Colorado Republicans have spoken: First-time political candidate Victor Marx will lead the ticket as the party’s gubernatorial nominee in November.

The Associated Press called the race for Marx on Thursday, more than a week after the June 30 primary election. His closest opponent, state Sen. Barb Kirkmeyer, took an initial lead and then stayed close to Marx’s heels for more than a week. The religious nonprofit leader finally sealed his narrow win in the three-way race after final vote totals came in.

While Marx, 61, steadily gained ground and seemed to be the frontrunner in the final weeks of the race, the result was still remarkable for a party whose institutional leaders had coalesced around Kirkmeyer. His once-unlikely victory, powered by his direct outreach to voters and disinterest in traditional campaign tactics, laid bare the party’s still-unresolved internal struggle between more traditional and insurgent, conservative candidates.

Part of Marx’s appeal has been that he is not a politician. But in the coming months, he may have to act like one as he tries to unite his party — and appeal to voters beyond it in what’s become a firmly blue state. He’ll face Democrat Phil Weiser, the state’s attorney general, as his chief rival in November.

Colorado election results for the 2026 primary

And Marx will also almost certainly face more questions about his extensive and eye-popping personal history, which includes stories of hunting demons, high-risk humanitarian missions and a backwoods forced killing when he was a child.

Here's what to know about those claims and about the Republicans' gubernatorial nominee.

What is Marx's backstory?

The most scrutinized, questioned and difficult-to-verify part of Marx's candidacy is his extensive personal history. A Louisiana native, Marx has said he was the victim of profound abuse as a child. He has said he beheaded a cat as part of a voodoo ritual at age 3 and that he killed a man at age 7, both at the behest of his then-stepfather. (The sheriff in the Mississippi county where Marx says the killing took place has not returned messages seeking comment.)

Marx later joined the Marines, and toward the end of his time in the military, he reconnected with his birth father, Karl Marx. That, in turn, inspired him to embrace Christianity, which would later animate his campaign. He has said he is a black belt in "Cajun karate," a form of martial arts invented by his dad, and the younger Marx taught martial arts at schools in Hawaii.

He moved to Colorado Springs to work for Focus on the Family, a conservative ministry, and in 2003, he founded All Things Possible Ministries with his wife, Eileen, and supporters in Texas.

Marx is deeply religious and has said that he has freed people from demonic forces, which he's said can be brought on by pornography and unmarried couples living together.

What has his ministry done?

When it was founded, All Things Possible Ministries' goal was "to reach people with the gospel of Jesus Christ through outreaches and crusades primarily to youth." Marx visited prisons and held speaking engagements elsewhere, where he sometimes demonstrated his claim to being . His group has provided trauma support to people, including through the distribution of stuffed animals loaded with prayers and songs.

After traveling to work with a former Special Forces soldier in Myanmar, Marx branched into what he's called "high-risk humanitarianism." He says he traveled to Iraq and Syria during conflicts with the Islamic State militant group, and he funded medical teams working with the Burma group to come and treat civilians caught in the crossfire.

Marx primarily played a support role there, though he was present at least twice when medics came under direct fire. His nonprofit's tax forms indicate the groups has spent more than $4.3 million in overseas efforts in recent years, though those records also indicate the group has no offices or staff in those countries.

Map: Where did the votes come from in the Colorado primary races for governor?

He has said his nonprofit, the annual revenues for which recently topped $7.5 million, now focuses on training law enforcement, and a police official in Colorado Springs said the group provides trauma support for officials investigating crimes against children. Marx said during the campaign that he and his wife had stepped down from the nonprofit.

What are some of his unsubstantiated claims?

Marx faced scrutiny during the primary campaign for several claims connected to him and the organization he co-founded. In an interview with 9News, he for a website claim that he'd rescued more than 45,000 women and children. Another humanitarian, with whom Marx worked in Burma and in the Middle East, confirmed to The Denver Post that Marx had traveled and worked in those countries, and the humanitarian said Marx played mostly support, funding and training roles.

Marx has said he called in an airstrike on Islamic State militants and that he entered Israel and Gaza shortly after the Oct. 7, 2023, attacks by Hamas. The U.S. military, the Kurdish government in northern Iraq, and the Israeli military did not respond to messages from The Post seeking to verify Marx's claims. The humanitarian with whom Marx worked in Iraq was unfamiliar with his claims about an airstrike.

He also attracted attention for his refusal to answer when asked by journalists how many people he'd killed as an adult. "Does it matter?" he replied in the 9News interview.

Marx's political history and role in the GOP

Marx has never run for office before this race. He previewed his candidacy at a Charlie Kirk memorial last September and announced his run shortly after. Prior to his entry into the race, he hadn't donated money to any political causes in Colorado, according to state campaign finance records.

During the primary, he received few endorsements from institutional Republican voices, other than U.S. Rep. Lauren Boebert and a handful of county sheriffs. Indeed, he was largely eschewed by the state's old-guard Republican officials. Both Kirkmeyer and state Rep. Scott Bottoms, who came in third in the primary, said they would not support his candidacy should he win. Dick Wadhams, a political consultant and former chair of the Colorado GOP, has sharply criticized Marx.

Marx, meanwhile, has embraced the opposition from what he's described as the political establishment, and he ran his campaign as a political outsider. He raised more money than Kirkmeyer and Bottoms combined.

His policy positions

Though he has shrugged off policy discussions, Marx has largely adopted policy positions familiar to Republican voters.

He has called for a reduction in the income tax, for audits of state agencies and for Medicaid work requirements that are stricter than those already passed by Congress. He said he would require state officials to cooperate with federal immigration authorities (which would require a change to state law), and he has generally called for supporting law enforcement and strengthening criminal penalties.

He has said he would issue a full pardon to Tina Peters, the former Mesa County clerk and election denier whose prison sentence was commuted by Gov. Jared Polis. Marx later softened that position in comments to the Colorado Sun. He has said he supports reducing "red tape" to make it easier to build housing, and he indicated to the Sun that he thought the state should provide support for pregnant women who are immigrants without permanent legal status.

