GOP Leadership Puts Colorado Senate Race in ‘Maybe’ Column

With Republican odds dwindling in other high-profile races, the GOP leadership appears to be once again eyeing the Colorado U.S. Senate seat as a possible pickup in 2022.A spokesman for the Senate Leadership Fund, a Republican political action committee aligned with the Senate minority leader, tells the Sun that the group is closely tracking the race there.“We’re keeping an eye on the race and we continue to be impressed with the campaign Joe O’Dea is running in Colorado,” spokesman Jack Pandol said.Mr. O’Dea, a businessman who is the GOP nominee for Senate in Colorado, has broken the mold for Republican Senate candidates this year. He’s one of the few who distanced himself from President Trump from the get-go.“I think the country is ready to move on,” Mr. O’Dea said of the prospects for a 2024 presidential bid by Mr. Trump.Mr. O’Dea defeated Trump-backed candidates in his primary, thanks in part to independent voters. In Colorado, independents are allowed to vote in party primaries, and their participation had a moderating effect on the race.Recent GOP polling from the Republican Attorneys General Association and Terrance Group suggests that rolling the dice on Colorado might be a decent bet.The poll found the competition to be a one-point race, with Senator Bennet leading Mr. O’Dea at 48 percent to 47 percent. Other polls have found Mr. Bennet’s lead to be much larger.This shift of gaze comes as Republicans in other Senate races navigate troubled waters — some of them getting dangerously short on funds.Senate races in Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Arizona are not going as well as expected for the GOP. Meanwhile, races in Wisconsin, Nevada, and Georgia are closer than GOP might like in a midterm election.The story of this election cycle so far has been, in part, the underperformance of Trump-backed candidates. Mehmet Oz in Pennsylvania as well as venture capitalists Blake Masters in Arizona and J.D. Vance in Ohio have all underperformed expectations.The Senate majority leader, Mitch McConnell, has griped that “candidate quality” is responsible for the flagging campaigns of Trump-backed candidates. President Trump responded by calling for Mr. McConnell to be ousted from his leadership position.The Senate Leadership Fund announced a $178 million rescue effort aimed at shoring up chances in the Senate. Mr. Trump, meanwhile, has kept a tight grip on his campaign money, doling out little of the millions he has raised since the November 2020 election.As the Sun has reported, Mr. O’Dea’s relatively moderate politics make him a viable candidate for Colorado, and an easy choice for anti-Biden or anti-Democratic voters.Still, a gamble on Colorado could be seen as the squandering of the committee’s limited resources. The Senate Leadership Fund drew criticism earlier this year for its spending in Washington and Colorado.Although Republican committees have barely contributed to the Colorado race, critics argue that they were spreading their resources too thin while ignoring struggling candidates in more competitive states.A political scientist at John Jay College, Brian Arbour, has been critical of this narrative, characterizing the GOP’s probes into Colorado as typical of early election strategy. He suspects that a gamble on Colorado might be personality driven.“I think it reflects a wisdom by Republican leadership that in Senate elections, candidates matter more this year than they have in the past few elections,” he tells the Sun. “They may just like O’Dea more.”Allocating resources to Colorado would mean less funding for candidates in more competitive states. Based on polling, Republican dollars might be better spent trying to flip Nevada, Arizona, or New Hampshire, where money is comparatively scarce.This lack of funding is due to the Senate Leadership Fund already committing much more money to defending Republican seats than flipping Democratic ones.So far, the committee plans to spend nearly $30 million on flipping seats in Arizona and Nevada, and an additional $37.1 million in attempting to replace Senator Warnock in Georgia.By contrast, the committee committed $112.3 million to defending Republican-held seats in Arkansas, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Ohio.Regardless of whether the committee decides to take the bet on Mr. O’Dea, the key factor appears to be his distance from Mr. Trump and Trump-style politics.

GOP Leadership Puts Colorado Senate Race in ‘Maybe’ Column

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