The wins in Tuesday’s primary amounted to a clean sweep for the outside spending group funded by the state’s largest labor unions, with progressives toppling four candidates backed by a network of largely opaque PACs that spent well over $2 million on the races this year.

The liberal primary victories in races for safe seats reverse, in part, gains made by the centrist organization One Main Street two years ago. That’s when the dark-money group, which doesn’t disclose all of its donors, won nearly every race in which it engaged to support “pragmatic” Democrats.

The latest results came amid an ongoing power struggle within the state legislature’s dominant Democratic Party, which has played out in primary campaigns for several years.

“This is a warning sign to any politician who thinks their political future lies in corporate money rather than the interests of working people across the state,” Dennis Dougherty, the executive director of the Colorado AFL-CIO, which funded the labor PAC, said in a statement Wednesday.

One of the candidates who won two years ago, Rep. Sean Camacho in Denver’s House District 6, fell to progressive challenger Iris Halpern on Tuesday night. Camacho had unseated one of the Capitol’s most left-wing — and controversial — lawmakers in 2024, former Rep. Elisabeth Epps, only to fall himself in another deep-pocketed primary.

Camacho was behind by roughly 1,300 votes as of Wednesday morning, when he conceded. District 6 roughly follows the East Colfax Ave. corridor from the state Capitol to the Aurora border.

His loss will be a blow to moderate Democrats in the legislature, where Camacho was the co-chair of the One Main Street-linked Opportunity Caucus. That group is composed of more business-friendly lawmakers. The caucus has been heavily criticized by more liberal legislators and groups, and Camacho’s loss gave a win to the labor groups, which wanted to knock the caucus back on its heels.

More than $1 million in outside spending poured into the race.

Elsewhere in Denver, Chela Garcia Irlando crushed Andrés Carrera for the soon-to-be-vacant Senate District 34 seat. More than $1.5 million was spent on that race. Most of that came from the unions-versus-One Main Street conflict, though Conservation Colorado also backed Irlando while an outside group funded by sports betting companies came in for Carrera. The seat covers part of downtown and west and northwest Denver, and it attracted national attention, with Irlando endorsed by U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders and labor icon Dolores Huerta.

Despite the deep spending, Irlando more than doubled Carrera’s vote total as of Wednesday, beating him by nearly 10,000 votes.

In Broomfield, Rep. Kenny Nguyen held off One Main Street-backed challenger Heidi Henkel, who serves on the city’s council. Nguyen narrowly beat Henkel earlier this year for a vacancy appointment to the legislature, and he drew One Main Street’s ire after criticizing the group on Facebook.

In Aurora, Rep. Jamie Jackson — also a vacancy appointee — overcame Anne Keke, who sits on the local school board, despite similar outside spending.

Perhaps the most surprising win of the night came from Gabriel Cervantes in Thornton. He beat Democratic Rep. Jacque Phillips, another Opportunity Caucus member, by nearly 600 votes, despite little outside support and negative attacks about past social media comments.

Like Camacho, Phillips had unseated a sitting lawmaker two years ago with the backing of One Main Street-aligned groups.

In one of One Main Street’s two wins Tuesday, Sarah Woodson cruised to victory in the primary over Rep. Mandy Lindsay. Lindsay, who represents Aurora, received no outside support and fell to Woodson by a roughly 2-to-1 vote margin.

In House District 19, which stretches southeast from Longmont, Jillaire McMillan beat two Democratic opponents for the chance to take on Republican Rep. Dan Woog in November. McMillan received outside support from a group funded by One Main Street.

Outside of metro Denver, another contested Democratic primary to represent Summit County in the House was close and had offered a glimmer of hope for One Main Street. But on Wednesday, Chris Floyd, who is also backed by the group, lost to Consuelo Redhorse. The AP called the race in Redhorse’s favor, with a leading margin of 164 votes as of 4:27 p.m.

Another sitting lawmaker lost on Tuesday. Sen. Lynda Zamora Wilson, who entered the legislature on a vacancy appointment last year, lost to Terri Carver in the Republican primary for a Senate seat in El Paso County. Carver comfortably toppled Zamora Wilson, earning nearly 15,500 votes to double the incumbent’s haul.

The Associated Press for Hickenlooper, who had 57% of the votes with nearly 78% of the votes counted. That margin continued to hold at 9:30 p.m. with 84% of the votes counted.

“Democrats are united,” Hickenlooper told supporters gathered in Denver at Steuben’s. “We are going to take back the U.S. Senate, we are going to take back the House. We are going to stop President Trump in his tracks.”

Hickenlooper, a pro-business centrist, pivoted to the left, at least in his campaign messaging, highlighting his work to expand healthcare access, boost housing affordability, cut environmental emissions and overhaul ICE.

Colorado election results for the 2026 primary

Gonzales, who declined corporate campaign contributions, had labeled herself as part of a new generation of Democrats looking to oust what she described as "do-nothing" incumbents backed by billionaires.

A community organizer and immigrant advocate, Gonzales graduated from Yale University in 2005 and was elected to the Colorado State Senate in 2018, where she currently serves as Majority Whip.

Among her key issues were reforming the immigration system and eliminating ICE; providing universal childcare, elder care and Medicare coverage; and protecting voter rights.

"The fight -- for an economy that works for us, a democracy that includes us, and a future that belongs to us -- continues," Gonzales wrote in a .

Progressives and democratic socialists had a strong showing in New York's primaries on June 23, where they swept deeper-pocketed rivals with a fraction of the financial support.

Named after New York mayor Zohran Mamdani, a social democrat, the Mamdani movement has found success mobilizing younger voters and tapping into working-class economic anxieties.

