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August 13, 2008 04:34 AM UTC

Polis Takes CD-2

  • 111 Comments
  • by: Colorado Pols

UPDATE: Joan Fitz-Gerald concedes. Rocky:

Former state Senate President Joan Fitz-Gerald has conceded to wealthy entrepreneur Jared Polis in the hotly contested 2nd Congressional District Democratic primary race.

“I just called Jared and congratulated him on winning the seat,” Fitz-Gerald said at about 10:20 p.m., adding that she asked Polis to take care of the people in the district.

Polis, a former Colorado Board of Education member, dumped more than $5 million in the race, helping to make it the most expensive congressional primary in state history.

Breaking Rocky Mountain News:

Wealthy entrepreneur and former Colorado Board of Education member Jared Polis has taken a slight lead over former state Senate President Joan Fitz-Gerald in the Democratic primary in the 2nd Congressional District, according to early results.

Environmentalist Will Sahfroth [sic–Pols] is in third place.

The 2nd District includes Broomfield, Clear Creek, Eagle, Gilpin, Grand and Summit counties, most of Boulder County, and parts of Jefferson, Weld and Adams counties.

Unaffiliated voters make up the largest voting bloc, but the district leans Democratic.

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111 thoughts on “Polis Takes CD-2”

  1. Jared’s ahead a bit in Boulder but he better be ahead in Adams too.

    Kudos to Boulder, Broomfield, Jefferson, & Weld counties – they already have their numbers up.

    A couple of the counties I called said they don’t know where on their website they will put the results. And Gilpin said no posting tonight – but they will fax them to me.

    Got it all at http://www.davidthielen.info/p… and will copy here if I get a chance.

      2. We really do have Internet.  It is our county government that is hick.  Our Clerk and Recorder chews tobacco and is as partisan a Republican as you can find.  She drinks hardy and thinks that the position is her’s for life.  Blame our officials not the area.

          1. We have voting centers here too but it is still a good old boy network as far as personnel.

            We could probably get the beetles to bring down the results but then they would want to stay and chow down.

    3.    Jared is doing better percentage-wise in Adams than he did in Boulder?

        If that holds up, then the redneck, blue color Adams County did more to help send Colorado’s first openly gay Congressman to D.C. than the politically-correct Boulder!

      1. Will’s support was Boulder and Summit. But this definitely shows one critical issue when running in CD-2 – the mountain votes are way to small to be worth anything. Joan is winnign all the small number counties and Jared is taking the large ones.

    2. I mean, when a 27 year old twit spends $500 per vote does anyone else even have a chance?

      “Jared Polis, not beholden to corporate interests or, for that matter, anyone else’s but his own and Mike Huttner’s.”

      Barf.

        1. Because I graduated before Jared promised to fix No Child Left Behind.

          And, I’m not particularly bitter.  Like I said below, I really don’t even care for Joan.  I’ve just been around the Democratic Party here in Colorado long enough to have completely tired of Mr. Money Bags Polis and the way he buys anything and everything he wants.  

            1. It is all relative.

              Will Shafroth spent $1.6 million plus another $250,000 via a 527 and ended up with under 10,000 votes.

              Jared Polis had a campaign. Shafroth and Fitz-Gerald did not.  

        2. SOLD! For five million dollars to the nimrod who will pay that much for a mostly thankless job.

          Let’s see, if I had $5 million to burn, I think I’d buy an English Castle, or give every person I know a pre-paid Visa card with $5K on it, or build 25 schools in Africa…  

          Anyone else care to say what they would do with $5 million, instead of buying a congressional seat and moving the media outlets into the black ink for the quarter?

          1. I’d use it to pay off my kids’ college loans and give most of the remainder to student aid.  We’re making higher ed a route to the poorhouse in this country.

      3. He met people one on one all over the county and had a message that resonated with voters.  I’m sure a lot of people didn’t vote for him because of his money but even more people voted for him because of his positions.  This guy is going to work much harder than Mark Udall ever did to end the occupation so I’m rooting for him to win the general.

        1. I think Joan, Jared or Will would undoubtedly work harder to end the war in Iraq than Udall has.  Udall has become the worst kind of pandering, flip flopping, say nothing politician.  Also known as…the perfect Senate Candidate.

  6. …is the number of party insiders and political activists who 1. Know JFG. 2. Don’t really like JFG. and 3.  Would give their left arm to see JFG beat Polis.

    1. which is worse:  

      1) “Party Insiders” deciding the race

      or

      2)  Voters deciding they prefer the candidate who is not supported by “Party insiders” who happens to spend loads of his own money on the election?