The most nationally resonating story of the night was the final one, where attorney Melat Kiros, a self-described democratic socialist, beat out 15-term U.S. Rep. Diana DeGette after mounting an insurgent campaign for the Denver seat.

But it also subverted many Democrats’ expectations when Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser handily beat Sen. Michael Bennet in the nomination race for governor. The better-known Bennet, who had won three statewide Senate races, entered the primary last year with an avalanche of support from the Democratic establishment.

Colorado election results for the 2026 primary

And Sen. John Hickenlooper, who secured the party’s nomination for a second term, was winning by less than 10 percentage points as of Wednesday afternoon — despite outraising challenger Julie Gonzales, a state senator, almost 10-to-1. In Denver, both candidates’ home turf, Hickenlooper was trailing Gonzales, revealing some voter dissatisfaction.

Here are major takeaways from Tuesday’s primaries.

Voters seek fighters

In the Democrats’ race for governor, Weiser credited his win to an electorate that wanted politicians who are authentic — and willing to fight for them. Central to his campaign was also the dozens of lawsuits he’d filed or joined against the Trump administration.

“For over a year, the establishment, pundits and so many others said this wouldn’t be a race at all — it would be a coronation,” Weiser said, referring to the underdog status he had through much of the race. “They counted us out, and they underestimated all of you.”

Meanwhile, Bennet and DeGette — neither of whom had faced real primary threats in recent reelections, despite occasional challengers to DeGette — will likely look back at their losses and kick themselves for not taking these challengers more seriously before it was too late.

Bennet all but cleared what was expected to be a crowded primary field just by announcing he wanted the governor’s office just over a year ago. But then Weiser seemed to out-hustle Bennet.

Kiros, meanwhile, out-organized DeGette. She wasn’t even alive when DeGette first entered office, but she nearly kept the longtime fixture of Denver political life off the primary ballot entirely. That prompted a campaign reshuffle, but there wasn’t enough of a shift for DeGette to beat an opponent backed by extensive — and dedicated — grassroots organizing.

“Tonight, Denver voters of all ages, all races, all religions sent a clear message: We will not wait,” Kiros said during her victory speech to supporters. “We will not wait to bring the fight to (President) Donald Trump and the oligarchy. We will not wait to demand that Congress abolish ICE and pass Medicare for All. We will not wait to end the politics of the past. To get big money out of our elections. To reject corporate PACs and AIPAC (the American Israel Public Affairs Committee). And no, we will not wait to end the genocide in Gaza.”

Progressives win up and down the ballot

A slew of other progressive — or at least anti-incumbent — Democratic wins were playing out further down the ballot.

Several farther-left statehouse candidates in Denver and the surrounding suburbs beat their more moderate opponents. Rep. Sean Camacho, who represents east Denver and is the co-chair of the moderate Opportunity Caucus, lost to progressive challenger Iris Halpern. Chela Garcia Irlando whalloped Andres Carrera for a soon-to-be-vacant Senate seat representing downtown and northwest Denver.

A network of outside groups tied to the dark-money group One Main Street spent more than $3 million on several primary races this year. But they lost in several that were opposed by progressive and labor groups, including in One Main Street����ap efforts to oust incumbent Democratic Reps. Kenny Nguyen and Jamie Jackson.

Even Gabriel Cervantes, who had received little financial help after controversial social media posts came to light, won his primary challenge against another Opportunity Caucus member, Thornton Rep. Jacque Phillips.

In Colorado's battleground congressional district — the 8th, which includes north suburbs — the farther-left candidate prevailed in the Democratic primary. Though the dynamics were a little different from the state legislative races, Manny Rutinel, a state representative, defeated former lawmaker Shannon Bird after progressive groups tended to back Rutinel.

Big money has a tough night

It was a bad night for big money.

The dark-money spending in statehouse primaries — which had propelled moderate candidates to wins two years ago — appeared to bear little fruit across metro Denver. Republican gubernatorial candidate Victor Marx, who raised and spent more than his two GOP opponents combined, was narrowly leading state Sen. Barb Kirkmeyer by Wednesday evening but had trailed for all of Tuesday night and most of the day Wednesday. That race has not yet been called.

While Weiser raised more direct cash in the Democratic race, Bennet was backed by a deep-pocketed outside group that raised an eye-watering $11.4 million, almost half of which came from New York City billionaire Michael Bloomberg. As DeGette’s situation grew more perilous in recent weeks, vast sums of outside money poured in to prop her up, too.

And ultimately, little of it seemed to matter.

To be clear, the winners — or, in some cases, apparent winners — spent vast fortunes, too. But the money backing Weiser, Kiros and progressive statehouse candidates was often more transparent in its origins, mostly given directly to the candidates and less extensive in its spending.

Unaffiliated voters break blue — hard

Colorado’s unaffiliated voters, who make up more than half of the total electorate, returned more than twice as many Democratic primary ballots as they did GOP ballots. (In Colorado's system, they receive both in the mail, but can vote only one of them.)

Whether that means these independents all lean left or were simply more enticed by a ballot with more competitive races than the Republican contests offered is yet to be seen — but it proves the bloc is a potent one.

Map: Who’s leading in the Colorado primary race for governor?

Colorado’s automatic voter registration system defaults to an unaffiliated registration, meaning voters need to take an extra step to declare as a Democrat, Republican or member of another party. The open primary system also disincentivizes them to register with a party. In short, the lack of party affiliation doesn’t mean those voters lack a political preference or are middle of the road — but it does mean campaigns have to work harder to identify those who will pull primary ballots.

Overall, the Colorado Secretary of State's Office reported that 1.47 million ballots had been returned statewide as of noon Thursday, a number that could still rise as clerks continue processing ballots. That amounted to about 36% of active voters, or nearly 32% of all registered voters.

