Colorado’s Federal Candidates

Two house races were not called on election night: District 3, where Republican firebrand Lauren Bobert is neck-and-neck with challenger Adam Frisch, and our district, the newly formed District 8. As we’ve previously reported, this district was added to Colorado after the 2020 census. The district, which stretches from Greeley to Westminster and includes the entire Frederick-Firestone area, was created to be highly competitive, and, with no incumbent in office, the race became one of the most anticipated in the country.

On the afternoon of Thursday, November 10, Dr. Yadira Caraveo was declared the winner of District 8 over Barbara Kirkmeyer. Caraveo is a licensed pediatrician and has been a member of the Colorado House since 2019. Barbara Kirkmeyer is currently serving in the Colorado Senate for District 23, and she had an early lead on Election Night. The former Weld County commissioner naturally had her base in Weld County, which finished and released its entire vote count early Wednesday morning. However, Adams County, where the Thorton-based Caraveo has her base of support, stopped counting ballots at 11 pm on Election Night and took two days to certify all of their results.

As she was ahead by over 1,000 votes with only 6% of ballots from very-Democratic-leaning precincts left, Caraveo was declared the winner Thursday afternoon by the Associated Press. However, this close race is likely to go to a recount, as Colorado law requires a recount when candidates are less than 0.5% apart in the final vote total (the current gap is 0.84%), so there may still be a chance for Kirkmeyer.

Incumbent US Senator Bennett won a third term as Colorado’s senior Senator, winning 54.9% of the vote compared to Republican challenger Joe O’Dea’s 42.5%. Joe O’Dea was a strong contender for the race, as he appealed to many Colorado moderates–while being a fiscal conservative, O’Dea is pro-choice and anti-MAGA in an election where the cost of living, abortion access, and threats to democracy are the three biggest concerns of Colorado voters. Yet these policies that made O’Dea popular with moderates made him unpopular with a large chunk of the Republican base, who voted for third parties or wrote in the name of O’Dea’s Trump-backed challenger from the Republican primary in June, Ron Hanks.