Gonzales raised only a tenth of the campaign finances that Hickenlooper had, according to public records. And Hickenlooper declined requests for a debate.

By highlighting his progressive accomplishments while at the same time staying true to his centrist leanings, Hickenlooper was able to successfully thread the needle.

Hickenlooper and Gonzales split the vote in Denver, the home base of each candidate. Hickenlooper, however, maintained a double-digit lead across most of the rest of the state, except for Adams County and some counties in southern Colorado, where his lead was in the single digits.

After two terms as Colorado governor, Hickenlooper had statewide name recognition in his favor. And he has championed rural causes during his first term in the Senate, noted Ken Salazar, a former U.S. Senator who spoke in support of Hickenlooper Tuesday night.

In his 2020 presidential run, he opposed "Medicare for All" and a national fracking ban, causes that Gonzales champions.

Among the groups that endorsed Hickenlooper are End Citizens United, League of Conservation Voters, Planned Parenthood Action Fund, and the Greater Metro Denver Ministerial Alliance.

Gonzales received endorsements from Oil Change Action, the Jane Fonda Climate PAC, GenZ for Change and Faith in Colorado.

Labor unions divided up their support among the two candidates.

The winner of Tuesday's primary will face Mark Baisley, the de facto Republican nominee who ran unopposed.

A Colorado Republican has not held a Senate seat since Hickenlooper defeated Cory Gardner in the 2020 election.

Now she lives in a Denver House district that has become a chronic Democratic battleground. Smith and her husband receive more mailers on some days than she put out during her entire campaign, which cost $36,700 in today’s money. The race to represent her, in one of the safest Democratic seats in Colorado, has now surpassed $1.2 million in total spending.

The eye-watering total almost certainly means that, heading into Tuesday’s primary, the fight for House District 6 between Rep. Sean Camacho and challenger Iris Halpern is the most expensive House primary in Colorado history.

“It’s scary, right now, to think that we’re going to waste that money, at this time, on these stupid attacks, when there’s so much work that needs to be done,” said Smith, 71, who lives in Lowry.

She sighed, remembering how much her unsuccessful Democratic challenge against Owens, the incumbent state representative and future governor, had cost. “Think about it. What could we have in this district that we don’t have now,” she asked, if the money were spent elsewhere?

When House District 6 was redrawn in the 2022 redistricting effort, it was for Democrats, or any party for that matter. But the seat has been less a comfortable sinecure than the legislature’s most expensive see-saw: In the three election cycles since redistricting, it has played host to three Democratic primary contests.

The district, which extends east from Capitol Hill all the way to the Aurora border, has become a proxy battlefield in an ongoing war between competing financial and ideological interests in the Democratic Party — one where weary voters catch volleys of mailers in the crossfire. The last three primary races in the district, including this year’s contest, have cost roughly $2.5 million in direct and outside spending, the bulk of it coming from dark-money groups backing more moderate candidates.

That’s enough to buy 7.5 million meals through the or a year’s worth of diapers for 3,425 babies through the charity.

That spending is a sign of the times, political experts say. Colorado Democrats have settled into one-party control in Colorado over the past decade, and that has meant more Democrats in the Capitol, more ideological diversity within the party — and more opportunity for infighting.

It has also meant that business interests, which once spent campaign cash in tossup districts, are looking for new places to spend their money and influence policymaking. District 6 is among the priciest of several legislative districts that have been the focus of outside spending this year. In all, roughly $3 million has been spent, largely in seven Democratic legislative primaries, by groups affiliated with One Main Street, a centrist dark-money organization that doesn’t disclose all its donors.

Colorado Labor Action, funded by the state’s major unions, has dropped more than $900,000 against One Main Street’s favored candidates in a handful of races, and other outside groups have poured in further cash.

“There has been a fundamental shift (away) from spending money in the general elections between Democrats and Republicans,” said Alec Garnett, a District 6 resident and a former Colorado House speaker. “And that money is shifting into Democratic primaries because that����ap where these outside interests believe that they can make a difference, in terms of the ideology of the candidates.”

This year in House District 6, Camacho, the incumbent, is a moderate Democrat seeking to fend off a progressive challenger in Halpern, an attorney. Camacho won the seat with nearly 85% of the vote in the 2024 election after beating then-Rep. Elisabeth Epps — one of the most left-wing, and controversial, lawmakers in the House — in the primary.

Epps, in turn, had won the seat two years earlier in an open race after beating a more moderate Democrat.

Why has the district become such a battleground? Part of the answer is circumstantial: The seat was open in 2022, and Epps was a magnet for criticism in 2024. Denver, Garnett said, is also the “headwaters” of the Democratic Party in the state. The voters in District 6 tend to be younger, and it’s home to some of the state’s most prominent politicians, including both U.S. Sen. Michael Bennet and Attorney General Phil Weiser, who are now facing off in the Democratic primary for governor. It’s also host to the governor’s mansion and the state Capitol building.

Victory in the primary could provide a springboard for a progressive political leader, as Epps once appeared to be. A win might also help set the tone for a Democratic Party still in search of a defining identity. Epps’ victory in 2022 was part of a wave of progressive wins, and the next legislative session featured debates, with mixed results, about supervised drug-use sites, eviction protections and assault weapons bans.

But Epps’ loss in 2024, after an outburst during a special legislative session that saw her reprimanded by House leadership, came against a backdrop of more moderate victories across Democratic primaries.

For Halpern’s outside–spending supporters, beating Camacho this week would mean putting a more progressive lawmaker back into what they see as a progressive district. It would also knock out one of the leaders of the legislature’s moderate — and much-criticized — Opportunity Caucus, which Camacho co-chairs.

