{"id":2447969,"date":"2019-08-25T21:00:00","date_gmt":"2019-08-26T03:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.aspentimes.com\/?p=311765"},"modified":"2019-08-25T21:00:00","modified_gmt":"2019-08-26T03:00:00","slug":"mike-littwin-now-the-question-becomes-how-or-if-hickenlooper-can-be-beaten-in-a-dem-primary","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/local-news\/mike-littwin-now-the-question-becomes-how-or-if-hickenlooper-can-be-beaten-in-a-dem-primary\/","title":{"rendered":"Mike Littwin: Now the question becomes how (or if) Hickenlooper can be beaten in a Dem primary"},"content":{"rendered":"
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And so it begins. As long expected, failed presidential candidate John Hickenlooper is now running for the U.S. Senate despite the fact that Hick had repeatedly insisted he would not make a Senate run and that, in fact, he was not \u201ccut out\u201d for the job. And a lot of the state\u2019s progressives don\u2019t seem happy about it.<\/p>\n

They also won\u2019t be happy that Hick\u2019s repeated denials that he would run \u2014 representing repeated unforced errors \u2014 will matter very little, if at all. It\u2019s a straight commentary on the electability-is-everything mood dominating Democratic thought these days. If Hickenlooper eventually proves, as he told us, that he\u2019s not cut out to be a legislator, the proof will somehow have to come before the primary election.<\/p>\n

On the electability front, Mike Johnston released an internal poll showing him easily besting Cory Gardner. Other polls show a generic Democrat beating Gardner by 8 to 10 points. But unless Hick\u2019s Democratic rivals can convince voters they\u2019re at least as well placed as Hickenlooper to beat Gardner, he will remain the clear favorite.<\/p>\n

The question now facing the post-Hick primary field \u2014 including Johnston, Andrew Romanoff, Alice Madden, Dan Baer, John Walsh and others \u2014 is how to change the dynamic. And I think this may offer some context:<\/p>\n

State Sen. Angela Williams, who also is running in the Democratic Senate primary, wrote a strongly worded op-ed in the Aurora Sentinel that questioned Hickenlooper\u2019s progressive credentials and said that despite his favorable early polling, Hick should not expect a \u201ccoronation.\u201d On the day before she wrote that piece, one of the leading primary candidates told me that the rumor is Williams will soon drop out of the race.<\/p>\n

Who knows? What we know is that Hick is clearly the frontrunner. He has basically 100% name recognition, he\u2019ll suck up much of the in-state money and media oxygen, and he has won two statewide campaigns, if against pointedly weak opponents. Yes, many progressives are skeptical of him. Others really don\u2019t like him. But as I\u2019ve pointed out before, Colorado is a culturally progressive state. Politically, it\u2019s more center-left. As Hickenlooper said in a recent interview with KDVR\u2019s Joe St. George when asked about progressive energy in the race, \u201cThere\u2019s a lot of moderate energy, too.\u201d And the primary, remember, is open to unaffiliated voters.<\/p>\n

Hickenlooper got a break when Donald Trump tweeted praise for Gardner and ripped Hick. Trump is in the midst of what may be remembered as the most bizarre week of his bizarre presidency, and one that may not be the best time to remind everyone that Trump, the chosen one, and Gardner are running mates.<\/p>\n

In a Twitter rage Friday, Trump called his appointed Federal Reserve chair, Jay Powell, our \u201cenemy\u201d \u2014 sort of like Denmark, I guess, but not like our friends in North Korea. Meanwhile, Trump \u201chereby order(ed)\u201d American companies to no longer do business with China, which is not \u2014 according to my read of the Constitution \u2014 how our system of government works. But maybe there\u2019s an amendment I missed with an exception for self-proclaimed Messiahs.<\/p>\n

According to the polls, Trump is anywhere from 15 to 20 points underwater in Colorado. I would think the betting line would be maybe 10 points. And in an era when ticket splitting has become a lost art, many of the so-called experts expect Trump to take Gardner down with him. And it can only help Hickenlooper if Trump and other Republicans bash him. This is pure briar-patch territory.<\/p>\n

But Hickenlooper got bad news himself with a semi-endorsement from the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee. The last thing Colorado Democrats want to hear is national Democrats advising them how to vote. You\u2019d have thought Hickenlooper would have warned them off.<\/p>\n

Romanoff jumped right on it, tweeting: \u201cDemocrats: This is a moment of decision. Do we want DC to dictate our choice and buy this election before any ballots are even cast \u2014 or do we believe voters still matter? I\u2019m attached to democracy. Join me if you are too.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hick has clear weaknesses. In his presidential campaign, he embellished his record on guns. He avoided his record on oil and gas. The anti-fracking activist community will definitely oppose Hickenlooper. His run can\u2019t help but look opportunistic. He made his stand against socialism, which is not the same thing as democratic socialism. And, like Joe Biden, he gaffes.<\/p>\n

But a central fact of campaigning against a strong frontrunner is that you have to bring down his favorables \u2014 meaning, going negative, which can mean nothing more than strong contrast ads, although it usually gets much uglier than that. If Hick is now the Joe Biden of Colorado, you\u2019ll recall that Biden\u2019s worst moment of the race so far came with Kamala Harris\u2019s debate takedown of the former vice president.<\/p>\n

But going negative in Colorado is, shall we say, risky, particularly in a primary setting. There was one negative ad in the entire Democratic primary for governor \u2014 a hit by the teachers\u2019 union, which favored Cary Kennedy, on both Jared Polis and Johnston. The negative reaction to that negative ad may have cost Kennedy her shot at winning. Hick\u2019s condemnation of the ad, by the way, played a significant role.<\/p>\n

I don\u2019t see any big third-party money, other than GOP money, coming out against Hickenlooper in the primary. There\u2019s too much risk involved.<\/p>\n

And the one candidate I see going hard against Hickenlooper is Romanoff, who went very hard against Michael Bennet in a losing effort in the 2010 Senate primary. Romanoff, who was a moderate in his days as House speaker, went left against Bennet and he has stayed there. Romanoff has already likened Hickenlooper to Gardner on Medicare for All, the Green New Deal and attacks on socialism.<\/p>\n

The attacks are fair, by political standards, but Gardner is well to the right of Hickenlooper on these issues, of course. And I\u2019d guess that Hickenlooper will basically ignore any such attacks unless they come up in debates, and even then, he\u2019ll try to turn it around and make it about Gardner.<\/p>\n

As one candidate told me, anonymously, about a need to go negative and the difficulties involved: \u201cThis is a hard circle to square.\u201d<\/p>\n

Which is one more reason why Hickenlooper will be very difficult to beat.<\/p>\n

Mike Littwin is a former columnist for the Rocky Mountain News and Denver Post, and he currently writes for ColoradoIndependent.com.<\/p>\n

via:: The Aspen Times<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

And so it begins. As long expected, failed presidential candidate John Hickenlooper is now running for the U.S. Senate despite the fact that Hick had repeatedly insisted he would not make a Senate run and that, in fact, he was not \u201ccut out\u201d for the job. And a lot of the state\u2019s progressives don\u2019t seem […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[49],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-2447969","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-local-news"},"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-25 17:21:31","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KSPN The Valley's Quality Rock","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2447969","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2447969"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2447969\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2447969"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2447969"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2447969"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}