Battle for direction of GOP still too close to call

While Colorado’s Democratic voters bucked some of their party’s standard-bearers Tuesday night, Republicans were still locked in a fight over the immediate future of their party.

Until early Wednesday evening, Kirkmeyer, perhaps the most high-profile and well-respected Republican in deep-blue Colorado, had narrowly held off an outsider challenge by Marx, a nonprofit leader who outraised and outspent Kirkmeyer. But as new results were uploaded by multiple counties, Marx took a narrow lead. The outcome was still unclear (check the latest results here), and state Rep. Scott Bottoms, a pastor, in some ways competed with Marx for far-right voters' support. (He'd won about half as many votes as either of the other two candidates.)

But Kirkmeyer's competitiveness bucked expectations, both from Marx and some in the more traditional GOP operative space, that Marx would easily win. And it also showed that the battle over the battered, broke and beleaguered Colorado GOP — one waged between the more establishment, moderate faction and the right-wing and grassroots elements — was far from settled.

Colorado election results for the 2026 primary by county

Conservative political observers saw the GOP primary as more than just a fight between candidates. It represented an existential contest for the future of the party. Kirkmeyer brought decades of experience, along with a deep knowledge of the state budget and the inner workings of the state Capitol.

Dick Wadhams, who ran the campaign for the only Republican to win the governor’s office over the past 50 years, warned earlier in the race that Kirkmeyer was the only GOP candidate who could keep a general election debate with the Democratic nominee grounded in policy, rather than conspiracy theories or questions about a larger-than-life biography.

A win for her in the primary wouldn't necessarily portend a win in November, especially with Colorado trending steadily blue over the past decade. But it would mean the best chance for Republicans up and down the ballot to avert getting wiped out by voters who want serious leadership in the state, according to Wadhams, a Kirkmeyer supporter.

“This governor’s race is going to help answer the question, ‘Is this party serious or not?’ ” Wadhams said ahead of the primary.

Staff writers Elliott Wenzler and John Aguilar contributed to this story.

First-time candidate Victor Marx took a narrow lead over state Sen. Barb Kirkmeyer early Wednesday evening as counties uploaded more results in the race for the Colorado Republican Party’s gubernatorial nomination.

Marx’s margin stood at 2,262 votes as of 7:40 p.m., according to the Associated Press. Marx led 39.9% to Kirkmeyer’s 39.4% with just over 500,000 votes tallied so far, . Rep. Scott Bottoms, a conservative pastor from Colorado Springs also seeking the GOP nomination, was in third with 20.7%.

The AP estimated about 92% of votes in the race had been counted. Should the final margin in the race fall within 0.5% of the leading candidate’s vote total, Colorado law requires an automatic recount.

Kirkmeyer had led in results since polls closed Tuesday night and then all day Wednesday, by narrowing margins.

But around 5 p.m., El Paso County — a Marx stronghold — and Denver, where she’s led, were among counties began updating their results for the day after counting tens of thousands more ballots, resulting in an overall shift in Marx’s favor. The AP projected more outstanding ballots were left to count in El Paso County than in Denver, which was nearing completion. But other counties that favor Kirkmeyer, including Arapahoe County, still expected to report more, too.

Kirkmeyer has led in several Front Range counties, including the red-tinted Douglas County. She had fallen behind in Adams County and trailed in El Paso County, a conservative stronghold.

Shortly before Marx took the lead, his spokesman, Roger Hudson, said the campaign felt confident that late votes would continue to break for Marx and that he would overtake Kirkmeyer.

“We feel more confident (now) than we did even last night, after seeing the numbers coming today,” he said.

Map: Who’s leading in the Colorado primary race for governor?

In an interview late Wednesday morning, when she still was leading, Kirkmeyer said she, too, was optimistic about her chances. She pointed to outstanding ballots in Front Range counties where she had led Marx.

"We peaked pretty much at the right time, the momentum is behind us, the trend is coming our way," she said.

Nearly 400 people gathered for Marx's watch party at a ranch-resort in Larkspur on Tuesday night, and by 8:45 p.m., they were milling about as country music played and a projector screen showed the results. Marx spoke well after 9 p.m., telling his supporters that while he remained confident he would win, final results would likely not come Tuesday night or, potentially, on Wednesday.

"So it is too close to call tonight," he said, though "every drop of more votes, they're leaning toward us."

"We've kept pressing forward because the mission is simply to win and get our state back," he continued.

If Kirkmeyer ends up winning, she will have successfully steered the party away from Marx and Bottoms' more religious conservatism in favor of a more mainstream Republican politics. A state senator and longtime Weld County commissioner, Kirkmeyer has for years been among the most prominent Republicans in a state that has become dominated by Democrats.

The assumed front-runner when she entered the race last year, she promoted her candidacy as a balance to Democrats' legislative control over the past eight years. She pitched herself as an experienced hand who was ready to step in and address the state's fiscal woes. Though out-fundraised by Marx, she garnered more support from the party's traditional and moderate wing, who viewed her as the most viable approach to win back power -- or at least limit down-ballot losses -- in a blue state.

Still, she faced an unexpected challenge from Marx, a nonprofit leader with an extensive history. He describes himself as a high-risk humanitarian, and the nonprofit he runs -- which provides training to law enforcement and trauma support for people -- had annual revenues surpassing $7 million in 2024.

But he's also claimed to have killed a man as a child and to have exposed and removed demons from people. Unlike Kirkmeyer, whose strength has long been her policy chops, Marx ran a campaign focused primarily on direct outreach to voters, premised on his own charisma and Republican voters' distaste for established candidates.

Whoever wins the race for the GOP nomination will face long odds in November. Colorado has not elected a Republican to the governor's mansion in more than 20 years, and the state has only become more electorally inhospitable to the GOP in the years since.