For the groups opposing Halpern, backing Camacho is partially a matter of defending a candidate they’d helped elect two years ago. His voting record, they’d argue, has been in line with Democrats across the Capitol and doesn’t warrant booting him from office.

Their support of Camacho is also part of their ongoing effort to keep pragmatic Democrats in office.

‘Campaign has just become about the money’

But that higher-level reasoning that’s crystallized into an avalanche of campaign literature has not been celebrated by the House District 6 residents who spoke to The Denver Post.

“I’m a pretty engaged person; I’m probably going to vote no matter what,” said Zach Robertson, who lives in Denver’s Uptown neighborhood. He said he had not voted yet but was leaning toward Camacho. “But (the spending) has me more cynical. This campaign has just become about the money — versus about the issues or campaigning on the ground.”

He’d looked at Camacho’s legislative history and his voting record, and they seemed fine for a Democrat. He didn’t buy the attack ads against Halpern, which falsely accused her of being a secret lobbyist.

And he knew there had been a split between different factions in the party, though he said he didn’t understand why it seemed to keep coming to a head in District 6.

It was much the same for William Thompson, a 37-year resident of the district who was once involved in Democratic organizing. He’s also supporting Camacho, and he questioned the integrity of the independent groups putting out mailers — which he felt were coming from interests based outside District 6.

“I can see where some people would be disgusted by the whole process and say, ‘To hell with it, I’m not going to vote,’ ” he said. ” … And I think it hurts the party, too.”

Amid all the noise, Smith, the onetime Owens opponent, said she wanted to hear about policies that would help her and her husband stay in Denver, even as they age and rely on a fixed income.

She said she’d heard both candidates speak in person and that she was supporting Halpern. She didn’t like feeling like she was the intended audience for attack ads from outside groups, especially when she wanted substance.

“Do (they) think we’re stupid?” Smith said. “There’s a part of you that wants to say, ‘OK, alright — now tell me what you’re going to do for us. What is it you’re going to do so that Colorado and HD6, the people here, can afford to live here in a great state, in a beautiful city? What are we going to do to protect that for future generations?’ ”

Drowning in negativity

The primary has been contentious. The biennial conflict’s reignition this year has sparked a mailer and advertising bonanza, most of it focused on critical messages.

Five dollars out of every $6 spent in House District 6 has come from outside groups, not from Camacho’s or Halpern’s campaigns. By law, the campaigns cannot coordinate with the outside groups that spend money in support of them.

In six days, a Post reporter who lives in District 6 received 10 mailers for or against Camacho and Halpern. Garnett said he received four mailers in one day last week.

Most of them have been attack ads: “Every mailer I get is negative,” he said.

As in 2024, Camacho is backed largely by dark-money groups tied to One Main Street, which generally supports “pragmatic” and pro-business Democrats. Halpern has received support from the PAC funded by the Colorado AFL-CIO and the Colorado Education Association.

In an interview, Camacho said he tries to run positive campaigns, including this go-round. But “one of the most frustrating parts” of the deluge of outside money, he said, is that those groups go so negative and threaten to drown out the message the candidates want to share.

He described himself as a “strong labor (and) anti-TABOR guy,” referring to the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights, which restricts taxes and spending in Colorado. He touted bills he’d run that sought to protect older people from financial fraud and to regulate artificial intelligence-powered chatbots.

“I’m trying to get out my message, but I can’t control what outside groups say or do,” he said. “That’s really concerning, frankly.”

Halpern told The Post that she knew the history of dark money in the district when she announced her candidacy in January. She also knew it’d be hard to outraise an incumbent.

But still, the amount of money — and how vicious the attacks have become — has shocked her.

Her , for example, launched with a video blasting Opportunity Caucus members for attending a private fundraising retreat in the mountains in October. But now it also features a banner at the bottom declaring “False accusations DISMISSED” — a reference to a complaint filed with the secretary of state’s office alleging that she’d illegally worked as a lobbyist.

As her website notes, that complaint . But an anonymous PAC continued to make the accusation in ads to voters. Earlier this month, Halpern sent the group behind it, Denver Progressives United, a cease-and-desist letter.

“It’s getting very dirty,” Halpern said. “There’s no accountability. And voters, and even I, don’t know who is donating to these dark-money groups.”

She and Camacho are both Democrats, and they would likely vote the same on bills that reach the floor of the House. But which bills reach the floor — and in what shape — is the key difference, she argued.

She criticized Camacho for the AI chatbot bill that, she argued, was “a giveaway to the richest companies in the world” because it limited monetary damages. She also knocked him for a vote he cast in committee that helped in mountain communities.

Other money-soaked races this year

If it’s any consolation to House District 6 residents, they’re not alone in being targets of so much spending.

A similar fight is spilling out of mailboxes in nearby Senate District 34, which covers the northwest corner of Denver, including part of downtown. Also considered one of the safest seats anywhere in Colorado, the District 34 Democratic primary has pulled in a whopping $1.5 million in total spending in the race between Andrés Carrera, who worked for the city of Denver, and Chela Garcia Irlando, who leads an environmental nonprofit.

The majority has come from outside dark-money groups, and most of that from One Main Street-aligned committees backing Carrera. Irlando has received substantial support from the labor PAC that’s supporting Halpern, as well as from Conservation Colorado and others.

Between the two Denver legislative districts, candidates’ campaigns and the outside groups backing them have spent roughly $3 million — enough for 9 million meals or diapers for 4,100 babies — for two seats that will almost certainly elect whichever Democrat emerges from Tuesday’s primary.

The Denver races have been by far the costliest of this primary cycle. But the labor PAC and One Main Street network have also squared off in races in Broomfield and Aurora. One Main Street has also been active in primaries for seats based in Thornton and Summit County.

