What it did not do is bring in big donations.

Boebert¶¶Ňőap campaign filed a Thursday that offers the first glimpse into whether her right-wing virality and social media stardom are a boon to her campaign coffers. The report suggests mixed results: Boebert¶¶Ňőap campaign received only two donations worth $100 or more in the three days after the Jan. 3 ad, but viral posts in March earned her far more medium and large donations.

Campaigns do not have to list donors and dates for small contributions, so it’s unknown how many small donors gave to Boebert’s campaign. Donations of $200 or more must be itemized with dates and donor information.

released March 8 by her congressional office showed Boebert walking around the Capitol telling House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to tear down a security barrier that went up after the Jan. 6 riot. The video, which was not paid for by her campaign and did not solicit donations, has been viewed more than one million times on Twitter. Her campaign received 21 itemized donations that day, valued at $8,275.

On March 9, to donate to her campaign in response to a viral Twitter hashtag that called for her to be imprisoned. Her campaign received 33 itemized donations that day worth $17,531 and 41 the next totaling $15,381.

Boebert ultimately raised $846,156 between New Year’s Day and March 31, a strong fundraising quarter at the beginning of a nearly two-year-long defense of her job representing western and southern Colorado against several Democratic challengers.

In other federal fundraising news:

• The Jan. 6 riot also played into Democratic U.S. Rep. Joe Neguse’s campaign spending. The congressman put $10,400 from his campaign account toward security in February, when he was a prosecutor in former President Donald Trump’s impeachment trial. Anlance Protection, the Fort Collins company his campaign hired, specializes in “intelligence gathering, threat assessment, tactical planning and proactive security measures.”
• State Sen. Kerry Donovan led the Democratic field in the 3rd District, challenging Boebert with a $643,596 haul. She received four $5,800 donations – the maximum allowed under law – from members of the Walton family (Walmart), as well as a $2,900 donation from Robin Hickenlooper, wife of U.S. Sen. John Hickenlooper. Former U.S. Senate candidates Trish Zornio and Dan Baer donated as well.
• State Rep. Donald Valdez, who is running in the 3rd District for a second time after falling short in 2020, raised $67,150 last quarter, including a $2,800 donation from Boulder author T.A. Barron.
• Sol Sandoval, a Pueblo social worker and activist running in the 3rd, raised $45,526. Much of that, $10,000, came from When Democrats Turn Out, a political action committee. $2,900 came from Merle Chambers, a former oil and gas CEO. Diane Mitsch Bush, who lost to Boebert in 2020, donated $500, as did state Rep. Edie Hooton, D-Boulder.
• Colin Wilhelm, a Glenwood Springs defense attorney and 3rd District candidate, raised $14,369 for his Democratic campaign, including an $8,000 loan.
• U.S. Sen. Michael Bennet raised $1.2 million last quarter and had about the same amount on hand at the end of March. Bennet is up for re-election next year but doesn’t have a Republican challenger yet.

“Somebody who knows how to use social media has an advantage,” says Michael Cornfield, a George Washington University professor who studies Twitter use by congressional campaigns. “That doesn’t guarantee victory, of course, but that is an advantage.”

Boebert¶¶Ňőap rise to conservative social media stardom coincided with her stunning win over Rep. Scott Tipton, a Cortez Republican who rarely uses the website, on June 30. Twitter is well suited for the time and place Boebert finds herself in, campaigning across half of Colorado on a relatively small budget during a pandemic that has drastically shrunk crowd sizes.

“It adds to name ID, which brings in money,” said Trish Zornio, a former Democratic candidate for U.S. Senate who also has a large Twitter following. “It¶¶Ňőap just another way to add to your campaign. It¶¶Ňőap not the end-all and be-all but it is something that contributes. She’s got a pretty solid platform.”

Boebert¶¶Ňőap posts on the social media site — which has become a playpen for politicos and the reporters who cover them — are a mix of Trumpian antagonism, conservative platitudes, culture war charges, policy ideas and the occasional conspiracy theory. They rarely mention her opponent, Diane Mitsch Bush, but have a Trump-like ability to garner immediate attention from disparagers and devotees alike.

It wasn’t always that way. Boebert¶¶Ňőap Twitter account was born when her campaign was, in December 2019, and was little used for the first several months. By mid-February, she was asking supporters to help her reach 3,000 followers. She would go a dozen days without tweeting at times and in April posted only 13 times.

In May, her approach changed, and her following skyrocketed to 30,000 by May 6. Posts were suddenly garnering thousands of retweets and likes. At times in May she tweeted more in a day than she had in all of April. She tweeted at popular accounts, namely Trump, bringing her more attention from his fans.

Boebert, 33, quickly found an audience in conservative circles decrying shutdowns meant to slow the coronavirus pandemic. Closing small businesses was “criminal,” May 6. Three days later , “If Hillary (Clinton) was President, no one would even be talking about this virus.” On May 12, Anthony Fauci, America’s top infectious disease expert. On May 15, she of prolonging shutdowns to hurt Trump.