      As a democrat, I prefer wealthy democrats who are willing to spend their money liberally on campaigns–their own and those of other democrats.  Jared has shown he is willing to do both.

      1. for all the Democratic JP-haters to remember. It’s people like him who make this blue revolution that we’re experiencing this year a reality. I still say that an individual interest (like a wealthy entrepeneur) is better than a special interest (like a PAC, or other lobby.) All the complainers about how Jared “bought the election” need only look at how much special interests give establishment candidates like JFG. I will concede that he did buy name-recognition, but that is only part of the battle.

  8. At present Jared is winning by a hair under 1,000 votes – not a whole lot.

    Both Joan & Will basically did no marketing on the net. I can understand them figuring Jared had an advantage here, but to just give it over ot Jared was, I think, a mistake.

    Could Joan have flipped 500 votes by having a strong effective presence on the net? Very possibly so. Voters like my daughters go to the net with their ballots to decide.

    As to TV commercials, they don’t reach people like me, I never saw a Jared commercial on TV and saw just 1 of Joan’s and Will’s, with no sound, while in a restaurant.

    So people like me and my kids – we pretty much only heard from Jared.

    1. Joan’s campaign did not put much stock in talking to the ‘Net – not via bloggers, nor through their website.  While this may have been a rational decision in 2004, in 2008 people use the Web much more as an information-gathering tool and news substitute.

      Jared was, effectively, everywhere on the Internet.  There was no way Joan could catch him in advertising here.  But an effective website would have done wonders to help the perception of her among the ‘Net-savvy.

      Two other factors I think didn’t help.  One, I don’t think voters really saw “the real” Joan even in most of the TV ads.  It’s not the person Joan herself would have chosen to present, and I wonder if her campaign consultants tried to “tone her down” too much.  The other factor was an apparent lack of strong response to accusations flying her way; I feel the campaign just didn’t do enough to reject some of those claims.  (In some cases, it seemed the media did a better job than the campaign did…)

        1.    the Pat Schroeder endorsement was significant I think.  

          I would like to know what led to that?  Was there bad blood between Pat & Joan?  What was the history between Pat & Jared?

          The other 2 factors I think were important are that JFG did not run a very effective campaign (above) and the huge $$$$ Polis dumped (see below).

    1. It looks like almost all have reported. Take the total ballots, then the Dem and Rep votes in 2nd and 7th districts, looks like they’re almost all counted.

        1. 22251 total votes cast

          9832 in the Dem 2nd

          5877 in the Rep 2nd

          3887 in the Dem 7th

          2655 in the Rep 7th

          That’s all the votes, except the provisionals.

  12. Had Joan Fitz-Gerald hired a real campaign manager instead of a tired old hack she’d be on her way to Congress.  The press loved Mary Alice but anyone who knows anything about politics knows how she blew a ten point lead with three weeks to go for Schoettler for Governor in 1998 and blew a 20 point lead for Fitz-Gerald with a month to go.

    When will Joan talk to Mary Alice again? Never.  

    On the Republican side the same bunch of overpaid losers blew another one. Stansberry says “At least we know a fiscal conservative is going to Congress.” What we do know is Stansberry is worthless and despite outspending Coffman by over two to one lost badly

  14. To the people of CD-2 for sending the right person, at the right time, to Congress.

    To the GOP of CD-6 for helping to paint our state executive an even deeper shade of blue.

    To Paul Rosenthal for running a campaign based on ideas that will help Colorado in the future–but ones that it is not ready for right now. Also to Joe Miklosi for being a really nice guy (showed up early to the multi-county assembly and helped set stuff up) and a person that will represent the people of SE Denver quite well. Also to Scott Bates who wasn’t in the primary election but had a lot of good ideas, and I hope he runs for office again.

    And finally to David Thi and ColoradoPols for doing an amazing job day in and day out with this blog. It is a joy to read and then discuss all the things that are shaping this important and historic election.

    Onward to November!

  15. any campaign he touches, loses.  I guess same with matt mosley too – he lost CD 7 twice before this!

    Hopefully this ends mary alice mandarich’s political career too.

    1. Huge staffs with big payrolls.

      No field operation even though they spent a lot of money for organizing.

      Terrible TV.

      Terrible direct mail.

      In each campaign mail and TV was handled by second tier friends of the campaign manager.

      Big money spent by friends on a 527 that caused problems rather than gaining votes.

      Whiney excuses.

