DENVER (KDVR) – Democrats and Republicans seem to finally agree on something – Colorado’s Republican seat is all but flipped to Democrat John Hickenlooper.
Word broke Friday that the Democrat-affiliated Senate Majority PAC is pulling $1.2 million in television ads from Colorado, considering the race finished with weeks yet till Election Day.
“We’ve been encouraged for a long time about the race that Gov. Hickenlooper is running. Given his strong fundraising and multiple public polls showing him ahead by double digits, we believe Gov. Hickenlooper is in good shape heading into the final stretch,” said Rachel Irwin, a spokeswoman for Senate Majority PAC, in an interview with POLITICO.
Hickenlooper has led polls throughout the fall, most recently by ten points. According to Federal Election Commission filings, he raised three times as much as Republican incumbent Sen. Cory Gardner between July and September.
Republican money is now making Colorado take a backseat to more conservative states. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s Senate Leadership Fund is only putting $1 million into Colorado out of $22.5 million destined for Republican candidates elsewhere.
Statewide, this not only points to a trend in the long-Republican Senate seat but with most of Colorado’s House of Representative seats. Whatever PACs are leaving Gardner aren’t showing up elsewhere.
Democrats outraised Republicans in all but three Colorado races through June 30 – House districts 3, 4 and 5.
These three historically conservative districts, whether because Republicans consider them locked or because Democrats consider them flippable, turned a corner in July and Democrats are now outraising Republicans.
House District 3, which saw its incumbent Rep. Scott Tipton unseated in the Republican primary by Steamboat Springs restaurant owner Lauren Boebert, has little PAC money. The House District 3 race commands the most money, but only a scrap of it – $65,000 – came from political action committees between July and September.