Victor Marx has held a narrow, roughly 2,000-vote lead over state Sen. Barb Kirkmeyer for several days, but the race is still too close to call as the window for voters to fix deficient ballots remains open.
Marx, a religious nonprofit leader, has led Kirkmeyer for nearly a week after overtaking the veteran lawmaker the day after polls closed in the June 30 primary. With more than 518,000 ballots counted, Marx led Kirkmeyer 39.8% to 39.5%, . The AP projected that 98% of votes had been counted.
State Rep. Scott Bottoms, a conservative pastor, was in third place, with 20.7% of the vote.
As it stood Tuesday afternoon, the margin between Marx and Kirkmeyer was still outside the threshold required to trigger an automatic recount. Though Marx has held a steady lead over Kirkmeyer for several days, the AP has not yet called the race and likely won’t until the end of the week.
That’s because voters have until Wednesday evening to , meaning those with signature or voter verification issues. Voters whose ballots have been set aside are notified by their county election officials, and campaigns often work to cure ballots in close races.
Wednesday is also the deadline for county clerks to receive and count overseas ballots, cast by military personnel or other registered voters who are abroad.
The Marx campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment Tuesday. In a Monday email to supporters, Marx's campaign said he was leading, "but with margins this tight, every ballot matters, and we don't have a final answer yet. Our team is on the ground doing everything we can to ensure every vote is counted accurately, and we remain optimistic."
In a statement Tuesday, Kirkmeyer said the race was not over and that she remained optimistic, noting Wednesday's deadlines.
"Over the next several days, our incredible team will be working hard to help voters cure eligible ballots and make sure every valid vote counts," she wrote. "Most counties are expected to report final results Thursday, with the full picture anticipated by Friday."
Last week, Marx's campaign said it was confident Marx's lead would hold, in large part because late-arriving ballots -- meaning from people who voted on Election Day -- had broken for the first-time candidate.
Kirkmeyer's campaign had held out hope that the last batches of ballots, primarily from Arapahoe County, would help the state senator retake the lead. Though Kirkmeyer won Arapahoe County, late returns from there or other areas of the state were not sufficient for her to overtake Marx as of Tuesday afternoon, a week after Election Day.