Posts that Boebert has clicked the “like” button on have delved deeper into the online world of conspiracy theories. In early July, she liked a post that featured the hashtag #WWG1WGA, or “where we go one, we go all,” a rallying cry for believers in QAnon, a far-right conspiracy theory that alleges Trump is secretly fighting an elite cabal of Satanist pedophiles who operate a child sex trafficking ring.

Boebert expressed some interest in QAnon while appearing on a QAnon talk show in mid-May but she and her campaign spokesperson have since stated on several occasions that Boebert does not believe in the conspiracy theory.

On June 13, she liked a tweet from QAnon believer DeAnne Lorraine that claimed the “world is waking up” and used the hashtag #ExposeBillGates, reference to a that the Microsoft founder is trying to track and control the world’s population through microchips in coronavirus vaccines.

On June 3, Boebert liked a tweet from a parody account that called former President Barack Obama a “Kenyan terrorist” and claimed Michelle Obama is a man. The tweet was later unliked by Boebert.

Boebert¶¶Ňőap most popular tweets came in May, the month of her Twitter rise. One listing prominent Democrats and their time in office ended, “Yet somehow Trump is the one who created the problems in America,” and was . Another accusing Democrats of favoring undocumented immigrants over small business owners . A star of right-wing Twitter was born.

“If you’re on a campaign and you want to know how you’re doing on Twitter, you look at retweets,” said Cornfield. “If people are retweeting what the candidate is saying, that¶¶Ňőap an approximate sign of support. That is peer-to-peer communication, which in our age is more trusted than communication from the media.”

Boebert¶¶Ňőap campaign has told reporters she is still studying policies before taking positions and laying out plans, but she has posted some policy ideas to Twitter. Among them: that open carry , for example, “there shouldn’t even be a federal Department of Education.” In May, she would “veto any legislation that raises taxes,” a power that members of Congress do not have.

Trump’s transformation of Twitter into the tech world’s loudest megaphone has spurred considerable research of its effects on elections since 2016. of 2018 midterm campaigns found four incumbent House members avoided Twitter in the months before the election and half lost. Five Democrats who used Twitter far more than their opponents beat Republican incumbents that year.

“And the primacy of digital campaigning has risen because of the pandemic,” he said Thursday.

Zornio, despite a Twitter following of 109,000 that rivaled that of her top opponents, did not win the Democratic primary this year. But it helped the political novice make a run.

“I didn’t make any fundraising calls. I didn’t have wealthy people in a Rolodex. I wasn’t that kind of candidate. So, the six-figures-plus that I raised came almost exclusively from Twitter posts,” she said.

Mitsch Bush has about 8,300 Twitter followers, as of Friday. Using analysis software, Cornfield calculated the number of times her name was mentioned on Twitter and the number of times Boebert¶¶Ňőap name was mentioned between July 1 — the day their race began — and Thursday.

“The numbers are kind of staggering,” the professor said. “In the U.S., Boebert¶¶Ňőap name has been mentioned in this two month and 10 day period almost 51,000 times. 50,920 to be exact. Mitsch Bush’s name has been mentioned 2,531 times. That¶¶Ňőap a 20-fold difference in mentions.”

Within Colorado, Boebert¶¶Ňőap name was mentioned 3,629 times compared to 687 times for Mitsch Bush, a less drastic difference. The Democrat has criticized Boebert¶¶Ňőap tweets for containing little mention of Colorado or the 3rd District. An Aug. 20 fundraising email from Mitsch Bush’s campaign looked at 24 hours of tweets from Boebert.

“Just like we thought: not a single mention of Colorado. Instead, she made a nod to her QAnon followers by , talked about rapper Cardi B, and topped off the 24 hours with an attack on the intelligence of her favorite bogeywoman, AOC,” the email stated, referring to Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a New York Democrat that Boebert has tweeted about 37 times.

Scant polling in the race between Boebert and Mitsch Bush has shown a close contest in a district Republicans won easily four years ago. On Thursday, Boebert received the endorsement of Trump, the Republican president she idolizes.

It was announced on Twitter.

I am a student, and as of right now, I am forgotten. I have been forgotten for some time now; I would say around 754 days, the number of days since the school shooting in Parkland, Fla. Where has the fear gone? The thoughts and prayers? They have faded into an abyss of nonconcern and insincerity. However, the fear remains in the back of every young student¶¶Ňőap mind — a lingering presence. How long will it be? A day? A week? A year?

Often I find that, when daydreaming in school, my mind does not drift to a distant land of enjoyment, but rather to a reality not so different from my own. A reality in which one of my classmates decides to take up arms. My mind spins at a rapid pace to plan my escape from whatever classroom I’m currently trying to learn in. It would be wrong to say that I am rudely awoken from these dreams, snapped back to reality. More justly, I feel relieved. I feel prepared for a possibility that, to many, seems impossible, but to me, seems probable.

Soon someone else’s children will have to be remembered instead of raised. Might just be me. People must not forget as they are now.

