August 04, 2010 10:18 PM UTC

State Legislative Primaries to Watch

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• by: Colorado Pols

Lost in the hoopla surrounding the Primaries for U.S. Senate and Governor are a handful of interesting state legislative races that will be decided on Tuesday. After the jump, we break down the most interesting and relevant of those races.

STATE SENATE

State Senate District 6

This may be the fiercest Republican Primary on the legislative side, with Rep. Ellen Roberts and challenger Dean Boehler battling it out to take on incumbent Democratic Sen. Bruce Whitehead in this Montrose-area district. Roberts has raised almost twice as much money as Boehler, but the latter is a Tea Party favorite in a year where the more conservative candidates are doing better than their moderate GOP counterparts. This race probably comes down to turnout, with a higher turnout likely favoring the more well-known Roberts.

State Senate District 20

Democrats Cheri Jahn and Dave Ruchman are running to replace term-limited Sen. Moe Keller in what may be the tightest legislative race in the state on Tuesday. Ruchman narrowly lost (by a few dozen votes) a Primary bid to Rep. Sue Schafer in 2008, which was a race to replace Jahn in HD-24. Jahn is probably more well-known in the area than Ruchman, but she has some terrible votes for a Democrat that have been widely exploited in direct mail by third party groups. Jahn won top line out of the caucus by just two votes, but we think Ruchman will eke out a win with Primary voters.

State Senate District 34

Democrats Lucia Guzman and Rep. Joel Judd are battling it out for the North Denver seat vacated by the term-limited Paula Sandoval. Judd has more money and more campaign experience, but Guzman is better known in the more highly-populated parts of the district (the Denver Highlands area). Judd likely wins this race based on a more organized campaign, but high turnout could really boost Guzman.

STATE HOUSE

State House District 4

Three Democrats — Dan Pabon, Jennifer Coken and Amber Tafoya are running to replace term-limited Rep. Jerry Frangas in this North Denver seat. Pabon easily won top line out of the caucus process, forcing both Coken and Tafoya to petition onto the ballot, and he’s been the top fundraiser of the bunch by far. For those reasons, it’s hard to see Pabon not winning this race.

State House District 5

Democrats Mark Thrun and Crisanta Duran are trying to win the downtown Denver seat vacated by term-limited Rep. Joel Judd. Both Thrun and Duran have their own bevy of backers and have done well raising money. This race is too close to call, and we really don’t have a feeling one way or the other from what we’ve heard.

State House District 7

Democrat Angela Williams has long been considered the favorite to replace term-limited Rep. Terrence Carroll, but Jon Goldin-Dubois and Mark Mehringer have still run tough campaigns. It still seems likely that Williams will ultimately win here, but it’s always tough to predict a three-way race when all the candidates are strong campaigners.

State House District 12

This is an interesting race to replace term-limited Rep. Paul Weissmann in the Louisville/Longmont area. Both Jake Williams and Matt Jones have raised more than $60,000, and each have a good background in Democratic politics. Jones was a former State Representative from the same general area in the late ’80s, but he’s coming off a 2007 Louisville City Council loss to a Republican (in a non-partisan election). Williams is relatively well-known in Democratic circles from work with labor and environmental groups, won top line at the assembly, and has more support from current elected officials. From what we hear, the younger Williams has run a strong campaign and should win this Primary.

State House District 44

Three Republicans are fighting it out for the Douglas County seat being vacated by term-limited Rep. Mike May. Polly Lawrence has outraised Chris Holbert by an almost 3-to-1 margin, while David Casiano has managed only about $4,000 total. Given the huge fundraising disparity, Lawrence would seem to have the edge.

State House District 54

Two Republicans are vying to replace Rep. Steve King, who is running for State Senate. Bob Hislop has significantly outraised Ray Scott, but Tea Party-types are trying hard to label Hislop as the dreaded RINO (Republican in Name Only). Hislop hasn’t raised enough money to offset grassroots RINO attacks, so this is a tough call, but Scott doesn’t seem to have done enough to get his own name out there. We’ll go with Hislop here.