While Denver’s Senate District 34 won’t have another primary election for four years, House District 6 could host another expensive primary in 2028.

In conversations with The Post, campaign operatives involved in the outside spending who declined to speak on the record expressed a hope — if not quite an expectation — that the tug-of-war over House District 6 might end after this race, regardless of who wins.

Paul Teske, a political scientist at the University of Colorado Denver, said the fighting in the primaries, in that House district and elsewhere, may change only if the money and attention are needed elsewhere.

“I think with such a weak Republican Party statewide — we’ve maybe moved from purple to solidly blue — then the fights that are left are within the blue,” Teske said of Democratic races. “So the money and the attention is going to get funneled there.”

But that might change if Republicans “put together a more competitive set of candidates across the state” that gives them a shot at winning the legislature or the governor’s office, he said.

House District 6 is full of engaged Democrats, said Rep. Steven Woodrow, who represented the seat before the boundaries were redrawn in 2022. He now represents House District 2, which includes Washington Park, and is not running for reelection. He described the primary as a microcosm of the broader moderate-vs.-progressive fight within the party.

“That rift is somewhat based on policy differences, no doubt, but it’s also largely based in approach and philosophy regarding change and operating within the system that we have,” he said.

Woodrow, who has not endorsed either Camacho or Halpern, said it made sense that outside groups who’d backed Camacho before would defend him now. They fought hard to land Camacho in the seat back in 2024. Why would they pull back the next cycle?

“I don’t begrudge folks for trying to protect the gains they feel they’ve made,” he said.

But the cost has been staggering, and voters have noticed. Two who spoke to The Post pointed out how physically large this year’s mailers have been. Others criticized their mysterious origins.

“What is wrong with us?” lamented Elizabeth Pace, a longtime District 6 resident and Democratic voter. “We have lost (our way), even in this small, liberal, progressive area of town. It����ap very discouraging.”

She supports Halpern but earlier backed Camacho and gave money to Epps’ 2022 opponent, Katie March. She said she resented the crush of attack ads, and she got a knot in her stomach even when she saw negative ads against Camacho.

“It’s negative to the point of, I want to put this down — I don’t want to see this anymore. I will reject the premise on its face,” she said. “That is bad. That is bad for us in this little haven that we call democracy.”

John Hickenlooper has had a storied political career. But if he wins the Democratic Party’s primary, is re-elected in November, and serves a full second term, he will be 80 years old by the end. If Diana DeGette (Colorado House District 1) follows a similar path, she will be 70 when her next term expires.

As a “Boomer,” whose age falls between these two candidates, I recognize that my mental faculties are not what they were a decade ago — and that they will only decline. We have also seen the electoral consequences of ignoring this with President Joe Biden.

Of course, age should not be the only criterion that a voter uses when evaluating the suitability of a candidate, but it should be considered. Especially since the generational differences between the Boomers and everyone younger are so stark.

If the Democrats have any aspirations to be the party of the future, they will need candidates who have a similar lived experience with younger voters.

An additional problem is that people often fail to recognize their own diminished capacity. And because most House and Senate seats are “safe,” many incumbents end up with seats for life.

Politicians who hold national office, even more so than athletes, are loath to retire for the simple reason that they will instantly go from being a “somebody” to becoming a “nobody.” Quick, who was the previous Speaker of the House?

So it is up to primary voters to ease older candidates out of office if this is warranted. There are many talented younger candidates on the Democrats’ primary ballot. Perhaps you should choose one. I have.

Guy Wroble, Denver

Michael Bennet for governor

In the Democratic primary for governor, we will be casting our votes for Michael Bennet for three reasons.

First, Michael’s career is marked by experience that will be essential for our next governor. He has been a successful businessman, led the Denver public schools through a precarious period, and now serves as Colorado’s respected U.S. Senator. This experience puts him miles ahead of other candidates.

Second, his life has been one of acting with veracity and honesty, two traits that underscore his proven record of personal integrity.

Finally, he is a committed advocate for moving all regions of our state ahead. No matter the stage in his professional career, he has demonstrated time and again that making Colorado the greatest place in America to raise a family — through affordability, excellent education, and protecting our public lands — is a number-one priority.

In many ways, Michael Bennet is a “throwback” to how political leaders used to behave and must behave again if we are to navigate the onslaught of revenge that Donald Trump seeks to wreak on our beloved state.

Michael Bennet. Experience. Integrity. Commitment. He is our choice for the Democratic primary and our next governor.

Don and Jan Smith, Denver

Scott Bottoms for governor

As an independent voter, I tire of being ignored by the two monopoly parties, so when I sent out questions to the governor candidates and received only one reply, which was from Scott Bottoms, he got my vote for governor. And though I don’t agree with him on many issues, at least he’s willing to listen and engage with voters — even those of us who don’t agree with him.

Candidates who can’t or won’t engage with us are telling us that they are inefficient or too busy and important. It����ap going to take innovative thinking to figure out how to engage and represent so many diverse voters, all constitutionally promised equality under the law, which includes minority rights under majority rule. If candidates don’t have the wherewithal to listen to us, then there is no way they can represent us.

Bottoms gets my vote because he is the only candidate who is respectful enough to engage with those of us whom he will represent as governor, even those of us with whom he disagrees. At least he listens before disagreeing or agreeing. These others are just talking at us.

If candidates can make themselves available for lobbyists, they can make themselves available to the rest of us. There are solutions for reaching and engaging us, but they’d have to actually listen to us in order to find out what those solutions are. It matters.