Cooper Paul Angell, Cherry Hills Village

Thankful for art installation

Kudos to Denver Parks and Recreation for the new totem by artist Jaime Molina in Barnum Park at 6th and Federal. It is a wonderful addition to the park and public art in Denver.

Hannah Schechter, Denver

Send a scientist to the Senate

There are no scientists on the U.S. Senate’s Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee. Most are lawyers, including Colorado’s committee member, Cory Gardner. Trish Zornio, a scientist, is running against Gardner to add a scientist¶¶Ňőap voice to the Senate.

One subcommittee of the Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee includes science, oceans, fisheries and weather. Zornio has posted a climate action plan on her website, including job creation and transition, budgets and timelines. Ocean temperatures, such as El Niño and La Niña affect our weather here in Colorado. We need support for our weather and atmospheric agencies and research to understand and predict changing weather patterns and severe storms.

Zornio grew up playing in the northern New Hampshire woods and nearby rivers far away from the big city. Outdoor recreation and access to public lands are important to her.

Zornio has a passion for health care and helping people. She has worked in top hospitals and clinics. She believes we should all have access to affordable health care.

Zornio was trained to understand data, the requirements for a good study and detecting a biased or poorly designed study. We need someone who has these skills to balance the influence of lobbyists and industry-supported studies serving a profit motive, not the public interest.

When you need sound science decisions, who ya gonna call? A lawyer or a scientist?

Marilyn Stone, Paonia

Check this out, please

Re: “Self-checkout conflicts with day of rest,” Jan. 12 news story

Concerning the article about France and the conflicts with self-checkout: We have the same problems here at numerous places, including grocery stores, department stores and big-box stores. It is so irritating! Has anyone been to Walmart lately? Many cashiers are gone since the remodeling of the front of the stores so customers can check out their own items. Why do people comply? If one wants to work at Walmart, then fill out an application.

Service is not the name of the game now. And now fewer people have jobs.

Sam Walton, when he established Walmart stores more than 50 years ago, had goals to provide quality service and value for customers. Where are those goals now?

Sheryl Bliss, Northglenn

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Romanoff, a favorite of progressive activists, dominated the better-funded John Hickenlooper in statewide caucuses Saturday, winning more delegates than Hickenlooper in every large Colorado county en route to a commanding win.

Statewide, Romanoff won 55% of support in the preference poll, Hickenlooper earned 30%, Trish Zornio received 7%, Stephany Rose Spaulding won 5%, and Erik Underwood won 0.2%. Another 3% of caucus attendees were uncommitted, . A few small counties had not reported as of Sunday night and are not included in this total.

In Denver County, where Hickenlooper was mayor for eight years, Romanoff won 61% of delegates to 22% for Hickenlooper, 9% for Spaulding and 6% for Zornio.

In Boulder County, a hub for liberal activism, Romanoff won 64% of delegates to 21% for Hickenlooper, 9% for Zornio and 3% for Spaulding.

Romanoff also won majorities in Adams County, Douglas County, Jefferson County, Pueblo County and Larimer County, plus a plurality in El Paso County.

“You defied the political establishment and carried our message — a Green New Deal, health care for all, an economy that works for everyone — to communities across the state,” Romanoff told supporters in an email Sunday.

Held on an unseasonably warm Saturday and amid worries of a coronavirus outbreak, the low-turnout caucuses were the first occasion for Democrats to choose among their party’s large U.S. Senate candidate field. Rather than choose the front-running Hickenlooper, most instead went with the liberal Romanoff.

At Thomas Jefferson High School in Denver, Barbara Groth, 67, voted for Romanoff. She expressed frustration with the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee for throwing its support behind Hickenlooper, calling that decision a “huge disservice to Romanoff.”

At Overland High School in Aurora, Michael Carr also chose Romanoff, who went on to win 56% of delegates in Arapahoe County and 55% in Adams County.

“He’s the best at building bridges with the other side,” Carr said of the former Colorado House speaker, who often touts his bipartisan record in the legislature. “It can’t just be us versus them; we all have to work for the good of our country.”

As a result of Saturday’s preference poll, most of the delegates sent to county caucuses later this month will be Romanoff supporters, making it likely that he is able to earn 30% of support at an April 18 state assembly.

Romanoff, Spaulding, Underwood and Zornio will each need 30% of assembly support if they are to have their names placed on June 30 primary ballots. Several other candidates are taking a signature-gathering route to ballot access, bypassing the caucuses. Hickenlooper is taking both routes and has turned in signatures.

Romanoff expects the weekend win will boost his fundraising and volunteer recruitment, but caucuses in Colorado are not predictive of primary success. Cary Kennedy won the Democratic gubernatorial caucuses in 2018 but lost to Jared Polis later that year. And Romanoff over Sen. Michael Bennet but lost to the incumbent Bennet in that year’s Democratic primary.

Hickenlooper predicted two weeks ago that he would win the preference poll but downplayed both his expectations and the importance of caucuses in remarks to reporters Saturday afternoon. He said the true contest will be the June 30 primary.

