Outside money floods Colorado’s June 30 statehouse primaries

DENVER — With ballots due by 7 p.m. on June 30, outside money is moving into Colorado’s statehouse primaries on a scale that has caught the attention of the insurgent candidates on the receiving end of it. On the Republican side, $250,000 in federal PAC money originating from the sportsbook companies DraftKings, FanDuel and Fanatics has flowed into a state group called the Colorado Conservative Leadership Fund, which is helping more mainstream Republicans beat their more hard-line opponents, according to The Colorado Sun, citing TRACER campaign-finance reports.

The money is part of a national push. The three sportsbook companies plan to spend as much as $41 million on state legislative races across the country this year, the Sun reported, citing The New York Times, with the spending aimed at limiting taxation and regulation of sports betting.

A fund that insurgent candidates say works against them

Nancy Rumfelt, a Thompson School District board member running for Colorado House District 51, brought the spending to listeners’ attention on The Kim Monson Show on June 23. Rumfelt is one of seven Republican primary candidates whose opponents the fund is backing. “It’s Colorado Conservative Leadership Fund. And it’s anything but that,” she said on the show, describing the group as “leading the charge on these attacks against us seven grassroots candidates.”

Rumfelt, whose Republican primary opponent is Amy Parks, said the spending against her reaches beyond paid advertising. “They’re literally bussing in out-of-state canvassers into my district and three other house districts to canvas for these candidates,” she said on the show. “That’s just not grassroots at all.” The Sun noted that only a portion of the fund’s money has come from the sportsbook companies, so the filings do not spell out which races those dollars are paying for.

The seven targeted races

Rumfelt named all seven contests on the show: herself in House District 51, Jason Bias in House District 54, Troy Vanderhule in House District 14, Jamie Koch in House District 16, Matt Alexander in House District 60, Bob Davis in House District 44, and Sen. Lynda Zamora Wilson in Senate District 9. The Colorado Sun reported that the fund is defending incumbent Rep. Anthony Hartsook of Parker against Davis in House District 44, and that it is backing former Rep. Terri Carver to unseat Zamora Wilson in Senate District 9.

Rumfelt cast the spending as a bipartisan establishment effort against insurgent candidates. “Here in Colorado, that uniparty in this primary election is alive and well,” she said. She named businessman Kent Thiry and Walmart heir Ben Walton among the funders, alongside what she called “some conservative groups that have joined in with this effort.” Thiry is spending across the partisan line this cycle. The Sun reported he gave $35,000 to the Colorado Affordability Project, one of the Democrat-side groups working to shape this year’s primaries.

The same pattern on the Democrat side

Rumfelt told listeners the funders “are also doing the same thing on the Democrat side.” About $2 million in untraceable money has flowed into a handful of Democrat statehouse primaries in recent weeks to help more moderate candidates beat their more liberal opponents, the Sun reported on June 18. That money runs through three nonprofits that do not disclose their donors, One Main Street Colorado, Fair Economy for Coloradans and the Colorado Affordability Project, routed through eight state-level super PACs, several with names that suggest grassroots groups.

For Rumfelt, the through-line is who decides Colorado’s elections. “This is an absolute assault on our constitutional republic and the way our elections are supposed to be decided by the people, not by some corporate sponsorship,” she said.

Voters who want to follow the money can check the source records directly. Independent-expenditure and contribution filings for the Colorado Conservative Leadership Fund and the Democrat-side super PACs are public on the Colorado Secretary of State’s TRACER system. Ballots must be returned to county clerks by 7 p.m. on June 30 to be counted.