Voters in Colorado’s vast 3rd Congressional District who are looking to unseat the Republican incumbent will choose between two Aspen-area businessmen running in the Democratic primary.
One is a military veteran who pitches himself as a lifelong civic servant and recently tossed his name in the hat. The other is a political newbie who emphasizes his family’s deep Colorado roots and entered the race more than a year ago.
Both candidates — and — said in interviews that they decided to seek the Democratic nomination in the June 30 primary to challenge freshman U.S. Rep. Jeff Hurd in response to overreach and corruption they see in the Trump administration. With little difference in their policy platforms — Kelloff even claimed Romero copied his — voters will have to look to their backgrounds to decide.
“This particular district is very large … it’s all these disparate economies: farming, ranching, tourism and steel production,” Romero said. “Because of all that, it’s hard to find some single thread that pulls everyone together. … (Voters) need to see someone that they can trust and they need to see a part of themselves in the candidate before them.”
Colorado’s 3rd District covers nearly half of the state, swooping from the desert and canyons of the Western Slope to the high mountains in southern Colorado and the southern end of the Front Range in Pueblo.
Larger than the entire state of Pennsylvania, the rural district encompasses 27 of the state’s 64 counties and takes in vastly different towns, including Aspen, Grand Junction, San Luis and Durango.
The district in recent years has leaned Republican, though voter data show 23% of the district’s voters are affiliated as Democrats, 26% as Republicans, while nearly half have no party identification.
The district has not been represented by a Democrat since 2011, when former U.S. Rep. John Salazar lost to Republican Scott Tipton. Tipton was then ousted in the 2020 Republican primary by Lauren Boebert, who in 2024 moved across the state to instead represent the 4th Congressional District.
In the 2024 election, President Donald Trump won the 3rd District by a 10-point margin.
But voting tallies show that Republicans’ hold on the district is not absolute. In both 2022 and 2024, Democrat Adam Frisch came close to clinching the seat. The Aspen businessman lost to Boebert in 2022 by less than 546 votes. In 2024, Hurd won the seat with 51% of votes — nearly 20,000 more votes than Frisch, who earned 46% of the vote.
Seizing on frustration with Trump
Both Kelloff and Romero hope to ride the momentum of what they see as rising frustration with the Trump administration to flip the seat back to blue.
“We need to bring back leadership in Washington,” Kelloff said. “I’m running to hopefully lead with moral clarity. I think this is the most corrupt administration that we’ve ever seen in the history of America.”
Both candidates listed addressing the rising cost of living as their top priority. Other goals include protecting public lands and Western Slope water interests.
“There is an absolute public outcry on affordability and the cost of living and making ends meet for rural families and working-class families,” Romero said. “What our current administration has done is absolutely ignore that.”
In interviews, both candidates emphasized their ties to Colorado and — despite their business success and affluence as adults — more humble upbringings.
Kelloff’s family has lived in the district since 1893, though he grew up outside of Washington, D.C. He traveled back frequently to the Centennial State to visit family before moving to Aspen permanently six years ago.
Kelloff, 52, spent 30 years in the telecommunications industry and also co-founded Armada Skis. While he’s never won elected office, Kelloff said he has decades of experience forging deals and leading large teams in the business realm.
He announced his candidacy more than a year before primary ballots were set to be mailed out — starting today — so that he could spend time traveling the state, talking to voters. By January, he had visited all 27 counties in the district.
“I’ve been in this race for almost 13 months,” Kelloff said. “To win this seat, to flip this seat, you need a fighter to take on Jeff Hurd and win. That’s why I got in 13 months early to do the hard work.”
Romero, 61, grew up on the Gulf Coast of Texas and, after 11 years in the military, moved to the Roaring Fork Valley in 1996. He leads that has sold more than $50 million worth of property since 2023. His wife, Margaret, has worked as a local schoolteacher in the Roaring Fork Valley for 25 years.
Romero, who entered the race four months before the primary, emphasized his history of serving on local boards: two terms on the Aspen City Council, two terms on the Aspen School District board, two terms on the local fire district board and, now, serving his second term on the local water and sanitation board. He also served for six months as the chief economic development director in then-Gov. John Hickenlooper’s cabinet in 2011 and for three years on the state economic development commission.
“Twelve months of driving around in the district and taking some pictures here and there is all well and good,” Romero said of Kelloff’s campaigning, “but that does not erase the body of work and the experiences and know-how we’ve achieved over the last 30 to 35 years — sorry.”
Hurd is ‘not a headline-grabber’
Frisch, the Democrat who previously tried to win the seat, endorsed Romero on the day he announced his campaign. The two men served on the Aspen City Council together and the address for Romero’s campaign is the same as that for the Frisch now runs.
Whichever candidate wins the Democratic primary will need to educate voters on Hurd’s voting record, said Nick Voss, the chair of The incumbent operates more quietly than his predecessor, whose controversial statements and personal life routinely made news.
“He’s not a headline-grabber, like Lauren Boebert is,” Voss said.
This year’s race , who previously endorsed a Republican candidate looking to challenge Hurd in the primary after Hurd split from the Republican majority on tariff policy.
However, Trump in March re-endorsed Hurd and said he convinced the other Republican running against him, Hope Scheppelman, to and instead work in his administration, where she as an adviser for the federal .
“Together with (the Scheppelmans), we decided that Congressman Jeff Hurd, of Colorado’s 3rd Congressional District, should in no way, shape, or form, be impeded from winning the District in that the Democrat alternative is a DISASTER for our Country,” Trump wrote in a March 20 social media post.
In April, a former state representative announced he would challenge Hurd in the Republican primary. served in the state House, representing Fremont County from 2021 to 2023.
Hurd, a Grand Junction attorney, , winning 41% of the vote to Hanks’ 29% in a crowded open race.
As of the most recent federal finance reporting, through March 31, Hurd had raised $3 million, compared to about $1 million by Kelloff and about $500,000 by Romero.
Both Democratic challengers have loaned significant money to their campaigns: Kelloff loaned $450,000 of his own money to his campaign and Romero loaned $280,000 to his.
