Bennet, Hickenlooper, Weiser Rally State Dems

Elected officials and local leaders point the ‘way out’ of ‘dark times’  |  

The Colorado Democratic Party (CDP) held its first statewide meeting since the presidential election last Saturday, March 8, with hundreds of party members gathering in Aurora to elect state party officers and hear from a full roster of elected officials, including U.S. Senators Michael Bennet and John Hickenlooper, Secretary of State Jena Griswold and Attorney General Phil Weiser, who earlier this year announced he is running for governor, with Jared Polis’ term-limited seat up for election in 2026.

The Colorado Republican Party holds its own biennial organizational meeting on Saturday, March 29.

“For the first time in my life, we’ve had a legitimate opponent of democracy take the White House,” Hickenlooper told the CDP’s central committee members. “We’ve had legitimate opponents of democracy take the House and Senate. They are taking apart our federal government, and our region, as rapidly as they can.”

Hickenlooper is up for re-election in 2026 and reiterated that it will be his last election.

Kamala Harris and Tim Walz won the Colorado vote in November, and the Democratic party maintained control of the State House and Senate, but reaction to the sweeping firings across federal agencies, the abrupt shift in foreign policy with aggressive acts against historical allies, and proposed massive budget cuts that would threaten vital safety nets like Medicaid and Medicare have spurred locals to action across the state, including in deep-blue San Miguel County (SMC).

“A lot of our population relies on Medicaid, (so) to lose federal funding is devastating,” said newly elected SMC Democratic Party Chair and former SMC Commissioner Joan May, citing some of the biggest concerns county residents are facing. “The Norwood clinic is probably going to have to shut down. That is really serious.”

May also highlighted privacy issues, with Elon Musk accessing people’s personal data, and she said public lands are top of mind for SMC residents.

“The loss of democracy would probably be their number one thing,” May said of local concerns. “They’re very concerned that we have a constitution, and it’s not being upheld, and the courts are being ignored. People are petrified of what our country would be like if we just lose all democracy. It’s very scary.”

(The Planet reached out to the Republican County Chair for comment, but did not hear back by press time.)

Bennet’s comments last Saturday reflected what May has been hearing about public lands issues, with the sudden cuts to forest service employees hitting western Colorado particularly hard.

“We had a hearing this week in Washington, and Jonathan Houck, who is a great commissioner from Gunnison County, was there to testify to the effect of the across-the-board layoffs that Trump has done to Forest Service employees all over the state of Colorado,” Bennet said. “There is not a city or a town or a farm or a ranch downstream from those forests that doesn’t depend on that watershed for their future. Not a single one. By the end of that hearing, even the Republicans were saying, ‘Why are we releasing those people just when fire season is about to come to the Rocky Mountain West?’

“Maybe it’s the same reason that all of a sudden we’ve decided that Vladimir Putin is our friend and (Volodymyr) Zelenskyy is our enemy,” Bennet continued. “Maybe it’s the same reason that we literally cut off aid to Ukraine at a moment when they had suffered 400,000 casualties, not just in the name of Ukraine, but in the name of freedom, in the name of democracy.”

Bennet recently said he is considering a run for governor, and Griswold is expected to announce her candidacy soon, joining Weiser in what could be a crowded primary.

Weiser highlighted his legal victories over the Trump administration, challenging the attempt to do away with birthright citizenship, enforcing the separation of powers, with Congress controlling the purse, protecting privacy issues, and advocating for immigrants.

“Our ancestors had it worse,” Weiser said on immigration, noting he is the son and grandson of Holocaust survivors. “Our ancestors lived through dark times, and they found purpose through the trauma they lived through. So can we.”

In the months since the election, residents have certainly experienced trauma, according to May.

“There’s been complacency,” she said of the pre-election perspective of the deep blue county. “It was replaced by hopelessness and despair and depression. But I think people are starting to come out of that a little.”

Democrats may not find “hope” as an organizing theme these days, but there does seem to be renewed activism at the local level as residents respond to the assault on institutional norms. Montrose County Democratic Party Chair Kevin Kuns attended the SMC organizational meeting in February and shared his ideas for West Slope Democrats to work together and strengthen their voices.

“People are really fired up,” May said, noting the strong attendance at the local meeting in February. “The most exciting thing is that we have a lot of younger, new leadership.”

In addition to May taking the reins as chair, Mason Osgood was elected first vice chair for the SMC Dems, and Fiona Ahern, an 18-year-old high school senior, was elected second vice chair. Kathrine Warren is the newly elected secretary, and Kathleen Erie is the only returning officer, as treasurer.

“It is encouraging that we have some new energy in the party, and now we have to keep that momentum up,” May said. “It’s a hard time to be a Democrat. Our country right now is overrun by values that don’t align with the Democratic party, and people feel somewhat helpless. So it was really encouraging to be in a gathering of people that were enthused and had ideas and want to become more active.”

May emphasized that the solutions were beyond politics and political parties, calling for residents to put politics aside and act “as humans who care about the plight of other humans.” Hickenlooper echoed her sentiments in his remarks.

“While I was governor, we had the worst wildfires in history, the worst floods in history, the worst shootings in history,” the senator summed up. “We learned that when times are tough, you don’t attack each other, right? We’ve learned in Colorado and in the West that when we work together, that’s when good things happen.”

This is the first in a two-part series, covering the March 8 Democratic Party organizational meeting this week and the March 29 Republican Party organizational meeting in early April. Owen Perkins is a member of the CDP state central committee.