile races, one week after insurgent victories in New York.
Rep. Diana DeGette, who has served in Congress for almost 30 years and is 68, faces a serious primary challenge from a 29-year-old challenger who immigrated from Ethiopia, and Justice Democrats has spent more than $500,000 to boost the challenger while various super PACs have spent more than $2 million to bolster DeGette.
At a party assembly the challenger outperformed DeGette and qualified for the ballot after DeGette narrowly cleared the 30% threshold of activist support; Kiros said, "in order for the Democratic Party to actually fulfill its progressive agenda, we need to have members that are unbought and unafraid to stand up to the billionaires and corporations," and DeGette said, "Now is not the time to gamble and send somebody with no experience to Washington."
Sen. Michael Bennet has been the front-runner in the race to succeed the term-limited governor but faces a significant challenge from Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser in a contest that has grown increasingly negative, with both sides and allied outside groups trading attacks over who has taken a tougher approach to Trump; if Bennet wins, he would be able to appoint his own replacement to the Senate to serve out the remainder of his term.
Bennet, who has represented Colorado in the Senate since 2009, has emphasized affordability and pointed to achievements such as the expanded Child Tax Credit, and Bennet said, "the best solutions to our challenges will not come from Washington's broken politics," while Weiser has cast himself as a fighter who has been willing to take on the Trump administration with dozens of lawsuits.
Sen. John Hickenlooper is facing state Sen. Julie Gonzales, who has painted Hickenlooper as a product of "go-along-to-get-along politics" and criticized him for voting for 10 of Trump's Cabinet nominees; Hickenlooper has vastly outraised and outspent Gonzales and has run television ads highlighting his Senate work and opposition to Trump.
Colorado's 8th District is described as the most competitive seat in the state: in 2024 Trump carried it by less than 2 points and freshman GOP Rep. Gabe Evans won it by less than 1 point, and the two major Democratic candidates are former state Rep. Shannon Bird and state Rep. Manny Rutinel, with Rutinel the top fundraiser and backed by labor unions and former Interior Secretary Ken Salazar while Bird is endorsed by EMILY's List and centrist Democratic groups; so far only nine House races have drawn more fall ad bookings, according to the ad-tracking firm AdImpact.
On the Republican side, Victor Marx, a former Marine and ministry leader, is running against state Sen. Barb Kirkmeyer and state Rep. Scott Bottoms, and Marx told a Denver TV station that his abusive stepfather forced him to kill a man when he was 7 and that he has "been in other situations where, possibly, people or persons died as a result of me defending myself in other countries."
The GOP primary in the 3rd District has featured a saga over Trump’s endorsement of Rep. Jeff Hurd, who lost and then regained the endorsement; Hope Scheppelman dropped out at Trump's request and is now working at the Department of Health and Human Services, and Hurd has raised more than $3 million for his re-election compared with $42,000 raised by former state Rep. Ron Hanks, whom Hurd defeated by 14 points in the 2024 primary.