“I’ve run statewide twice in bad years for Democrats and I have a relationship with Democrats across the state,” Hickenlooper told reporters outside his precinct site, referring to gubernatorial wins in 2010 and 2014. “And that relationship should allow me to build momentum and really take Cory Gardner on head to head.”

Romanoff, a progressive favorite, won 55% of the raw vote and Hickenlooper won 31% with 55 of 64 counties, including Denver, reporting late Saturday, according to the Colorado Democratic Party. However, several counties will not report their results or the number of delegates won by candidates until Sunday.

Precinct caucus results will determine the number of delegates that candidates have at upcoming county caucuses. Results there will determine delegate counts at an April 18 state assembly, where candidates will need at least 30% support to have their names placed on June 30 primary ballots.

The caucus is one of two ways to get on the Senate primary ballot — candidates also can do so by gathering signatures — and only about half attempted the caucus route. Low turnout at Saturday’s precinct gatherings amid the coronavirus outbreak had some Democrats discussing whether the tradition should continue.

In a phone interview, Romanoff called the results “a new beginning” and “a shot in the arm” for his campaign. He said he expects an uptick in fundraising and volunteer recruitment to follow.

“Our grassroots campaign just crushed the D.C. machine and won today’s caucuses!” Romanoff told supporters around 7:30 p.m. “The power brokers and party bosses in Washington didn’t get the memo, but it turns out a lot of people in Colorado want to replace Cory Gardner with a progressive champion.”

Gayle Rodgers, 74, caucused for Romanoff in south Denver because of his environmental ideas. Romanoff is a supporter of the Green New Deal and, like most candidates, has made combating climate change a top issue.

“Hickenlooper is married to oil and gas,” Rodgers said.

At his precinct caucus site in Park Hill on Saturday, Hickenlooper downplayed the importance of caucuses. While a great way to hear from people and meet engaged Democrats, caucuses are usually attended by “the very progressive part of the party,” he said, adding that a long line of successful Colorado Democrats — Ken Salazar, Michael Bennet, Jared Polis — have lost caucuses.

“The only ballot that really matters in determining who the candidate is going to be representing Democrats in the Senate race is the one that happens June 30. That¶¶Ňőap where I have to win,” he said.

At Thomas Jefferson High School in Denver, 40 precincts came together to vote. Elizabeth ErkenBrack, 37, caucused for Hickenlooper, calling him a “hard-core Democrat” who nonetheless brings a balanced perspective she said the country desperately needs.

“Hickenlooper is more effective on a national stage,” she said. “He has proven he can be attractive to the majority of Coloradans.”

The day was less of a success for the three other Democrats on caucus ballots, according to the results posted Saturday night: Trish Zornio had nearly 7% support in the preference poll, Stephany Rose Spaulding over 5%, and Erik Underwood less than 1%.

Spaulding had a supporter Saturday in Tay Anderson, an outspoken new member of Denver’s school board, who caucused for her.

“I strongly believe we need to have representation on the ballot,” Anderson said in an interview at McAuliffe International School in Park Hill. “We failed to nominate a woman to be on the ballot for the presidency. It¶¶Ňőap time for us to at least acknowledge we believe in woman leadership.”

As thousands of Colorado Democrats congregated in their neighborhood schools, rec centers, firehouses and churches, talk of coronavirus was everywhere. Candidates and their surrogates often met voters with an outstretched elbow or a fist bump, rather than risk a handshake.

Several precinct leaders and participants in Saturday’s caucuses noted the low turnout. While many expected fewer people to show up because voters selected presidential candidates through a primary election this year, rather than the usual caucuses, they still felt it was disappointing.

Sarah Johnson, 21, participated in her second caucus Saturday. At her precinct meeting in Thomas Jefferson High School, there were four people. She said, “I just kind of think of it as doing my civic duty.”

But maybe the low turnout means it¶¶Ňőap time to retire the process, some suggested. U.S. Rep. Diana DeGette attended several caucus meetings, including at Thomas Jefferson High School, and noted those who showed up are dedicated.

She’s not sure, though, that moving the meetings to the Saturday after Super Tuesday was the right call. She said it¶¶Ňőap time to have a conversation about how candidates will be nominated in the future.

Michele Hanley, 41, has mixed feelings about what to do. She said caucuses are where candidates who are not backed by big money can fight against larger campaigns and have a better chance than in a primary.

“I’m torn,” she said. “I like that it opens it to small groups of people.”

An earlier version of this story reported delegate-count results in Denver, but the state Democratic Party subsequently removed those numbers from its results page, saying they were being recalculated.

Five Democratic candidates for Senate will compete in Saturday’s caucuses: John Hickenlooper, Andrew Romanoff, Stephany Rose Spaulding, Erik Underwood and Trish Zornio. Five other candidates will try to obtain ballot access for the late June primary by collecting signatures, bypassing the weekend caucuses.

For the five competing Saturday, a preference poll of caucus attendees will be the first gauge of their statewide support and a true test of their ability to compete. The poll will be used to allocate delegates to county assemblies later in March. Polls taken at county assemblies will then be used to allocate delegates to the state assembly April 18, where a candidate will need 30% support to have their name placed on June 30 ballots.