In the Democratic race, Attorney General Phil Weiser beat U.S. Sen. Michael Bennet for his party's nomination. Regardless of whether Kirkmeyer or Bottoms prevails, Weiser will be heavily favored to win the general election in November and succeed Gov. Jared Polis, who is term-limited.

The Republican winner will also have to try to unite a fractured Colorado GOP. During the campaign, Kirkmeyer and Bottoms said they would not support Marx should he become the party's nominee, and they accused him of being a con man and a fraud. A spokesman for Kirkmeyer said Tuesday that she still did not intend to support Marx should he win.

The race pits state Sen. Jessie Danielson, 48, of Wheat Ridge, against Amanda Gonzalez, 41, the Jefferson County clerk and recorder. They are seeking to replace Democratic Secretary of State Jena Griswold, who is term-limited.

The Libertarian Party also has a contested primary race with 33-year-old , an engineer from Holyoke, running against , a 25-year-old entertainer and music DJ from Highlands Ranch.

The Republican primary is uncontested. The Democratic and Libertarian winners in November will face , who calls himself the “Red Flame of Liberty” and is a self-described “Dark MAGA” candidate — a nod to Elon Musk.

While the secretary of state cannot single-handedly change Colorado’s election system, the position is increasingly under scrutiny because of Trump’s attacks on vote-by-mail states, and his insistence on nationalizing elections rather than leaving the states to decide how to administer them. As the top state executive responsible for elections, the person holding the office sits on the frontline of Trump’s actions to challenge mail voting.

On the campaign trail, and have touted their backgrounds in advocating for voters’ rights as both worked for political interest groups before running for office. Both said any claims about a stolen 2020 election are lies, and both said they want to keep Colorado’s vote-by-mail system.

Danielson’s political involvement began at the University of Colorado Boulder, where she volunteered as a student for . She eventually became the abortion-rights group’s state political director.

From there, she moved to , a progressive voter-rights organization, where she served as state director for Colorado and Minnesota. In that role, Danielson helped write Colorado’s mail-in ballot laws, fundamentally changing how people in the state make their voices heard.

As a two-term state senator, Danielson sponsored several voter-rights bills at the state Capitol, including one that ensured people who are blind or physically unable to write can vote in private by filing out electronic ballots. She also worked with other Democrats to create an automatic voter registration system in Colorado.

Danielson said she is the best candidate because she has worked on voting rights as the leader of a nonprofit and as a state senator. In those roles, she has earned the trust of county elections officials of all parties.

Trump has threatened Colorado’s vote-by-mail elections, and the next secretary of state must defend the state’s system, she said.

“I have worked to Trump-proof these elections for years, and I’m going to keep doing it when I’m the next secretary of state,” Danielson said. “We need someone with experience and knowledge of our voting system to defend against these attacks from Trump.”

Gonzalez was elected in 2022 as the Jefferson County — a role that puts her in charge of running elections in a county with 430,000 active voters. As county clerk, she also supervises the county’s motor vehicle offices, issues marriage and liquor licenses and records real estate transactions.

“You have to know the system in order to protect it,” Gonzalez said. “I’m the only person in this race from any party who has experience running secure elections and fending off interference from outsiders. This job is not legislative. It’s operational. It’s an executive position.”

Gonzalez, who has a law degree from the University of Denver’s Sturm College of Law, became involved in election law as executive director for , another voting rights group. Gonzalez said she pushed Colorado’s elections administrators to translate ballots into other languages so people who do not speak English as a first language could better understand their Blue Books and ballots.

While the secretary of state’s role as an elections supervisor takes center stage, the job also comes with the responsibility of managing business filings for companies and tracking charitable nonprofits. The office also licenses notaries.

Gonzalez said her experience running the Jefferson County clerk’s office puts her in the best position to manage all the roles the secretary of state plays.

The secretary of state’s election is the first contested statewide race for the Libertarian Party since 2020, when two men competed for Sen. John Hickenlooper’s seat.

Neither Libertarian candidate running for secretary of state has elected experience.

Vadney said he chose to run because of a lifelong interest in politics and that voting is an important issue for him. He does not believe the 2020 election was stolen, but would urge Colorado lawmakers to return the state to in-person voting.

Vadney has a criminal record that he says was connected to a mental health breakdown and alcohol abuse. He pleaded guilty to third-degree assault of a police officer and criminal mischief in connection with a December 2021 incident. He served three years on probation, and the criminal mischief charge was expunged after he finished his sentence. Vadney told The Denver Post he no longer drinks alcohol and has received counseling.

Astley said he would neither affirm nor deny the inaccurate claims that the 2020 election was stolen. Instead, he said that, as an engineer, he needs to see proof before he decides.

“I’m not able to speak to that because I haven’t seen any documents about it,” he said.

Astley said he would push for a hybrid mail-in voting system. Voters would receive ballots by mail but would need to return them in person and show a government-issued ID, he said.

Both candidates are current elected members of the legislature. Throughout the debate, Bottoms, who has been a state representative for Colorado Springs since 2023, repeatedly referred to concerns about pedophilia rings but then said he had no way to back up his claims.

“The FBI is checking into all of that,” he said. “There’s no way I can prove this right now because I’m not a federal investigator … but we’ll see.”

Kirkmeyer of Brighton has served in the state Senate since 2020 and has been on the influential Joint Budget Committee since 2022. She leaned heavily on that experience throughout her responses Thursday.

“I’m the better candidate because I have the most experience and I’m qualified and I know how to get the job done,” she said. “I actually govern and run a multibillion-dollar budget in this state.”

During her time in the Democratic-majority legislature, she has, at times, reached across the aisle for policy-making. She during the 2026 legislative session, which ended Wednesday. Many of them were the product of the budget committee’s work and, in keeping with how that body works, included at least one Democratic sponsor.

“You have to work across the aisle to get anything done,” she said.