I’ve sent numerous letters and emails to Attorney General Phil Weiser over the past five years, but he can’t be bothered to respond. Five years! And I voted for him! Not making that mistake again.

Krystyn Hartman, Grand Junction

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The venue cancellations, at least two of them said to be based on security concerns with hosting the event featuring Hasan Piker, prompted outrage by the candidates. The episode also underlined broader questions as Democrats from different factions of the party debate whether figures like Piker draw in voters or risk alienating them.

Piker, a Twitch streamer who has 3 million followers on the video livestreaming platform, has tapped a young, anti-establishment audience that the Democratic Party has struggled to bring into its fold.

He’s also been the subject of sharp criticism from prominent political groups, including , for some of his most controversial comments. Those include a 2019 comment because of its foreign interventions and Piker saying he would “ every single time.” Piker has apologized for the comment about 9/11.

His provocative comments have made Piker a . But some Denver Democrats, including Melat Kiros, who is running in Colorado’s 1st Congressional District primary against U.S. Rep. Diana DeGette, and state Sen. Julie Gonzales, who is running against U.S. Sen. John Hickenlooper, have leaned into the figure’s sphere of influence. Both share progressive political views with Piker, and Kiros identifies as a democratic socialist.

“He has a large audience of really engaged voters,” said Annie Orloff, a spokesperson for Kiros’ campaign. “I think people like to throw a lot of shade at him, but he’s really supporting these candidates and helping them.”

Orloff said the two times have overlapped with some of the campaign’s best fundraising periods.

Gonzales, who wasn’t available for an interview for this story, to discuss her platform.

Both Kiros and Gonzales were set to campaign with Piker at a rally in Denver on Sunday. The event changed locations three times after venues canceled.

The original location, ReelWorks in the Five Points, canceled the event a week ahead of time after stating that its HVAC system wasn’t working, according to an email provided to The Denver Post. According to Kiros’ campaign, the venue hosted other events that same weekend.

A Reelworks representative didn’t respond to a request for comment.

Then a backup location, the Ogden Theatre on East Colfax Avenue, pulled out two days ahead of time, citing “significant pressure and concern from the local community.”

“This decision was made purely from a security viewpoint, there was no political viewpoint or political decision around it,” Dennis Dennehy, a spokesperson for theater operator AEG Presents, told The Post.

Organizers then turned to the Stanley Marketplace in Aurora. But it also canceled the event, citing security concerns related to Piker’s appearance, according to the Kiros campaign. The Stanley Marketplace didn’t respond to a request for comment.

Piker has spoken at Yale University and the University of Chicago. He was also set to speak at South by Southwest in London until he was banned from entering the country because officials believed his presence “may not be conducive to the public good,” .

After the Kiros campaign ultimately moved the event to the steps of the Colorado Capitol on Sunday, drawing hundreds of people, Piker and Gonzales both decided not to attend. Instead, during the event and later hosted Kiros and two candidates from other states who were in town for the event on his channel.

Kiros’ campaign alleged, without evidence, that DeGette had applied pressure to compel the venues to cancel the event.

“I think it is hard to make a distinction from the folks who fund people like Diana DeGette and the people who own these venues,” Orloff said.

AEG Presents is part of the Anschutz Entertainment Group, founded by Colorado billionaire Phil Anschutz, a Republican.

DeGette’s campaign denied the allegations, saying the claim was made up.

“I can’t believe I have to say this, but it’s an absolute lie that I or my campaign had anything to do with her venue cancellations,” DeGette said in a statement. “She’s free to make her own mistakes, and campaigning with an infamous anti-semite who says he ‘hates this country’ and thinks we ‘deserved 9/11’ is a big one.”

Democrats in other states who have appeared alongside Piker have seen a mix of harsh criticism and a boost of engagement with their campaigns.

Democratic left figures like New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders have also all appeared on his channel.

Other Democratic candidates — like Sen. Michael Bennet and Attorney General Phil Weiser, who are running for governor of Colorado — haven’t appeared on Piker’s channel. Colorado Democratic Party spokesperson Andrew Nicla said the party had no comment on candidates appearing on shows like Piker’s.

Colorado’s June 30 primary and other states’ party contests may serve as a litmus test of sorts for candidates who welcome that ideological corner of the internet.

When Politico reported that Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed was appearing alongside Piker in April, his opponents heaped criticism on him. But in recent polls, he in the three-way race.

Earlier this month, as primary election results rolled in, Piker celebrated the victory of a congressional candidate he had campaigned for in New Jersey, . But that same night, in California, three candidates whom Piker also supported lost their primary races.

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The district, covering Colorado Springs and its suburbs, is typically solid red. But national Democrats have marked the race to unseat Republican U.S. Rep. Jeff Crank as demographic shifts, falling approval for President Donald Trump and fired-up liberal voters shifted the district’s rating from “solid Republican” to “likely Republican,” according to the

Crank is unopposed in the Republican primary.

Candidate Jessica Killin, a former U.S. Army captain and chief of staff to former second gentleman Doug Emhoff, is going up against Joe Reagan, a U.S. Army combat veteran who turned to the nonprofit sector after his military career, in this month’s Democratic primary.

Reagan narrowly lost the 2024 primary for the Democratic nomination and is running again.

While the 5th District is expected to be a tighter race — the notes it is one of the few House districts that has consistently moved to the left over the past three presidential cycles — it will still take work to flip a district Crank won by 14 percentage points in 2024.

Killin, 52, is banking on doing so with a “Team Normal” platform.

“People are fed up and frustrated,” she said. “They want someone who is going to stand up for their community and stop playing partisan games. Yes, I have a ‘D’ behind my name, but I hate the labels. I am Team Normal… I am exhausted by the chaos, uncertainty, partisan bickering, tribalism.”