      Put these campaigns side by side and stick a fork in them both,  

  16. congressional seats in america are now officially for sale to the highest bidder. As a poli sci degree holder, i always knew this, but it just hurts to see it right in front of your face like that.

    and democrats are supposed to be the smart party,,, but they chose a young, inexperienced multi-millionaire buyer of the election over an experienced and proven agent of change and good governance.

    and my friends think i’m crazy for trying my damnedest to move out of this backward assed moneyed political system, where you can lie about being endorsed by newspapers (is it a lie, i mean he says “colorado newspapers”, but nothing about how it was a weekly, unread, and tiny newspaper in his hometown that endorsed him).

    anyway, thank you, “smart people”, or “progressives” for affirming my deep seeded suspicious, and good luck, you’ll need it  

    1. I posted the odds for self-funders here a couple of days ago and we had a major discussion on this. The numbers don’t back this up. As a couple of peopel said, the number of races are so small that the margin of error is large but the data definitely indicates that you can’t do that.

      It is fair to claim that Jared’s money bought him a couple of points. But it was his putting in immense effort on the ground, having strong relationships with boatloads of people, and a very well run campaign that got him most of his votes.

    2. Joan spent nearly as much as Polis did.  AND her money came from big institutional support like the unions and Emily’s List and Tim Gill’s 527.  

      You can’t BUY an election in this country.  You can only buy communication.  And the fact that Jared won is an indication that his communication was more effective than Joan’s.  Period.

      1. Even if you add in the 527 ads, Joan didn’t come close to spending what Jared invested in to the race.  The two were almost even on fundraising, and then Jared threw in $5m+ of his own money on top.  No candidate in the state of Colorado has ever thrown that kind of money at a race before.

        And when is it that Democrats began to forget the accomplishments that Unions have made in favor of bashing them like your day-to-day Republican operative?

        1. Again, Joan had ads.  Joan had mailers.  Joan had the GOTV advantage.  Joan had Emily’s List.  Joan had the Unions.  Joan had Tim Gill.  

          You can’t tell me that the voters of CD2 were so overwhelmed by Jared’s 10 extra fliers or his response ads that they were helpless in the face of his ca$h –

          “Can’t. resist.  Campaign money.  Too much.  Must. Vote. Polis”

          It just doesn’t work that way.

          I love unions.  But when did unions forget that  it only helps the Republicans when they spend time/money eating fellow Democrats??  And no one has yet answered my query (for the 4th time now)…what do unions have against Polis anyway?

          1. you’re assuming the vast majority had at least half the knowledge you do about the race, they do not. so when they see this guy on the television every tenth commercial, they just kinda flock over because they recognize the name. so yes, joan had stuff, but not 330 bucks per vote.

            and unions dont like him cause he started those charter schools, and charter schools have been the most effective way that republicans are prying unions out of schools.

              1. Surely they did.  Most of the registered Dems in the district did not vote.  The ones who did tended to be more informed rather than less.  

                badhobo ignores the fact that the money spent on Joan rivaled that spent by the Polis campaign.  Unions, Gill and Emily’s List spent up a ton and went negative on Jared.  One needs money to respond to that.  But there is no such thing as buying an election, and plenty of better funded candis have lost.  

                  1. Gill ponied up $110,000 and the Communication Workers of America chipped in $25,000. The original round raised $245,000, not $155,000.

                    http://images.nictusa.com/cgi-…

                    Add it all up and it’s still a tiny fraction of what Polis threw in, not “a ton.”

                    In addition, the money raised through Emily’s List showed up on Fitz-Gerald’s reports, same as ActBlue helped Polis raise $466,373. Independent Emily’s List expenditures were in the tens of thousands — again, hardly Dr. B’s supposed rivalry with Polis’ self funding.

    3. Perhaps you can attribute Jared’s win to his hard work over the last year as well as his staff who worked 12-hour days talking to voters. If Jared works as hard in Congress as he did on the campaign, no one has anything to worry about.

      2. hmm, if you pay anyone enough money, they will work 12 hour days. thats not a function of crazy dedication, thats a function of polis-money. so by working hard, do you mean spend another 5 million?

        1. campaigns don’t pay all that well, and if you calculate it by hour, they make very little. They do it because they believe in it, not for the money.

  17. Joan has fewer friends because of her I am queen bitch attitude.  Women won many seats in 2006 and Joan thought this seat would be hers.  The women’s time may be over, thank you people.

    Well money talks and Polis ran the correct ads.  People believe that if you are rich you can not be bought.  Nice idea but not true the more money you have the more money you want.  

