April 23, 2025 11:46 AM UTC

Brita Horn: Same Circus, Different Clown

• 2 Comments
• by: Colorado Pols

When Brita Horn was running to become the next leader of the Colorado Republican Party, she and her allies presented her as a more rational and capable choice for GOP Chair in comparison to outgoing Chairperson Dave Williams. While that was an incredibly low bar for any sentient organism to clear, we’ve seen from Horn’s first few weeks on the job that there really isn’t a lot of daylight between her and Williams, whose 2023-24 term was nothing short of disastrous for Colorado Republicans.

In discussions with local media outlets, Horn has tried to present herself as a more, um, “compassionate” conservative. As Scott Miller reported earlier this month for Vail Daily:

In addition to finding candidates, Horn said the party simply needs to recruit more Republicans. That means the party needs to “roll out the welcome mat” to people with different views. [Pols emphasis]

Horn noted that she was once a Democrat who became a Republican. Former Sen. Ben Nighthorse Campbell followed the same path, she added. President Donald Trump’s cabinet has other former Democrats, including Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard.

Horn said a state as diverse as Colorado can’t welcome only “a certain kind of” Republican, adding that conservatives in, say, Delta County and Eagle County may hold somewhat different values. [Pols emphasis]

If you judge Horn by what she says outside of media interviews, you’ll find a very different posture. From supporting anti-vaxxer content spread by disgraced former General Michael Flynn to openly advocating for a “Christian nation,” Horn is only a “big tent Republican” if that tent contains a circus.

If Republicans were hoping to at least get better financial management from Horn, they should probably cross all of their fingers; Horn was briefly a candidate for State Treasurer in 2018 until stories about her mismanagement of funds as Routt County Treasurer derailed her campaign. Her oversight of the first campaign finance filing for the State GOP included a nonsense line about “antifa” forcing the a venue change for last month’s big Republican Party fundraiser; the real story was that multiple venues refused to host an event featuring Nazi-saluting enthusiast Steve Bannon as the keynote speaker.

From Q1 2025 campaign finance report for Colorado Republican Party

It’s hard to say if the Colorado Republican Party can actually get much worse than it was over the last couple of years, but we wouldn’t count on Horn making things a whole lot better.