April 13, 2026 01:32 PM UTC

Colorado Republicans Outfail Themselves, Produce Horrific Slate of Statewide Candidates

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• by: Colorado Pols

The 2022 Republican state assembly was an epic disaster for the Colorado GOP, producing a slate of bonkers candidates that presaged a General Election in which Republicans lost EVERY statewide race by double-digit margins.

On Saturday, Colorado Republicans convened in Pueblo and said “Hold my beer,” somehow producing a candidate slate that might actually be worse than that 2022 debacle.

Before we get into the official statewide slate of Republican candidates, we should note that the Republican convention was once again a complete clusterfuck. As The Colorado Sun reports:

The assembly started hours late Saturday. Hundreds of delegates were still waiting in line to enter the Massari Arena at Colorado State University Pueblo hours after the 9 a.m. start time. The state party conducted the voting using paper ballots counted by a machine, further slowing things down.

The final results were read at about 8:15 p.m.

After farting around in Pueblo for 12 hours, Republican delegates shrugged off their inability to count and called it a day:

The release of the official results was delayed by the discovery that about 80 more people had cast paper ballots than were credentialed to do so. “We don’t believe there has been any fraud,” said Al Gage, the state Republican Party’s parliamentarian, who said the party had three options: accept the overvotes, adjourn until another day or wait to see if the 80 votes made a difference in any of the races and then decide how to proceed.

Through a voice vote, the delegates decided to accept the overvotes.

In fairness to Colorado Republicans, no amount of overvoting (or undervoting) was going to produce a less-ridiculous result. When you go fishing in a polluted lake, you’re never going to go home with a trophy catch.

Republicans were always unlikely to be competitive in most Colorado statewide races in 2026, but the top of the ticket has a huge impact on how candidates down the ballot perform in November. When your headliners are awful, partisan voters are obviously less enthusiastic about bothering to vote in general — which has a cascading effect in races from the state legislature to local county offices. A weak ticket could also spell doom for Republican chances of holding seats in Congress, particularly for Reps. Jeff Crank (CO-05) and Gabe Evans (CO-08).

Let’s take a closer look at why the 2026 Republican MAGA slate could end up making its awful 2022 candidates look competent by comparison…

U.S. Senate

The tippy-top of the Republican ticket will feature State Sen. Mark Baisley (R-Roxborough Park), who is only running for Senate because his campaign for Governor was DOA.

Again: Colorado Republicans chose as their candidate for U.S. Senate a guy who was so bad at running for Governor that he gave up and changed races in January. WCGW?

How could Republicans have known this was a bad idea? Well, they could have remembered what happened in 2018, when George Brauchler bombed as a candidate for Governor; changed course to run for Attorney General; and was then beaten soundly in the General Election by Democrat Phil Weiser.

To paraphrase a famous quote, the only thing Colorado Republicans have learned from history is: screw history let’s go with the most MAGA candidates available!

Governor

What’s worse than choosing a demonstrably-terrible candidate for U.S. Senate?

Choosing two of them for Governor!

State Representative Scott “Rock” Bottoms, a “pastor” at a church in Colorado Springs, earned top line on Saturday but wasn’t able to prevent “ministry leader” and gun porn weirdo Victor Marx from also making the ballot. State Sen. Barb Kirkmeyer did not participate in the caucus/assembly process but will also be on the June Primary ballot after qualifying via the petition route.

If nothing else, the candidate debates should be fun (assuming Marx ever shows up to one).

In addition to his, um, ministry work, Marx claims to be an armed mercenary who frees victims of sex trafficking in Syria (or something). Bottoms, meanwhile, is so desperate for attention that he started claiming in February that he had uncovered “pedophile rings” in the State House, State Senate, and the Governor’s office — although he has yet to produce any sort of evidence to support these wild allegations. While Bottoms and Marx argue over who is going to bring a bunch of imaginary pedophiles to justice, Kirkmeyer will bang her fists on the table pushing back against any narrative that she is a more “moderate” Republican. Good times!

Since “none of the above” is not an option for voters, one of these three rocket surgeons will have to make it to the General Election.

Attorney General

This is the one statewide race in which Republicans were hoping to have a fighting chance in November. Naturally, they screwed it up.

El Paso County District Attorney Michael Allen seemed poised to cruise through June while four Colorado Democrats battled it out in the Primary, but then Colorado Republicans decided to include Denver attorney David Wilson on the ballot.

Wilson’s claim to fame is serving as one of the attorneys for former Mesa County Clerk and Recorder Tina Peters. In a normal world, it would be a huge red flag to consider an AG candidate whose client was handed such a lengthy jail sentence that the President of the United States repeatedly punished an entire state in a failed effort to get her out of the clink. But when Republican candidates for Governor are pledging to release Peters from prison “on day one,” even a failed association with Peters is a gold star on the ol’ political resume.

Secretary of State

Republicans selected James Wiley as their sole candidate for Secretary of State.

We can sum this result up in one sentence: Wiley ran for Congress in CO-03 in 2024 as the nominee of the Libertarian Party.

State Treasurer

Former State Senate President Kevin Grantham was the only Republican option for State Treasurer, so this was easy.

And how excited are Republicans for Grantham’s candidacy? The reaction from the bald guy in the bleachers (top right in the video below) explains the answer better than words:

We learned on Saturday that the MAGA-fication of the Colorado Republican Party is complete and unwavering.

This is great news…if you’re a Democrat.