Democrats in El Paso County were hopeful that during this election cycle, the first since redistricting in 2023, they would get at least one candidate onto the El Paso County Board of County Commissioners. Their hopes did not materialize, as both Democratic candidates Naomia Lopez and Detra Duncan were defeated by their Republican opponents.
In addition to redistricting, Democrats were bolstered by this year’s County Comeback Initiative, in which a number of Democratic county organizations, like the El Paso County Democrats, received grants from the Colorado Democratic Party to help support candidates, campaign planning, training, and staff support for this year’s county commissioner races.
“We invested around, I think, a direct investment into counties of about $45,000,” said Colorado Democratic Party Chair Shad Murib.
Despite the investment, the makeup of Colorado’s county commissioner boards, of which only 34% are Democrats, changed very little. Democratic candidates won in Chaffee, Ouray, and Routt Counties, while Pueblo, long considered a Democratic stronghold, saw incumbent Daneya Esgar, a former Colorado Representative, lose to Republican Paula McPheeters. Still, Democrat Miles Lucero beat unaffiliated incumbent Epimenio Griego.
Republicans saw strong victories in Alamosa, Douglas, El Paso, Garfield, Grand, Huerfano — where Republican Jim Chamberlain beat Democratic incumbent Arica Andreatta by 40 votes — Mesa, and Park Counties.
“When you run a great offense, sometimes it turns out you’re piling sandbags at the same time,” said Murib. “Thirty-one of our counties shifted away from Trump, and I place that success on this program, but also the incredible work of volunteers and party leaders in their counties to do things that we had never done before. We’re disappointed in some of the outcomes for sure, but, you know, my motto is you can’t win if you don’t compete.
“I believe the next frontier of Colorado politics is local, and we’re going to continue to invest in our county parties, especially in rural communities.”
Despite Colorado largely resisting the red wave that former President Donald Trump rode to victory this year, Colorado Republicans have celebrated their minor wins, preventing Democrats from gaining a supermajority in the Colorado Senate and Rebecca Keltie ousting incumbent Stephanie Vigil by a margin of seven votes.
“The Republican Party has been shoveling sand with a pitchfork,” said Murib. “They’re going to continue to do so. They’re going to take credit for a national trend and have almost zero role in any of the outcomes of this election. We are continuing to invest these resources in places we know we can win, and in places where we cut the margins significantly. They should be deeply concerned that Trisha Calvarese is within 10 points of [U.S. Rep.] Lauren Boebert (R-CO). They should be incredibly concerned about the gains we’ve made in places like Montezuma, and Mesa, and Douglas, in Chaffee, and Ouray, and other counties that are going to make or break CD3 in our statewide elections in the future. We had an incredible outcome for Kamala Harris, a +13 victory for her. That is going to have major implications for their ability to win a statewide election ever again. They can continue to shovel sand with a pitchfork. And we’re just going to continue organizing in communities and getting wins, because the worst thing you can do in this business is take a victory lap.”
Murib says Colorado Democrats will continue to focus on local races moving forward. “We’ve got incredible opportunities to continue picking up city council and school board seats,” he said. “We had unprecedented, unbelievable success in 2023 shifting communities to get more community-minded leadership. That’s something we’re going to double down on in 2025. I’m also looking forward to building our coalition and being more in service to a lot of our coalition communities — like labor. Being really tied to the politics of working folks is something that I’ve been dialed in on, and we’re just going to really double down on [that] because we’ve seen in this election that people want to not just get by, but they want to be able to get ahead. They admire success, and they want to feel like they’re on the up and up and able to go on a nice vacation while also paying their mortgage. They want to be able to buy the slightly nicer computer for their kid when they go to college than the one that’ll just get them through the semester. We want to make sure that we’re the party telling folks that not only can you live a great life here in Colorado, but you can actually live a marginally better life because of our great business climate, our great economy, and our great sense of togetherness. That’s something we’re really going to be focused on here in the coming months.”