“This is the first time Colorado will get a sense of where people actually stand on the candidates,” Spaulding said of Saturday’s caucuses. “Coloradans are not yet decided on who they want to be their nominee.”

In interviews Thursday, several candidates said they have spoken to engaged Democratic voters who are unaware caucuses are occurring or who have lost faith in caucuses after Iowa’s mishaps this year. In Romanoff’s words, Colorado’s caucuses are “a system that no one would design from scratch.”

“I actually have no idea what the turnout will be,” he said.

The field of five caucusing candidates includes Hickenlooper, the former governor and leading Democratic candidate, as well as two of his top liberal opponents, Romanoff and Spaulding. Zornio has been running longer than the other four and has toured every Colorado county twice. Underwood has been through the caucus process before, when he was a gubernatorial candidate in 2018.

“I do expect to win, of course,” Hickenlooper told reporters Feb. 28 at a Denver event with U.S. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, a New York Democrat who endorsed him that day.

“He’s going to kick some serious butt,” Gillibrand added with a laugh, before Hickenlooper slightly downplayed his chances.

“You have to understand, our caucus system is an old-fashioned caucus system, so I might not kick that much butt in the caucus system,” he said. “But I look forward to the primary election.”

Underwood said he will spend Friday meeting with voters in population centers along the Front Range. to what he estimated to be 1,000 people at a Capitol rally opposing , which would make the process for requesting vaccine exemptions more onerous.

“I will never get in between a woman trying to protect her child or children,” Underwood said into a megaphone on the steps of the Colorado Capitol. In that day, he wrote, “We cannot let Big Pharma to become a shadow government controlling our choice, freedom, and bodies.”

Romanoff will spend Friday in Colorado Springs, Highlands Ranch, Littleton and Fort Collins. Spaulding said her campaign will continue knocking doors and operating phone banks. Zornio, fighting an illness, will remain at home and make calls reminding her supporters to caucus Saturday.

“We’re feeling good as we look at the number of people who say they’re going to come out and support us,” Zornio said. “We just have to see what happens on Saturday.”

Hickenlooper has led the Democratic field by a wide margin in early polls but faces an engaged and enraged left flank of the party that prefers his more progressive challengers. The caucuses will be the first test of Hickenlooper’s well-funded campaign, as well as those of his liberal critics.

“In the progressive wing of the Democratic Party, many of them are very much anti-Hickenlooper,” said Spaulding. “We’ll see how much they are anti-Hickenlooper come Saturday.”

Preference poll results will be posted by the Colorado Democratic Party online and on Twitter on Saturday afternoon and evening. Though crucial for allocating delegates, such polls are not always indicative of primary success. In 2018, for example, Cary Kennedy easily won the Democratic gubernatorial preference poll but lost handily to Jared Polis in that summer’s primary.

Democrats can take part in Saturday’s caucuses if they will be at least 18 years old by Election Day, are registered to vote, and were registered as Democrats by Feb. 14. Precinct numbers can be found on the Secretary of State’s Office website, and precinct locations are at .

Republicans will also gather for caucuses Saturday, though there isn’t a competitive Senate primary. For the re-election campaigns of Sen. Cory Gardner and President Donald Trump, the caucuses are an opportunity to organize grassroots support and energize volunteers eight months before November.

In the state’s closely watched Senate race, Democrat John Hickenlooper raised nearly $2.8 million between October and New Year’s Eve, leaving him with $3.2 million on hand to begin 2020. The former governor’s campaign coffers were padded with large donations from prominent and wealthy individuals, especially from the world of finance. George Soros and his relatives donated $14,000 to Hickenlooper’s campaign.

Though a critic of corporate PACs, Hickenlooper did accept money last quarter from non-corporate PACs, including ones for the real estate industry, plaintiff’s lawyers and the Environmental Defense Fund. PACs tied to several Democratic senators also donated to Hickenlooper’s campaign.

Companies whose employees gave large amounts to Hickenlooper include Liberty Media, where the candidate’s wife works, and the powerful lobbying firm Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck, where his former chief of staff works.

Other noteworthy donations to Hickenlooper’s campaign include $2,800 from former U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, $2,800 from former Disney head Michael Eisner, $5,500 from congressional candidate James Iacino, and $2,800 from Soledad Hurst, the wife of a former Goldman Sachs executive who hosted an Aspen fundraiser for Hickenlooper.

“As we head into the election year, these resources will help us to travel across the state and get out our message of bringing change to Washington and bringing people together to actually get things done on the issues that Coloradans care about,” Hickenlooper said in a statement.

Sen. Cory Gardner, the Yuma Republican that Hickenlooper and nine other Democrats are hoping to face in November, raised about $2 million last quarter and had $7.8 million on hand Jan. 1. Of the $2 million raised, about $260,000 came from PACs and roughly $335,000 was transferred from other committees.