Bottoms is the lead pastor at the Church at Briargate, a Colorado Springs evangelical church. Bottoms is one of the most conservative members of the legislature. In four years in the Capitol, he has been the primary sponsor on one bill that became law — This year, he had no Democratic co-sponsors on the , and he was the sole representative on four of them. They focused on topics like restricting abortion access and gender-affirming care for minors. His fellow legislators rejected almost all of them after their first committee meetings.

“I don’t shy away from the scary kind of issues,” he said. “I’ve tried to pass many bills that have specifically to do with that leadership, grooming our kids, trafficking kids, parental consent, pedophilia.”

The debate was sponsored by The Denver Post, Denver7 and Colorado Public Radio. Last week, the same outlets also hosted a debate for Democratic candidates Attorney General Phil Weiser and U.S. Sen. Michael Bennet.

Kirkmeyer, Bottoms or Victor Marx, a third candidate who didn’t participate in the debate Thursday, will take on Bennet or Weiser in the general election. The odds are unlikely that a Republican candidate will win that race, as the state has become increasingly blue in recent years. Gov. Jared Polis defeated Heidi Ganahl by more than 19 percentage points in 2022.

Still, the winner of the Republican primary is significant, in that the victor will show what direction the state’s minority party is headed. The Colorado GOP has had years of upheaval as its members have fought over what direction to take next.

Unaffiliated voters’ participation in primaries

A major point of contention for the state Republican Party has been whether unaffiliated voters should be allowed to participate in the party’s primaries. The candidates disagreed about that issue, among several others, during the debate Thursday.

Bottoms, who filed a lawsuit this month to block the unaffiliated voters said he believes the change would keep the system in line with the Constitution.

Kirkmeyer, who unsuccessfully ran to represent Colorado’s 8th Congressional District in 2022, said she wouldn’t support blocking unaffiliated voters because it would alienate unaffiliated and Republican voters and force the state to use only the caucuses — a system she said many voters aren’t familiar with.

The candidates also disagreed about whether the state’s voting system is secure. Kirkmeyer said she believes the system may need some new rules, like ID requirements, and that voter rolls should be cleaned up. But overall, she said, she believes it is secure. Bottoms said he wants to see lots of changes, including ending the state’s mail-in voting system and requiring IDs to vote.

Alignment with Trump

When moderators asked the candidates how they would differentiate themselves from Trump, the candidates took different approaches. Kirkmeyer said she disagrees with some of the president’s decisions that have impacted Colorado, like declining requests for disaster relief dollars and removing the Space Force headquarters from the state. She added that she would try to find ways to work with the president and remind him “we are all his constituents as well.”

Bottoms praised the president’s work but said he isn’t afraid to stand up to him if he doesn’t agree with his decisions.

“I’m a reformer. I do not mind looking at people in power,” he said.

Kirkmeyer and Bottoms mostly focused on their own experience and opinions throughout the debate but a few times directly clashed with one another. When discussing the state budget, Bottoms posited that widespread corruption is costing the state billions of dollars, adding that if he were elected he would “DOGE” all the departments — referring to the now-disbanded Department of Government Efficiency.

“We have hundreds of millions of dollars right now that are going to illegal immigrant abortions and transgender surgeries,” he said.

Kirkmeyer said his comments were untrue and asked him to directly point to where those items are in the budget. He didn’t directly answer.

“Pretty much everything Rep. Bottoms said is inaccurate,” she said to one of his responses.

The candidates disagreed about whether former President Joe Biden won the 2020 election. Bottoms said no while Kirkmeyer said yes. Both said Trump isn’t eligible to run for another term.

Bottoms secured the top spot on the primary ballot after he won the most support during the party’s state assembly in April. He won 45% of the 2,145 delegates present, with Marx coming in second. Kirkmeyer landed on the ballot through a signature-gathering process.

The primary will be June 30. The general election will be Nov. 3.

The third candidate on the Republican primary ballot, Victor Marx, didn’t attend but hosted his own livestream at the same time.

Kirkmeyer, of Brighton, will face off against state Rep. Scott Bottoms and political newcomer Victor Marx in the June 30 Republican primary. Bottoms and Marx, both pastors who live in Colorado Springs, qualified for the ballot through the GOP state assembly on Saturday.

Bottoms, who led a wide assembly field and won support from 45% of attendees, will get the top spot in the race.

Kirkmeyer took the petition route to the ballot. She submitted more than 15,000 valid signatures, including more than 1,500 from each of Colorado’s eight congressional districts, according to the Colorado Secretary of State’s Office, which certified the signatures.

“This campaign has been built by thousands of real people, in real communities, all across Colorado,” Kirkmeyer said in a statement about her ballot qualification. “I’m incredibly grateful to everyone who took the time to sign our petition, share our message, and be part of something bigger. This is your campaign.”

The Democratic slate was mostly set at the end of March with that party’s state assembly. Attorney General Phil Weiser, who won support from more than 90% of that event����ap voting members, will face U.S. Sen. Michael Bennet, who petitioned onto the primary ballot.

Also on Wednesday, the Secretary of State’s office certified University of Colorado Regent Wanda James’s spot in a primary challenge to incumbent U.S. Rep. Diana DeGette, a Denver Democrat. Melat Kiros, a Denver lawyer who stunned DeGette by outpolling her during the county assembly in March, has also qualified for that primary race. Republicans have nominated Christy Peterson, who is unopposed.

Earlier in the week, the Secretary of State’s Office certified Hetal Doshi and Boulder County District Attorney Michael Dougherty for the Democratic primary ballot for attorney general. They will face Secretary of State Jena Griswold and attorney David Seligman in that party’s nominating contest.

Democratic and Republican primary ballots

Here are the candidates who qualified for the major-party ballots in the June 30 primary in statewide races. Voters affiliated with a party will receive its ballot in the mail in June. Unaffiliated voters can participate in primaries and will receive both parties’ ballots in the mail, but they can return only one of them.