    Time will tell of Polis is going to D.C. to do some good or to line his pockets with more money.

    Time for Joan to retire to her home in the canyon. Bye Joan!

    Good luck in D.C. Jared let’s see if you can keep yourself “clean”.

    2. Jared did better in Adams against Joan then he did in Boulder. Of course Will took a lot away in Boulder, but that still surprises me.

      He walloped her in Adams. Too bad the only ones she won were in the mountain counties and of course JeffCo.

  20. Obviously I was a Will supporter but I always held Jared as my second choice over Joan.  I have an ick feeling from the cash that Jared dropped on this seat, but whatever, it is what it is.  

    I do wish some of the commenters here could step up in the intellectual honest category and just admit to the obvious reality that Jared bought this seat, but again, it is what it is.  Yes, Jared needed the money and the skills to win, no doubt.  I won’t downplay the skills just because the money was there, but you all can’t possibly downplay the money and feel right about it.

    Again, congrats to Jared and here’s hoping you have fun being a Rep.  As a former resident of that bizzaro world called the Hill I know you have some intellectually challenging times ahead of you.

    1. Each campaign cost a ton of money. It’s just whose money that is in question.

      And there was no way that one of the four horsemen was going to get a bunch of independent expenditure support because everybody knows he has the money to spend himself.

      Jared’s personal cash advantage was in a way a disadvantage. It both deterred donors and outside groups spending independently, and at the same time opened him to criticism that spending his own money was buying the election. Winning under those circumstances was a tough needle to thread, and he pulled it off.

    2. I would say that intellectual honesty involves admitting that you are using ‘bought this seat’ and ‘bought the election’ in metaphorical ways.  Metaphor is rhetoric, not analysis.  If you, and others on this site, would like to achieve intellectual honesty on this issue, you will need to explain what ‘buying’ a seat or an election means, and do so in language that is not short, trite, obscure or opaque.  Use whole sentences that describe how someone goes about buying those things.  “Buying?”  What Jared bought was air time, mailers, a staff and what not.  What he did not BUY is a seat or an election.  And we all know that he did not buy any such thing because we all know that they cannot be bought, though ad time and mailers can be.    

    3. He didn’t just sit home throwing money out his window. He talked to as many people as he possible could. Even called my husband and asked if he’d host a get-together; when my husband told him I’d divorce him if he hosted a Polis event because of Amendment 41, Polis offered to talk to me directly about it. I never took him up on his offer, but give him credit for making it.

      I was an election judge in Adams County yesterday, and we had some unaffiliated voters come in late in the day wanting to vote. I told them they couldn’t vote unless they filled out the party declaration form, and they said, “But Jared told us we could vote today!” (They declared and voted.)

      He personally called my husband several more times during his campaign. I’d say his hard work as well as his money won him the primary.

      I hope he keeps working as hard on our behalf in Congress, and I expect he will.

  21. I’m not a CD-2 resident.  I congratulate Jared on his win, and I hope he does well in Congress.  But I’ve always had the feeling that he was the Student Council president who promises to bring some big name singer or band to the prom (you know, like Davy Jones ;).  While those schemes may work out in sitcoms, I have a feeling it would be tougher in Congress.

    No doubt Jared is a smart guy who has been able to accomplish a lot in business (with no small help from a little thing called the dot-com bubble).  I will be interested to see how he handles a very different challenge.

  22. Although a CD6 (Jeffco) republican, I’ve always had respect for JFG. I believe she provided strong leadership in the legislature and although partisan (which is expected) she was fair and thoughtful.

    I think that Jared’s money was a factor in the outcome but that isn’t the first or the last time this will happen. Usually the money equation benefits the best connected or the best fundraiser or most crooked or the richest. Doesn’t matter, that’s political reality.

    Polis is intelligent, a hard worker, and will bring a new perspective in Congress. As a Coloradan I believe he’ll represent us well. Shafroth too would have done an excellent job.

    I congratulate the CD2 dems for fielding three quality candidates and toning down the rancor. There are always wounds after a highly contested race but those resulting from this race don’t seem deep. Good luck to Joan and Will. Although on the wrong side of the vote they earned respect through this campaign and emerged in better position than going in.

    Maybe I should’ve posted this in that smarmy hugs thread.

  24. Advice: hire a good staff.  One that will challenge you.   Get at least one respected washington old hand and have one person personally close to you who is willing to tell you you are wrong.