More than two dozen executives and employees at the private prison company GEO Group donated a total of $44,150 to Gardner in November, with nearly all the donations coming on a single day. GEO Group’s PAC to Gardner Victory, a joint fundraising committee, in November. The company, which operates a controversial immigration detention facility in Aurora and about a dozen other Colorado facilities, did not respond to questions about why it supports the senator.

Seven employees of Blackstone Group, a Wall Street firm, made maximum donations to Gardner last quarter. The company was founded by Stephen Schwarzman, an associate of President Donald Trump and prominent Republican donor who has previously given to Gardner’s campaign. A company spokesman declined to comment on the donations of its employees.

Gardner continues to receive a large number of donations from PACs, including those for energy companies — Chevron, ConocoPhillips, Haliburton, Arch Coal — and pharmaceutical companies, such as Pfizer and Merck. The Committee to Defend the President, a former anti-Hillary Clinton PAC that became a pro-Trump PAC, gave $1,000.

Billionaire businessman and former New York City mayoral candidate John Catsimatidis donated $2,800 to Gardner last quarter, as did , the U.S. ambassador to Jamaica.

“Senator Gardner’s historic 2019 fundraising puts us in an incredible position at the beginning of 2020,” said Casey Contres, Gardner’s campaign manager. “His large cash on hand advantage over all of his far-left, Democrat opponents will allow our campaign to get our message out about all Cory has done for this state, while also warning Coloradans about how his opponents’ policies will hurt hardworking families.”

Ten Democrats are competing in the Senate primary. Andrew Romanoff raised $313,218, leaving him with $686,244 on hand to begin 2020. Stephany Rose Spaulding raised $29,518, Lorena Garcia brought in $28,143, Michelle Ferrigno Warren raised $23,891, Trish Zornio received $21,486, Diana Bray brought in $6,069, and Christopher Milton raised $5,769. David Goldfischer and Erik Underwood have not yet filed fundraising reports.

3rd District

Colorado’s largest congressional district, spanning the Western Slope and southern Colorado, as well as much of the mountains, is represented by Republican Rep. Scott Tipton of Cortez and has been a Democratic target for several years. Tipton is opposed this year by a Republican primary challenger and a trio of Democrats: businessman James Iacino, former state Rep. Diane Mitsch Bush, and veteran Root Routledge.

in the final three months of 2019, more than Tipton or Iacino’s fellow Democrats. The donations were overwhelmingly large and from executives in Colorado’s business community. He also contributed more than $19,000 of his own money. Iacino had $165,717 to begin 2020.

“We’ve proven that we are the first campaign that has the chops to send (Tipton) packing,” Iacino’s campaign boasted in a fundraising email.

Bush, who lost to Tipton in 2018, raised $138,143 last quarter. Her campaign is largely driven by small donations from within Colorado. Routledge raised $820.

Tipton raised $181,843, nearly half of which . PACs for Raytheon, Chevron, Xcel, Marathon Petroleum, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, Conoco Phillips, Miller Coors, Koch Industries, Halliburton and other corporations donated. Tipton’s campaign had $529,668 on hand to begin 2020.

Meanwhile, Lauren Boebert, a Republican challenger to Tipton, raised $19,250 between Nov. 20, when she entered the race, and Dec. 31.

6th District

Denver’s eastern suburbs are represented by Democratic Rep. Jason Crow of Aurora, but Republicans hope to change that this year. Several Republicans are running, led by Steve House; all were outraised by Crow last quarter.

Crow brought in $429,115 and had $1,397,878 on hand to begin the election year. About one-fourth of Crow’s money last quarter, $108,095, . Attorney Frank Azar donated $5,600 and Jennifer Allan Soros, a daughter-in-law of billionaire George Soros, gave $2,800.

Jaimie Kulikowski, a Democrat challenging Crow, raised $9,608 last quarter.

House raised $213,019 and loaned his campaign an additional $85,000. Among his donors were University of Colorado Regent Heidi Ganahl, U.S. Rep. Doug Lamborn’s campaign, and George Mentz, a lawyer and author. Casper Stockham, another Republican in the race, raised $13,995.

In the days after President Donald Trump ordered a surprise drone strike in Iraq that killed Iranian Gen. Qasem Soleimani on Jan. 2, Democrats seeking the Senate seat in Colorado criticized the move, and one, Lorena Garcia, marched with protesters in downtown Denver, demanding peace.

“No War on Iran! U.S. Out of Mid-East,” Garcia’s sign read, as she alongside hundreds of other anti-war Coloradans on Jan. 4.

“He has no authority to continue any sort of engagement in Iran,” of Trump that day. “He is posturing, and the only thing that will come of this is unnecessary blood spill and destruction. This man is the most dangerous human on the planet right now.”

Democratic candidate Andrew Romanoff, asked by The Denver Post what he would do about Iran if he was in the Senate today, had a more moderate response.

“I would demand the same thing that a bipartisan group of senators is demanding: Evidence of the threat and a required consultation with Congress that the president seems indifferent to,” Romanoff said at a Denver fundraiser Thursday night.