The four state offices are all open races this year, with the incumbents term-limited.

Governor

• Democratic primary: U.S. Sen. Michael Bennet, Attorney General Phil Weiser
• Republican primary: state Rep. Scott Bottoms, state Sen. Barbara Kirkmeyer, Victor Marx

Attorney general

• Republican primary: El Paso County District Attorney Michael Allen, David Willson
• Democratic primary: Hetal Doshi, Boulder County District Attorney Michael Dougherty, Secretary of State Jena Griswold, David Seligman

Secretary of state

• Democratic primary: state Sen. Jessie Danielson, Jefferson County Clerk Amanda Gonzalez
• Republican primary: James Wiley (a former Colorado Libertarian Party official), unopposed

Treasurer

• Republican primary: Fremont County Commissioner Kevin Grantham, unopposed
• Democratic primary: state Sen. Jeff Bridges, unopposed

U.S. Senate

• Democratic primary: state Sen. Julie Gonzales, U.S. Sen. John Hickenlooper (incumbent)
• Republican primary: state Sen. Mark Baisley, unopposed

The ruling, in a case filed by the Colorado GOP, did not fully strike down , which opened up primaries to participation by party faithful and unaffiliated voters alike. But in the decision issued on Tuesday, U.S. District Court Judge Philip A. Brimmer wrote that the law puts a “severe burden” on parties that want to opt out of the open primaries.

He ruled that part of the law violates the First Amendment’s protections of the freedom of association.

The law says that if a political party wants to close its primary so that only its own registered voters can participate, 75% of that party’s central committee must vote in support of the change. That threshold is unconstitutionally high, Brimmer wrote.

“The background and origin of the three-fourths opt-out provision is unclear,” Brimmer, who is based in Denver, wrote. “What is clear is that it constitutes an unusual and difficult barrier for the central committee to overcome, more akin to a hurdle to amend a foundational governing document, such as the United States Constitution, than a traditional means of regulating political parties.”

He noted that unaffiliated voters’ share of the Colorado electorate has grown, and they now make up a majority of registered voters in the state.

Brimmer’s ruling does not set a new threshold for parties to hit, should they want to close their primaries, and his order does not give specific direction for how the state or parties should proceed.

The decision also doesn’t appear to impact the upcoming summer primaries. The state GOP meets April 11 for its state assembly, where it will nominate some candidates for those contests, which are set for June 30.

The state GOP filed the lawsuit against the Colorado Secretary of State’s Office in 2023 under the leadership of conservative hardliner Dave Williams. He had blasted Prop 108 as a “radical leftwing” effort and argued that closing the primaries was vital to protecting true Republican candidates.

Representatives for the state Republican and Democratic parties did not return messages seeking comment Wednesday.

Kent Thiry, the millionaire donor who supported Prop 108, criticized what he called a “terrible, tunnel-vision decision” in a statement Wednesday. He said he hoped Brimmer’s ruling would be appealed.

“This decision tramples on the voting rights of a majority of Colorado voters, namely the independent voters,” Thiry wrote. “Voters own elections, not the parties.”

In a statement, the secretary of state’s spokesman John Magnino said unaffiliated voters should be able to vote in primary contests.

“Based on our reading, the court has not disturbed the plans in place for the upcoming June 2026 primary election,” Magnino said. “We are disappointed with this decision and are evaluating next steps in consultation with the attorney general’s office.”

Brimmer previously rejected the GOP’s request to close primaries to unaffiliated voters in 2024, and the lawsuit dragged on for another two years — outlasting Williams and nearly outliving his successor, current GOP chairwoman Brita Horn. Horn is stepping down as party chair later this month.

The new ruling would apply to both the Republican and Democratic parties in future years, should Democrats later choose to close their primaries, too. No party has yet opted out of the primaries under Prop 108’s provision, but Republicans have tried at least three times, according to Brimmer’s ruling.

In September 2023, more than 64% of the party’s central committee who voted on the motion supported closing the primaries, falling well short of the threshold.

The ruling could have far-reaching implications for the state Republican Party, should it choose to close its candidate-selection process only to its own registered voters. The GOP has lost significant ground in the state over the past decade, as Democrats have won control of most statewide offices and secured near-supermajorities in the state House and the Senate.

Still, right-wing conservatives like Williams have argued that the party needs to tack further to the right, even as the state turns deeper shades of blue. Closing state primaries, those figures argue, would ensure that more strictly conservative candidates make it on the ballot, which in turn would activate more Republican voters.

More moderate Republicans, meanwhile, have said the primaries should remain open to unaffiliated voters. In the decade since Prop 108 was passed, an ever-increasing share of voters has registered as unaffiliated, and moderates contend that the party should be as open to the state’s changing voter base as possible.

Brimmer wrote that roughly 100,000 unaffiliated voters participated in Republican primaries in 2018. By 2022, that total had more than doubled to 231,000, accounting for 37.1% of ballots cast in those contests that year. In some counties, the unaffiliated voters rivaled the number of Republican voters participating in the GOP’s primaries in 2022 and 2024.

Gas prices are once again on the rise a month after the United States and Israel began bombing Iran, resulting in a severe crimp in the flow of oil through the Strait of Hormuz. And fingers are once again pointing at the party occupying the White House, now led by President Donald Trump.

But this time, the blame game has taken on a distinctly more digital and targeted approach as November’s midterm elections come into view.

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee last week an ad campaign targeting Republican incumbents it believes are vulnerable in 44 congressional districts, including U.S. Reps. Jeff Crank in the Colorado Springs-based 5th District and Gabe Evans in the 8th District north of Denver.

The ultrashort six-second video ad with the words “D.C. Republicans Did That!” It’s being “geo-targeted” to people’s Facebook and Instagram feeds when they come within close range of select gas stations in either district.

“Now, when voters fill up at the pump, they’ll have yet another reminder that D.C. Republicans are squarely to blame for the price of gas, and everything else, being too damn high,” DCCC spokeswoman Courtney Rice said.

