COLORADO- After the 2018 midterm election in Colorado, the state saw a shift with Democrats taking the majority in the Colorado House, Senate, and all major state elected positions.
With Democrats holding the trifecta: Governor’s office, Senate, and House- the state appears to be shifting blue.
UCCS Political Science Department Chair Joshua Dunn notices the change and says it could mean Colorado plays less of a role with presidential candidates.
“Every campaign goes through a stage where they have to engage in political triage and decide where they’re going to allocate their resources in the last month, two months of the election,” Dunn said, “it wouldn’t surprise me to see the Republican Party start to pull back at least on the presidential side fairly early in Colorado certainly earlier than they have in the past.”
Republicans in El Paso County, a stronghold for the party say the Trump campaign plans to focus heavily on Colorado. With legislation passed this year, party leaders plan to capitalize on that in 2020.
“There’s been extreme overreach by state elected officials,” Tamra Farah, El Paso County Republican Party Chair said, noting legislation such as the oil and gas bill and the national popular vote compact, “the agenda they’ve had that is very upsetting to Republicans, Unaffiliateds, and I would guess some Democrats.”
On the flip side, the issues are what El Paso County Democratic Chair Electra Johnson says will bring voters in 2020.
“People are really really burnt out on politics right now but they’re not burnt out on issues,” Johnson said, adding items such as climate change and environmental issues are key players for the Democratic party.
In 2018, the El Paso County Democratic Party had a candidate in every race- a first for the party.
“Every single candidate who ran became an organizer and the reason why we were able to elected a full slate of Democrats at the state level was because we had organizers across the county,” Johnson said.
Beyond the presidential campaign and races in the Colorado House and Senate, the U.S. Senate Race for Cory Gardner’s seat will likely get a lot of attention, and money.
“Gardner’s going to be facing some stiff headwinds, I think that’s just the way the political environment is right now but it doesn’t mean it’s impossible, he was able to succeed before,” Dunn said.