Killin had raised for her campaign as of the end of March — outraising incumbent Crank, who had raised more than $1.3 million.

“Jeff Crank has completely failed this community,” Killin said. “He is completely out of touch…The minute he took the oath, he went full MAGA (Make America Great Again). He lost Space Command. He’s never worked to stand up to Trump for our community. He hasn’t done anything to improve cost of living — he’s made it worse… I want our government to be functional again.”

Reagan raised during the same timeframe.

He served as a senior director at two nonprofit organizations, Easterseals, which helps people with disabilities, and veterans-focused Wreaths Across America. He works at a local nonprofit, Veterans Business Outreach Centers, which helps veterans open and operate small businesses.

The 44-year-old said veteran mental health and expanded healthcare access for everyone were priorities of his, along with working toward more affordable housing, making sure every child has access to a high-quality public education and supporting labor unions.

“When you are around town and talk to people about me, most don’t think of me as the Democratic candidate for Congress,” Reagan said. “They think of me as, ‘This is the guy at the Little League field with his kids every week, the guy who helped me start my small business, the incoming president of the Rotary Club.’ That����ap how you inspire trust.”

Reagan said his down-to-earth approach attracts people from all political factions. His campaign headquarters is a melting pot of progressive and moderate Democrats, “recovering Republicans” and independent voters, he said.

“So often, we get voters who say they don’t like either candidate and they’re going to vote for the lesser of two evils,” he said. “And in El Paso County, that means a Republican. It����ap on us to put forward a candidate people want to vote for.”

Reagan said there are El Paso County voters who support Democratic issues like the county during the 2024 election, but they still vote for conservative candidates.

“It����ap because they distrust the Democratic Party, and you break that by being a community organizer and leader first,” Reagan said. “I’m a combat veteran, so with 100,000 veterans in El Paso County, that puts me in a place I can relate directly to so many of our friends and neighbors.”

Killin, who secured early endorsements from all of Colorado’s congressional Democrats, zeroed in on cost-of-living issues as a core tenet of her campaign.

She said she would focus on improving the affordable housing stock in the Pikes Peak region and creating policies to get first-time homebuyers into homes. She would tackle the childcare desert to address skyrocketing childcare costs, she said.

“I joke that this is not your mother’s Colorado Springs,” Killin said. “People are hungry for change and normalcy. People are feeling so exhausted by this administration and Jeff Crank’s total failure, and that����ap how we win this.”

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.

But though some of their party, it’s far less certain if that discontent is strong enough — or focused enough — to pull off a seismic upset against Hickenlooper, the former brewpub owner and onetime Denver mayor and Colorado governor now finishing his first term in the Senate.

Gonzales’ progressive bona fides in Denver and the state Capitol will have to overcome Hickenlooper’s experience, his comparably vast fundraising and the inherent advantage that comes from being a fixture of Colorado’s political scenery.

“There doesn’t seem to be a whole lot of collective outrage at Colorado’s incumbents — like John Hickenlooper, like (fellow U.S. Sen.) Michael Bennet,” said Seth Masket, a political scientist at the University of Denver. “We’ll see what actually happens in the election. But that����ap really Gonzales’ best ticket to office — if there’s a lot of anger for incumbents seeming too complacent nationally or not willing to fight hard enough against the Trump administration.”

Gonzales, a 43-year-old two-term state senator from Denver, has framed her candidacy in large part as a progressive critique and challenge to the Democratic Party’s more moderate standard-bearers, like Hickenlooper.

“Does Colorado want to continue with more of the same, go-along-to-get-along politics?” said Gonzales, whose legislative work has focused on immigrant rights and progressive staples like tenant protections. “… Over the past six years, (Hickenlooper) has not met that moment in responding to (voters’ economic) pain — versus my track record, where I have shown up, done the work, advanced progressive and durable policy that has made concrete impacts on people’s lives.”

Hickenlooper, in contrast, repeatedly spoke of his candidacy — and his desired return to office — as laser-focused on responding to President Donald Trump. In a phone call last week, he didn’t acknowledge Gonzales and sidestepped a question about anti-incumbency feelings among Democratic voters.

He said his campaign was about “fighting back” against the president and responding to healthcare cuts and the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown. He highlighted his own extensive experience as mayor and governor, and his work in helping to pass the

“Right now, with Trump in office, that����ap what we need,” said Hickenlooper, who raised $40.7 million in 2020 on his way to defeating Republican U.S. Sen. Cory Gardner. “We need that experience of being focused on his lawlessness and combating his reckless attacks on our traditions, on the American way.”

The primary election is June 30, and mail ballots will be sent to voters beginning Monday. Both Democratic and unaffiliated voters can weigh in on the race.

The winner of the Democratic contest will face off in November against state Sen. Mark Baisley, of Woodland Park, who is running unopposed in the Republican primary.

In a nod to the progressive messaging adopted by both Hickenlooper and Gonzales’ campaigns, Baisley said they appeared to be trying to “out-liberal the other person.” He, too, was hoping to harness voter dissatisfaction — albeit in a far more conservative direction — to fuel what would be an upset win in November.

“There has been such a long run of single-party control in Colorado that everyone’s realizing that their freedoms have been curtailed in an enormous way,” he said.

Hickenlooper seeks a final term

Now age 74, Hickenlooper’s potential second term would end a month before his 81st birthday. He has already said he wouldn’t run for a third term, and he told The Denver Post that he would serve the entirety of his second term, should he be reelected.