    Set up good constituent services (ask Pat for advice on that) and listen to the mundane concerns of the district (for instance do something about the pine beetle).

    For your first session pick one thing you want to accomplish.  Pick something you know something about and try to push it forward. Even though it is counter intuitive I wouldn’t pick one of the hot issues (Iraq, energy, education) instead offer to support more senior reps efforts on those issues.  Insted pick an issue of concern to the district like IP reform, show your command of the issues and then try to go out and build support amongst others.  If you can show your mental chops and willingness to work with others you can set yourself up for success.

    My advice isn’t worth much, but seek out those whose advice is.

    I had 2 great fears about you candidacy–you don’t listen to advice and you won’t stay in the office long enough to accomplish anything–prove me wrong.

    And don’t forget you don’t support vouchers anymore.

    Good Luck.

    1. PMCs

      Even after we get out of Iraq PMC will continue to be a threat to our soveriegnty.  We need to put civilians and contractors under some kind of legal authority and we need restrictions on both the corporate use of paramilitary force and mission scope of government contractors.

      People forget that the British empite was created when commercial interests started conflicts and then called on the crown to bail them out.  I don’t want to be an accidental empire.

  25. Those of you filled with resentment over Jared spending so much for this race have a lot of nerve.  If he had spent that wad defeating a Republican, you would be congratulating yourselves over having such a terrific ally in the fight against the evil rightards.  This primary, more or less, was the decisive tilt.  It just happens to be the case that he was running in a primary rather than a general election.  Is that such a big deal?  Especially when the primary winner is for the most part assured of winning in November?

  26. Everybody loved Shafroth but the voters.  What an embarassmen to spend nearly two million dollars, have both papers endorse and get wiped out.

    Joan Fitz-Gerald made it close with the worst TV and direct mail I have seen from a candidate with such resource. The Mary Alice spin machine is already blaming everyone but the campaign manager. As she did in 1998 she blew a big lead. And, yes Bob Ewegen Schoettler was up ten on October 1, 1998.  Check your archives. Fitz-Gerald internal polls had her up twenty on with 45 days to go and than she unveiled an amateurish TV and direct mail program. How do you lose Adams County?

    Jared stopped making mistakes when he hired a campaign manager. In fact his was the only campaign with a manager who can rightfully use that title.

    The GOP once again blew it. Had Al White run for this seat he would have a real chance of winning as many supporters of Fitz-Gerald and Shafroth would have flocked to everyone’s favorite RINO.

    1. It was the worst misjudgment of voter sentiment in Colorado politics.  The people who vote in primary elections are very partisan and basing an entire primary campaign around being non-partisan was beyond stupid.

      Polis won because he vowed to be a Democrats Democrat.  Voters responded to that message.  Money was influential but if Polis had made his campaign themes the same as Shafroth, he would have gone down in flames.

  27. Yesterday you posted, “Shafroth made Beauprez look Brilliant”. First, do you enjoy bashing fellow democrats? Everyone that I know, including Jared Polis, have made thoughtful comments about Will Shafroth. Will ran a positive campaign and we should all try to be more results oriented, like Will, working together to end the war in Iraq, improve the condition of our Health Care and Education systems, curbing global warming, finding and funding solutions that work towards renewable energy and ending our dependence on foreign oil.

    Second, many in May were predicting Will would remain in the single digits on Aug.12th. There was a poll in early May that was not widely known had Joan 38%, Jared 28%, Will 4%. From May to August 12th Joan remained at 38%. Jared improved 14%. And Will made the largest increase up to 20% from 4%. He faced an opponent with huge name recognition and support of party insiders and an opponent with millions to spend from his own wallet. All three would be great for CD2. My first choice, like the Rocky and Post and 10,000 other CD2 voters was Will Shafroth.

    Third, Most people new that this race would not be won in the mountain counties that only make up approx. 10% of CD2. It was going to be won in Boulder and Adams. Over 35,000 of the 48,000 total votes came from these two counties. Reading your posts throughout this campaign made it obvious that you were spending way to much time in Gilpin. Gilpins 400 or so votes, Clear Creeks 477 votes, and Grands 654 votes were not going to bring home the win for Joan.

    Although I have been reading ColoradoPols comments since Feb, this is my first Post. It took me 36 hrs to pull my iWill yard sign after the results came in on Tuesday evening. Now, I am going to support Jared Polis who ran a strong campaign and deserves our support. I hope you and other Joan supporters will do the same. Jared’s willingness to serve and represent all people regardless of gender, age, race, ethnicity, religion or sexual orientation is honorable.  

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