“In the last week, we’ve seen Iran abandon any limits on its nuclear program and the American-led coalition halt its efforts to counter ISIS,” he added. “Those developments make the world more dangerous.”

John Hickenlooper, the front-runner to take on Republican U.S. Sen. Cory Gardner, said he weighs such matters with a simple test: “Is the world safer because of these decisions?”

“And now it seems more dangerous for us, for our troops, and for our allies than it was last week. Now we have to figure out what comes next. We need congressional oversight, real diplomacy, and global engagement going forward to keep us safe,” Hickenlooper said Friday.

In 2019, it would have been hard to imagine the Democratic Senate primary could be dominated by talk of foreign policy. It was rarely asked about at forums and debates and, when it was discussed, usually garnered only broad answers about Iran, such as the need for reinstating a nuclear agreement.

At campaign stops, candidates would spend an hour or 90 minutes taking questions and never hear one about foreign policy. On campaign literature and websites, foreign relations is well below the domestic topics that have dominated the Democratic race: climate change, health care, immigration, guns, the economy.

Now, as the campaigns ramp up after a holiday slumber, there are new topics: authorization for military force, the need for congressional oversight, and the complexities of a volatile Middle East, though there’s reason to believe domestic issues will still dominate 2020. At the private Romanoff fundraiser Thursday night, there were two questions about mental health, one about guns, one about climate and one about pet euthanasia. Iran was not mentioned.

“It¶¶Ňőap a shame we haven’t been talking more about foreign policy,” Garcia says. “I think it will become an issue and then it’ll die down, just like every other issue. We start talking more about gun violence when there’s a shooting, and a week later we stop talking about it.”

The Democratic field largely agrees there needs to be a de-escalation of tension with Iran, though they differ on what that should look like.

“Actions have consequences, and while Soleimani is an enemy of the U.S., I fear his assassination — ordered by Trump with no congressional oversight — is reactionary and could serve to escalate tensions in an already fraught region and cost more lives,” said Trish Zornio soon after the Iranian general’s death. “We need strategic plans, not emotions.”

On Twitter, candidate Diana Bray shared a tweet that called Soleimani’s death “an illegal war crime” and predicted “it will begin a world war.” Stephany Rose Spaulding has called on Congress to reclaim its war powers and “repudiate presidential overreaches,” a problem she says did not begin with Trump.

The man every Democrat in the race is hoping to compete against in November, Gardner, has been an outspoken supporter of Trump’s decision to kill Soleimani. The Republican senator from Yuma is a Foreign Relations Committee member and foreign policy is an area of expertise.

“We find ourselves here because the Obama administration failed to deter the Iranian threat,” Gardner said Jan. 3 — a point of disagreement with every Democratic challenger. “The flawed 2015 nuclear deal not only provided a pathway to a nuclear bomb, it emboldened Tehran’s bloody ambitions.”

“I do not want war with Iran, but the president did not take this action in a vacuum,” Gardner said on the Senate floor Thursday, referring to Soleimani’s death. “Contrary to claims by some of my colleagues in this very chamber, it is Iran that has escalated tensions, not the United States.”

Gardner is seeking a second Senate term, five years after narrowly beating incumbent Mark Udall in a race that centered on domestic concerns but touched on foreign policy in its final months. , who voted against the Iraq War in 2003, of being weak on ISIS after it beheaded two Americans. of playing politics with national security and criticized his reticence on Syria.

“Running for a seat like U.S. Senate, you have to be ready to understand foreign policy and take a position on it,” Garcia said, “especially when it comes to war and especially when it comes to a president who is already not trusted to make a decision that would be in the best interest of Americans.”

One foreign policy expert in the Senate race dropped out Sept. 12 and endorsed Hickenlooper. Dan Baer was a U.S. ambassador to the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe and a deputy assistant secretary of state under Obama. When he entered the race, he said he looked forward to going “toe to toe” with Gardner on foreign policy.

“One of the interesting things this week was how Gardner decided to hug the president close on a foreign policy issue that was controversial,” Baer said in an interview Friday. “In the past, he’s hugged the president close in a lot of ways but he has, at times, tried to find an independent voice on foreign policy. He’s had strong statements on North Korea, on Russia.”

Baer said the Democratic primary winner should link Gardner to Trump, who is unpopular in Colorado, when discussing foreign policy.

As it awaits the transfer of articles of impeachment from the House, the Senate must determine whether the trial of President Donald Trump for abuse of power and obstruction of Congress should be quick or lengthy, and who will testify. Colorado’s Democratic senator has been outspoken on both questions. Its Republican senator, Cory Gardner, has not.

Gardner’s every move is being closely watched as calendars flip to 2020, a year that will decide his political future. And in the Senate, where impeachment rules will require a simple majority vote, he can play the role of decider within the narrow Senate Republican majority. But he and his office have not answered questions about his impeachment preferences.