“We’re going to have to rebuild better,” he said of his plans for a second term, echoing a slogan from the early years of Democratic President Joe Biden’s administration. He has called for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to be overhauled, and he’s backed broad reforms to the agency’s practices. “That����ap part of what I’m committing to, in my six years — I think we cannot just build back what we had, but build back in a much better form from what we should’ve had.”

Gonzales has served in the legislature since her election in 2018. A Yale University graduate, she was an organizer and worked for a prominent immigration law firm in Denver.

She said she would support “Medicare For All,” a proposal that typically means single-payer health insurance coverage for all Americans in a program run by the government. To achieve its passage and other reforms, she would advocate for ending the Senate’s filibuster, the rule that requires at least 60 senators to agree to end debate and move to a vote. She supports expanding the U.S. Supreme Court and instituting term limits for both justices and federal lawmakers.

She said she would not support U.S. Sen. Chuck Schumer of New York to continue on as the Democratic leader. She also said she would not support sending any military aid to Israel.

“I’m not only going to talk about standing up to Trump,” she said. “I also want to share the vision where all Coloradans can thrive.”

Hickenlooper said he supported giving Americans “universal (health insurance) coverage” but did not commit to supporting Medicare for All specifically. He highlighted to increase healthcare pricing transparency.

He said he was open to court reforms that would include term limits and a set number of appointments per presidential administration. Asked about Schumer, he said that he didn’t think the New York senator wanted to continue as minority leader and that other, younger lawmakers were interested.

He noted that the filibuster had prevented some Republican priorities from passing under the Trump administration, but he said he wasn’t “ruling out addressing the filibuster.” In 2021, he said he wanted to “change the filibuster” to pass voting rights legislation.

Hickenlooper recently voted against sending bulldozers and some munitions to Israel. Campaign spokesman Jess Cohen said Hickenlooper “would continue to vote against weapons that fuel the war,” which Cohen said included the conflicts in Iran, the Gaza Strip and Lebanon.

Scant polling has been released about the race. showed Hickenlooper with a 32-point lead — 45% to 13% — over Gonzales, with his other challengers in the low single digits. Thirty-seven percent of respondents were unsure.

But the race tightened significantly after the respondents — 739 likely Democratic primary voters — were read “neutral-to-positive” biographies of the candidates. Those biographies were not included in the poll release. The results had a margin of error of plus or minus 4 percentage points.

Gonzales faces name ID disparity

When it comes to fundraising, meanwhile, Hickenlooper has been dominant.

, the most recent reporting deadline, he had raised $5.7 million in total contributions and had more than $4 million in the bank. Gonzales, who entered the race in December, had raised $443,000 by March 31 and had just over $114,000 on hand, .

The fundraising disparity will make it harder for Gonzales to increase her name recognition across the state, already at a deficit against a well-known figure like Hickenlooper. Hickenlooper is taking the race seriously enough that he’s running ads to support his campaign, Masket noted. But the strength of his name recognition alone presents a formidable challenge.

“That’s hard, particularly against someone like Hickenlooper, who’s been in public life in Denver and Colorado for several decades now, and he was a popular governor, a popular mayor,” he said. “That’s very hard to overcome.”

Gonzales has criticized Hickenlooper’s support for several Trump cabinet nominees; , the third-most among Democratic senators.

He voted against 13 cabinet nominees last year, according to Ballotpedia, and Hickenlooper said he’d voted against 96% of Trump’s appointments overall. He said he wouldn’t vote again for any of the nominees he did support.

“I thought they would push back on the president,” he said. “I thought that a good executive — even a bad executive — if they get a senior staff that challenges them and pushes back, they make better decisions. … And yet this group of appointees, not one of them have come outside their shell and pushed back.”

To offset the fundraising disparity in the campaign, Gonzales has launched a statewide tour, and she earned her place on the ballot at the party’s statewide assembly earlier this spring. (Hickenlooper initially participated before withdrawing from the assembly process, instead filing petitions to make the ballot.)

Last month, Gonzales appeared , a leftist personality who has backed progressive Democratic candidates in other states. On Wednesday, Gonzales’ campaign announced that she and Melat Kiros, who is hoping to ride a similar upset wave and unseat longtime incumbent U.S. Rep. Diana DeGette of Denver, would participate in a Denver rally with Piker on June 14.

Platner is a political dumpster fire and the epitome of their moral hypocrisy.

Platner had a tattoo resembling the Nazi Totenkopf symbol, associated with the SS and concentration-camp guards during World War II, on his chest, which has been exacerbated by his rhetoric. He has also been tied to a long list of inflammatory Reddit posts and comments: remarks questioning why Black restaurant patrons tip less; comments interpreted as blaming sexual assault victims for drinking; attacks on rural white Americans as stupid; statements advocating political violence; calling all police officers bastards; and, even mocking a wounded Purple Heart recipient as someone who “didn’t deserve to live.”

Platner’s history shows a documented pattern of offensive and vulgar conduct.

Despite these concerns, Democrats looked the other way while jumping on the Platner bandwagon.

Why? Because Platner has been leading in the polls and offers the party a chance to beat Sen. Susan Collins and win control of the Senate. Collins has served in the Senate for 29 years and is one of the Republicans’ more moderate senators. Democratic Party leaders rationalized Platner’s history, dismissed it as old news, and insisted he was a changed man. The moral outrage was swept under the rug in the name of political power at any cost.

Then another bomb dropped. Platner recently exchanged sexually explicit text messages with multiple women shortly after getting married and during the early stages of his senate campaign.

Democrats would be incensed if the shoe were on the other foot and Platner was the Republican candidate. They would be on every talk show and flooding social media, arguing that he was unfit for office and demanding his immediate withdrawal from the race. Progressive activists’ talking points would call Platner a Nazi and brand him as the face of the Republican Party.