It’s no surprise that Democrats are taking advantage of elevated prices at the pump to gain political advantage, said Jon Krosnick, a political science professor at Stanford University. He co-authored a 2016 study titled which found that a 10-cent increase led to a 0.6-percentage-point drop in support.

The price for regular unleaded fuel in Colorado sat at an average a day before the war started in late February, according to AAA. On Friday, it averaged  — an increase of just over $1 from a month ago.

While November’s election is not a presidential one, Krosnick said there will very likely be crossover in terms of dissatisfaction toward the party in charge of Congress.

“Every Republican running for office should be worried about gas prices going up,” he said.

Gas prices play an outsized role in how people gauge the severity of inflation at any given moment, Krosnick said. On nearly every corner of major thoroughfares throughout the country, giant lighted signs display the price of petrol.

“There’s no other consumer good that is as advertised to consumers like gasoline,” Krosnick said. “Not everybody in the family may be filling up the car, but everyone is driving past gas stations every day.”

Though gas prices were appreciably higher under the Biden administration following Russia’s February 2022 invasion of Ukraine — reaching a peak of $4.87 per gallon of regular-grade gasoline in Colorado in June of that year, according to — Krosnick said voters care about what’s going on now.

“It’s a present-focused decision,” he said.

A ‘mitigating factor’ in the 8th District?

That was the case for Michael Kondur, a handyman who was filling up his truck last week at a Valero station at West 88th Avenue and Pecos Street in Thornton, in Evans’ congressional district. The price there was a comparatively forgiving $3.69 per gallon for regular.

“It’s the first time I’ve had a full tank in three weeks — and it will be gone in three days,” he said, also using choice words to describe Trump and Republicans in general. “I run my own business with this truck and I don’t have food on my table. Any Republican has got to go.”

Across the street at a Maverik station, where the price for a gallon of gas was nearly 10 cents higher, Carolyn McDowell said she was able to part with only $30 to fill her Chevy Silverado’s tank halfway. Her husband, who works for the delivery service DoorDash, is taking a real hit.

“It’s impacting his ability to make money,” she said.

McDowell said she’s against war in Iran, a stance that is in line with 61% of Americans who also disapprove of the conflict, according to a conducted between March 16 and March 22. The poll also found that 45% of respondents felt the military action was not going well, while 25% felt it was going extremely or very well.

Former Colorado GOP Chair Dick Wadhams, who has run his share of political campaigns, said there is no doubt that gas prices pose a problem for Evans, who’s seeking reelection in Colorado’s most politically competitive district, and Crank, who won comfortably in 2024 but is being targeted by Democrats more aggressively this year.

“The price of gas as it relates to inflation and the cost of living was a big part of Trump beating Harris in 2024,” he said of Trump’s defeat of then-Vice President Kamala Harris. “Democrats will try to make (gas prices) an issue right through November — there’s no doubt about it. The Republicans are in a vulnerable position.”

But there is a “mitigating factor,” Wadhams said, that Evans should be able to use to fight back in the 8th District — which covers a large chunk of Weld County, home to Colorado’s most productive oil and gas field.

“Gabe has a good argument against Democrats that they want to kill the oil and gas industry,” he said.

Two years ago, Democrats in the state legislature floated a bill that aimed to halt the issuance of new oil and gas permits by the end of 2029, a proposal that raised hackles in the industry. Lawmakers eventually .

In December, Republican state lawmakers attacked the Public Utilities Commission’s approval of a “clean heat” plan requiring Colorado’s larger utilities that supply natural gas to homes and businesses to substantially lower emissions over the next decade. The plan, they asserted, amounts to a mandate that forces families to buy “costly heat pumps, retrofits and electric appliances” to switch from gas to electricity.

This month, the influential environmental group Conservation Colorado filed ballot measures with the state elections office that would slap stricter penalties on the energy industry for the pollution and contamination that result from its operations.

In a , the group said it filed the measures to filed by the conservative political action committee Advance Colorado that would enshrine in the state constitution the right of producers to sell natural gas in the state and the right of consumers to use the energy source in their homes and businesses.

A spokeswoman for Evans’ campaign who declined to give her name called the Democrats’ stance on gas prices “hypocritical” in a statement.

“For years, they have pushed radical climate policies and overregulation, banning natural gas for residential heating, eliminating jobs for hardworking families, and handcuffing the very oil and gas workers who ensure reliable and affordable resources for Coloradans,” her statement read. “Now they expect us to believe they care about gas prices?”

Potentially bleak forecast

Republicans don’t just have gas prices to worry about — diesel prices are even worse.

Where a gallon of diesel fuel came in at $3.52 a month ago, , on Friday it hit $4.94.

Twenty percent to 25% of the operating cost for a long-haul trucker is fuel, said Greg Fulton, the president of the Colorado Motor Carriers Association, which represents more than 500 trucking companies in the state.

“This has come at a very difficult time for the industry,” he said of the spike in energy prices. “This is a situation where profit margins are very thin already.”

During the last peak in oil prices in 2022, Fulton said, some of that sticker shock was offset by the fact that more freight was on the road because consumers were buying more goods to accommodate new stay-at-home lifestyles set in motion by the coronavirus pandemic.

“They were able to pass along the increases easier,” Fulton said of his industry.

Trump’s widespread tariffs have made things even more constrained for trucking companies when it comes to trying to keep operating expenses down these days, he said.

“Hopefully this is more of a short-term situation,” he said.

While Iran last week , oil transport through the vital waterway was still badly hobbled by the war. Al Salazar, the director of research at oil and gas analysis firm Enverus, said the longer the strait was choked, the longer gas prices would stay high.

If the Strait of Hormuz were to remain largely closed through the end of May, Enverus projected that Brent crude prices would stay around $95 a barrel through this year and edge up to $100 a barrel in 2027. That’s because it would take time to replenish all the tanks and oil-holding facilities that are being tapped now, Salazar said.