Gardner’s silence dates back months. His public appearances, never numerous in 2019, were rarer still this fall. He has avoided conservative talk radio, once a political safe space, along with most news media. His office agreed to arrange an interview with The Denver Post in Washington, D.C., during the House impeachment process, but later said he was unavailable and instead emailed a statement criticizing that process.

Asked last week whether Gardner believes Trump cabinet members should testify during the trial and whether he agrees with Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s decision to work in “” with the White House, Gardner’s spokeswoman sent the same statement, answering neither question.

“Senator Gardner believes Nancy Pelosi’s impeachment inquiry to appease the far-left has been a total circus that has only served to divide this country. Senator Gardner will be a juror and unlike what has happened in the House, he is confident the process in the Senate will be bipartisan and fair,” that statement says.

The last time the senator spoke with a significant contingent of Colorado reporters was Oct. 10, when he made national headlines for refusing to say whether it¶¶Ňőap inappropriate for an American president to ask a foreign government to investigate a political rival. Gardner declined to answer the question a dozen times that day.

“What we know is this: (Speaker) Nancy Pelosi and the House of Representatives tried to start impeaching the president years ago. They said it. They talked about it. This is part of a campaign plan that they want to execute. This is a very serious issue. I take it that way, and that¶¶Ňőap why we have to have an investigation,” the senator said at the time.

Two weeks later, he co-sponsored a Senate resolution that called the inquiry into Trump’s actions in Ukraine “a political circus.” That resolution called for “a fair and transparent” impeachment process.

The House Intelligence Committee conducted an investigation in November, and the House Judiciary Committee approved articles of impeachment in December. Later that month, the president was impeached for abuse of power and obstruction of Congress.

Throughout that process, as impeachment gripped the nation’s capital, Gardner was quiet. And since then, as senators have debated how to conduct a trial of Trump, he has remained quiet. His critics on the political left and political right have not.

“Instead of ensuring the facts get a fair hearing, Senator Gardner is enabling Mitch McConnell’s partisan coverup while ignoring the rule of law,” said Morgan Carroll, chair of the Colorado Democratic Party.

“Senator Gardner has already compromised his impartiality by taking campaign cash from the defendant, but allowing President Trump to hide critical documents and block testimony from key witnesses would show yet again that Gardner puts his loyalty to the president ahead of getting the truth and doing his job for the people of Colorado.”

Republicans for the Rule of Law on Interstate 25 in Douglas County to accuse Trump of hiding his wrongdoing by preventing witnesses from speaking out. “Sen. Gardner, the witnesses must testify,” that billboard stated. The group also aired a television ad on pro-Trump Fox News shows over the holidays with a similar message for Gardner.

“Gardner has chosen, probably wisely, to try to be as publicly quiet as possible about various issues, including Trump, impeachment and other important political issues of the day that are at all related to Trump,” said Kyle Saunders, a professor of political science at Colorado State University.

“However, keeping that distance is going to get harder and harder,” he added. “Avoiding the spotlight for as long as possible in this tough situation makes sense, but that spotlight is coming, and he will have to somehow thread 20 needles with a length of rope.”

Gardner faces tough re-election odds in November. Nine Democrats are currently competing for the chance to face him, and all nine supported impeachment. John Hickenlooper, the leading Democratic candidate, faced a brief spate of criticism in October for at a Montrose forum, but has since made clear his support.

“I think the Senate needs to have a fair trial and that the president¶¶Ňőap aides have to be allowed to testify,” Hickenlooper said in a statement Dec. 18. “The president has so far silenced key witnesses and withheld key documents, and that¶¶Ňőap wrong. The American people deserve the full truth.”

Democratic candidate Andrew Romanoff said Dec. 11, “If I were in the Senate, I would vote to convict Donald Trump and remove him from office.” Another Democratic challenger, Trish Zornio, has said Gardner “isn’t serious about the oath he took” to the Constitution. Democratic candidate Lorena Garcia predicted Dec. 18 that “the GOP-led Senate will put their party over the preservation of our Constitution.”

Because he faces a tough re-election fight, there has been significant speculation among national pundits that Gardner will be a swing vote during the impeachment trial, but the senator himself has never suggested that. Instead, he has consistently criticized the impeachment of Trump and consistently voted in accordance with the president¶¶Ňőap policy interests.

“One thing to remember: Gardner is the most talented politician on the Republican team, so if anyone’s going to thread those needles, it will be him, but it¶¶Ňőap still a really difficult task,” Saunders said.

Colorado’s other senator, Denver Democrat and presidential contender Michael Bennet, has been more outspoken. A spokeswoman said Bennet believes everyone who had knowledge of Trump’s decision to withhold aid from Ukraine should testify, including former national security adviser John Bolton, acting chief of staff Mick Mulvaney, budget official Michael Duffey, and White House aide Robert Blair.

“ and evidence that has come to light even after the House voted to impeach only reinforces Michael’s concerns that the Senate needs to hear from witnesses and have access to all relevant documents,” said the senator’s spokeswoman, Courtney Gidner.

The Senate has a responsibility to hold a thorough trial, Gidner said, and McConnell’s decision to work closely with the Trump administration jeopardizes that.