Despite these recent developments, Platner has continued to receive silence, excuses, and outright support from prominent Democrats. Key Democratic leaders like Senator Bernie Sanders, Senator Elizabeth Warren, Representative Ro Khanna, and other progressive figures .

Sen. Sanders has spent years arguing that character, rhetoric, and personal conduct matter when evaluating Republican candidates. From chastising President Trump, to calling on Roy Moore to step down during the Alabama Senate race, to criticizing figures such as Herschel Walker and George Santos, moral standards and decency used to matter to Sanders. Not so much, apparently, when the candidate has a “D” by his name and his opinions align with Sanders’ socialist views. Then, the interests of the working class somehow become a permission slip for a moral and political train wreck.

Democrats should demand that Platner step aside before the next bomb drops. Gov. Janet Mills, who recently suspended her campaign, should be the Democratic nominee in this critical race if there is to do so.

The larger issue goes far beyond Maine.

Democrats now have two dramatic examples of losing their voice when it matters. Consider their lost-in-the-wilderness posture toward President Joe Biden when it was clear he was not competent to run for re-election. They either defended Biden as fit or remained silent.  And, the lack of moral clarity was disturbing, particularly from Jill Biden, who now concedes she thought her husband was having a stroke during his disastrous debate performance.

Even more concerning is the direction of the party. Democrats constantly describe themselves as the party of the “big tent” — a coalition supposedly broad enough to welcome different viewpoints, backgrounds, and perspectives. Increasingly, however, that tent seems to have room for radicals and ideological extremists while pushing out Democrats who think independently.

Take Democratic Pennsylvania Sen. John Fetterman, for example. Fetterman is a progressive Democrat who has never abandoned Democratic priorities on issues such as labor, health care, and affordability. However, he refuses to march in lockstep with Democrats on every issue, particularly when it comes to Israel and public safety. His independent views on Israel have drawn not-so-friendly fire from the activist left. For that independence, he is increasingly treated as a disloyal outcast by members of his own party, who continue trying to push him out of the tent.

As my son Wes aptly said, the moral of the story is that some democrats seem okay with Nazi symbolism but not a Jewish state.

The modern Democratic “big tent” appears large enough to embrace candidates accused of extremism and deeply disturbing behavior, but not large enough to tolerate free thinkers willing to challenge progressive orthodoxy.

A party desperate for national leadership and a cohesive message that resonates with Americans cannot have it both ways. And, it can’t credibly cry moral outrage with Republican candidates and elected officials while accepting and explaining away the outrageous behavior and conduct of its own candidates.

Platner is a national stain on the Democratic Party in 2026, and Republicans will use him across the country as midterm fodder unless Democrats find their voice — and their standards — while there is still time.

Doug Friednash is a partner with the law firm Brownstein, Hyatt, Farber and Schreck, who grew up in Denver and writes occassional columns for The Denver Post.

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Re: “Governor censured for Peters clemency,” May 21 news story

The base of the Democratic Party is outraged over the governor’s decision to commute the sentence of Tina Peters. Peters, of course, is a non-violent 70-year-old offender, and the chances of her repeating the behavior are probably minimal.

Why was there so little concern expressed about his decision to commute the sentences for violent and repeat offenders? Where was the unified outrage when Gov. Jared Polis vetoed labor law reform, environmental legislation and wage theft legislation? And that is a short list of what was once considered the core values of the Democratic Party.

I understand the governor’s reasoning on all the , but calling the Peters case his “legacy” tells us a lot about the state of our politics. Public policy decisions always need to strive for middle ground, and those leadership decisions often referred to as arrogant can just as easily be called principled leadership. Let me remind your readers that most offenders serve their time in community corrections, not jails or prisons. Most inmates are released to community corrections from prisons. Their response to supervision is a critical factor. Many offenders even choose incarceration over community supervision requirements.

The primary purpose of long prison sentences is to protect the public, but the preservation of power and revenge dominated this controversy. Both parties have weaponized the justice system. Let’s de-escalate tribalism.

And remember, there are four sides to every story. My side, your side, the truth and politics.

Timothy D. Allport, Arvada

Re: “Here’s why Polis is right to reduce Peters’ sentence,” May 16 editorial

I worked for Gov. Jared Polis for six years. Though he always either mispronounced my name, I just shrugged it off as the eccentricities of his personality or his casual enthusiasm for his minions. He was supportive of the energy my agency put into reducing crime and helping Coloradans, so that was my primary interest.

But when I read his statement rationalizing his commutation of Tina Peters’ sentence, I was so saddened. In that moment I understood that he doesn’t understand how the criminal justice system actually works. And the people who advise him are similarly naive.

The Common Law principles that shape sentencing are about accountability for the lawbreaker’s actions. That is first and foremost. But there are also many collateral goals.

Besides “just deserts,” there is the concept of deterrence–both specific deterrence, intended to discourage the offender from committing similar crimes in the future, and general deterrence, intended to send a message to the public and others considering similar acts.

It is also intended to support rehabilitation, repairing harm to the community and those directly impacted by the offender’s action, and reinforcing community norms and values.

All of these values were ignored by the governor.

Clemency should be reserved for those who are subject to unfair sentencing laws. Not those who have been sentenced appropriately and with the concept of justice foremost.

I strongly disagree with the opinion of The Post. It presents as under-informed about the purpose of the judicial process and is deeply disappointing.

When the people you think share your values actually ignore them, for whatever reason or personal gain they pursue, it is a heart-wrenching reminder that politicians are in it for themselves and not the people they profess to protect.

Joe Thome, Westminster

Editor’s note: Thome served as director of the Colorado Division of Criminal Justice.

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