“By the time the flow is fixed, your stocks (of oil) have all drawn down and you’re left at alarmingly low levels,” he said.

Weinberg, a Loveland Republican, faced accusations from fellow Republican Rep. Brandi Bradley that he misused a master key that could access any of the offices of his fellow legislators and that he used the key to enter at least one member’s space. She also alleged that Weinberg made sexually suggestive and inappropriate comments to her and others on multiple occasions.

Weinberg had initially requested an evidentiary hearing where the bipartisan could seek firmer proof that he committed wrongdoing. But Weinberg withdrew that request in favor of letting the committee make a recommendation based on probable cause findings.

The committee unanimously voted to recommend that Weinberg face a formal admonishment, including noting that the allegations fit “a pattern” of unbecoming behavior. The recommendation will now go to House leadership, along with a formal report of the committee’s findings.

The recommendation includes calling for Weinberg to complete sexual harassment training.

The committee drew a distinction between the probable cause findings and what would be clearer findings from a formal evidentiary proceeding. The required sexual harassment training was a particular sticking point. Rep. Javier Mabrey, a Denver Democrat on the committee, said it wasn’t proof that Weinberg broke ethics rules, but reflected the lower standard of probable cause.

“I don’t think that (required training) is necessarily saying we think you did this, or that this is the level of punishment to expect if sexual harassment did in fact occur,” Mabrey said.

An attempt to reach Weinberg for comment Tuesday morning was not successful. He announced in January that he would not seek reelection in the November election. Weinberg faces separate allegations that he misused campaign funds. The Colorado Secretary of State’s Office is investigating those claims.

Joe Oltmann, who filed his candidacy paperwork Monday night, now seeks to participate in an electoral system that he has repeatedly tried to undermine.

He is the 22nd Republican actively seeking to earn the party’s nomination in June. It’s the largest gubernatorial primary field for a major party in Colorado this century, surpassing the GOP’s previous records set first in 2018, and then again in 2022 — and it comes as the party hopes to break Democrats’ electoral dominance in the state.

That field will almost certainly narrow in the coming months; four Republicans who’d filed have already dropped out. No more than four are likely to make it onto the ballot — either through the state assembly or by gathering signatures — for the summer primary, said Dick Wadhams, the Colorado GOP’s former chairman.

The size of the primary field doesn’t really matter, he said, because few candidates will actually end up in front of voters. Eighteen candidates filed ahead of the 2022 race, for instance, but .

On the Democratic side, a smaller field of seven active candidates is headlined by Attorney General Phil Weiser and U.S. Sen. Michael Bennet. Polis is term-limited from running again.

For 2026, Wadhams counted only a half-dozen or so Republican candidates whom he considered “credible,” a qualifier that Wadhams said he used “very, very loosely”: Oltmann, state Sens. Barbara Kirkmeyer and Mark Baisley, state Rep. Scott Bottoms, ministry leader Victor Marx, Teller County Sheriff Jason Mikesell and former Congressman Greg Lopez.

Wadhams said that other than Kirkmeyer, all of those candidates had either supported election conspiracies or a pardon for Tina Peters, the former Mesa County clerk now serving a nine-year sentence for convictions related to providing unauthorized access to voting equipment.

Oltmann, of Castle Rock, has repeatedly — and falsely — claimed that the 2020 presidential election was not won by Democrat Joe Biden, while calling for the hanging of political opponents. He previously said he wanted to dismember some opponents to send a message, , before adding that he was joking.

In his Dec. 26 announcement video, Oltmann baselessly claimed that Democrats, who have won control of the state amid demographic shifts and anti-Trump sentiment, were in power in Colorado only because of election fraud.

He said Polis and Secretary of State Jena Griswold, along with 9News anchor Kyle Clark, were part of a “synagogue of Satan.” Polis and Griswold are both Jewish.

In his announcement, Oltmann painted an apocalyptic picture of the state and said he hoped that three of its elected leaders — Polis, Griswold and Weiser — would all be imprisoned. He pledged to eliminate property taxes, to focus on the “have-nots” and to pardon Peters, whom President Donald Trump has also sought to release by issuing a federal pardon that legal experts say can’t clear Peters of state convictions.

Oltmann’s decision to join the field is an example of “extreme candidates” from either major party “who file to run but will go nowhere,” predicted Kristi Burton Brown, another former state GOP chair. She now sits on .

She said the size of the Republican primary field was a consequence of Republicans’ difficulties winning statewide races in Colorado. Democrats have won all four constitutional elected offices for two straight election cycles.

Burton Brown said it “might be a good idea moving forward” to require candidates to do more than just submit paperwork to run for office. That might include a monetary requirement: She said she didn’t support charging candidates significant sums but thought that “requiring some skin in the game” could prevent “unreasonable primaries.”

The 2026 election comes as state and national Democrats search for a path forward after Trump’s reelection last year.

Approval polling for leading Colorado Democrats has sagged this year, and voters here hold unfavorable views of both the Democratic and Republican parties that are roughly equal, .

Wadhams said that the odds were “very difficult” for any Republican gubernatorial candidate next year. While approval for Polis and other Democrats has declined, support for the Republican standard-bearer — Trump — is far lower in the state. In last year’s election, Colorado was a largely blue island in a broader national red wave.

To have a real shot of winning in 2026, Wadhams argued, the GOP needed to nominate someone for governor who could sidestep anti-Trump sentiment and press on the issues driving voter discontent. Running more divisive candidates in a blue state, he warned, would risk harming Republicans’ chances in down-ballot races the statehouse or in races for Congress.

“There seems to be an opening for Republicans we haven’t seen for a while,” he said. “But that opening will only exist if we have candidates who won’t get pulled into this conspiracy stuff and this Tina Peters stuff. Because those are nonstarters. They’re sure losers.”