April 15, 2025 11:31 AM UTC

Gabe Evans is Going Down with the Ship

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• by: Colorado Pols

Colorado’s eighth congressional district is the very definition of a toss-up race. In 2024, Republican Gabe Evans defeated Democratic Rep. Yadira Caraveo by less than one percentage point (49.0 – 48.2). National Democrats almost immediately declared CO-08 as a top pickup opportunity for 2026, when Republicans are expected to be heavy underdogs to maintain majority control of the House of Representatives.

Nevertheless, Gabe-ish Evans continues to double-down on bad decisions that will make his re-election prospects exponentially more difficult. From inexplicably backing horrid GOP budget decisions that will gut Medicaid to wholeheartedly supporting President Trump’s on-again, off-again Tariff War, Evans is acting like a Republican in a deep-red district instead of someone who is one of the most vulnerable incumbents in the country.

As Axios Denver reports, Evans seems to be fully committed to going down with the proverbial ship in 2026:

U.S. Rep. Gabe Evans (R-Fort Lupton) says President Trump’s tariffs are helping level the playing field for an agricultural industry that’s critical to his district’s economic success.

While Trump has paused many tariffs, choosing to keep stiff taxes on China and a 10% baseline tariff, Evans tells us the president’s levies help local producers avoid being taken advantage of by overseas trade partners.

Evans recently visited with beef, dairy, cheese, onion, sugar beet and bison producers in his district who told him tariffs will help them negotiate better trade agreements with countries including Australia, Brazil, Italy, Mexico and Vietnam…

…Evans tells us the tariffs are restoring a trade balance not just for agricultural producers, but in the energy sector, another key industry in his district. [Pols emphasis]

Whether or not Evans truly believes this nonsense is irrelevant. Evans is personifying the “This is Fine” meme, since the majority of Americans and nearly 60% of Colorado voters believe that the Trump Tariffs are going to have a negative impact on their daily lives.

Colorado farmers are also not buying what Evans is selling, as Colorado Public Radio reported last week:

Colorado farmers say they expect multiple tariff impacts on both their operations and consumers to take effect over the next year.

Steve Ela, who owns Ela Family Farms on the Western Slope, said Colorado growers would be immediately impacted by tariffs imposed by the Trump Administration on basic farm inputs.

“If tractor parts and fuel and various other crop inputs are affected, that raises our cost of production,” Ela said. Higher production costs usually result in higher prices for consumers.

Additionally, farmers who sell goods in foreign markets could see customers disappear as countries slap retaliatory tariffs on American products like crops and meat. On Friday, China hit all U.S. goods with a 34 percent tariff, which will make U.S. goods like soybeans, beef, and even apples more expensive there. Beijing’s announcement caused crop profit margins across the nation to drop almost overnight. Then, this week, China increased that tariff to 84 percent, and President Donald Trump responded with a 125 percent tariff on Chinese goods.

“Anytime you have massive market disruptions and you create unsettlement, that makes us all nervous,” Ela said. “As farmers, we have enough problems with Mother Nature and labor and other costs all over the place. Having markets fluctuate wildly really makes it harder to plan ahead.”

It’s also not the case that Evans has a lot of goodwill built up that could soften the harm from his obsequiousness to President Trump. The Colorado Polling Institute recently found that Evans is not well-liked among Coloradans overall. Once he starts casting votes to gut Medicaid, his approval ratings are going to drop faster than the value of a used Tesla. Unless the Trump Tariffs magically turn out to be good for the economy and residents of CO-08 decide that they didn’t like having health insurance, Evans is in big trouble in 2026.

Evans has apparently calculated that he has no future political path that doesn’t involve being an unwavering foot soldier for Trump and House Speaker Mike Johnson. Perhaps he views this, um, “strategy” as the only way for him to avoid a Republican Primary in 2026, but what’s the point of making it to a General Election if you are too crippled to run a competitive race?

Here’s our prediction: Evans is going to continue to do whatever Trump and Johnson tell him to do, which is going to make him toxic to voters in the eighth congressional district. When the 2026 General Election comes around, Evans is going to be so far behind in the polls that national Republicans will have no choice but to cut him loose rather than spend millions of dollars propping up a lost cause.

Welcome to the ouroboros that is the Republican Party, Gabe. Enjoy your (brief) stay.