This story was produced as part of the Colorado Capitol News Alliance. It first appeared at coloradosun.com.
U.S. Sen. Michael Bennet is testing out a new way of differentiating himself from Attorney General Phil Weiser in Colorado’s Democratic gubernatorial primary: criticizing current Gov. Jared Polis.
During a recent debate, Bennet said Polis is “allergic” to building big statewide coalitions. At another gathering, Bennet said he totally disagrees with the idea that the governor’s health care policies have worked. At a third event, Bennet said Polis “has not helped” make it easier for people like teachers to live in the expensive communities where they work.
“No teacher can live in Denver,” Bennet said at a Denver Young Democrats forum with Weiser in January. “No teacher can live in most cities in this state, or most towns for that matter. They have to live far, where they’re cheap. And I’m sorry to say that, but the administration that we have had, a Democratic administration in Colorado, has not helped with the situation.”
While it’s business as usual for gubernatorial candidates to try to sell voters on a unique vision for how they’d lead the state, it’s less common for a Democratic gubernatorial candidate to take aim at a state’s Democratic incumbent.
For instance, in the crowded 2018 Democratic gubernatorial primary, which Polis won, incumbent Gov. John Hickenlooper was not a central figure.
“I don’t think Hickenlooper was the foil at all,” said Ethan Susseles, a Democratic strategist who worked on Donna Lynne’s 2018 gubernatorial campaign. “He was the popular outgoing governor. I don’t really remember anyone attacking him.”
Bennet’s criticisms come even as Polis remains relatively popular among Colorado voters and overwhelmingly popular among Democrats.
A November poll of 622 registered voters statewide found that 45% viewed Polis favorably, while 46% said they viewed him unfavorably. Among Democrats, 74% said they had a favorable view of Polis, while 59% of Democrats who participated in the same poll said they had a favorable view of Bennet.
When you consider the poll’s 3.93 percentage point margin of error, that’s statistically consistent with how voters felt in March 2024, when the same pollsters — New Bridge Strategy, a Republican firm, and Aspect Strategic, a Democratic firm — found that 50% of voters viewed the governor favorably and 44% viewed him unfavorably.
By comparison, 40% of voters said they viewed President Donald Trump favorably in November, while 60% viewed him unfavorably.
Lori Weigel, who leads New Bridge Strategy, said no Democratic politician in Colorado has had a higher favorability rating among Democratic voters in the past two years than Polis. While his numbers are lower among younger Democrats and Democrats who identify themselves as very liberal or socialist, they’re still relatively strong.
“There is a difference between all Democrats and Democrats who participate in primaries,” she said. “But there’s not a lot in this data to suggest” Polis is disliked.
One difference between the race in 2018 and 2024: It was much less clear back then that a Democrat would win the general election.
Hickenlooper barely won reelection in 2014. Then, in 2018, Polis beat Republican Walker Stapleton by almost 11 percentage points. Polis won reelection in 2022 by nearly 20 points.
The Democratic gubernatorial nominee in Colorado this year — whether it’s Bennet or Weiser — is expected to similarly cruise to victory.
Here are the biggest criticisms Bennet has directed toward Polis during recent debates with Weiser:
- “There is so much goodwill, and so much leadership in our state, among the county commissioners, among the mayors, in the private sector — all over the state of Colorado,” Bennet said of efforts to increase affordable housing. “They just feel like they’ve been totally ignored by our current governor.”
- “We’re going to have to modernize our tax, our budget, our regulatory systems, so that the wealthiest pay more and we can afford to build the Colorado we want,” Bennet said of addressing the state’s fiscal crisis. “This is not going to be easy, and we’re going to need to build a broad coalition of Coloradans across the state to support these goals. Our current governor has been allergic to building coalitions like that.”
- “He’s saying that he thinks that Jared Polis’ health care policies actually have worked,” Bennet said of Weiser. “I totally disagree. That’s particularly true for families who are on Medicaid and those who make too much money to be on Medicaid but can’t afford to buy private insurance.”
- Bennet doubled down by linking Weiser to Polis on health care: “Saying he’s satisfied with the Polis administration, which I think is a deeply outrageous thing to say, given what families are facing in our state right now. I’m deeply dissatisfied with how the current Democratic administration in Colorado has handled our health care crisis and actually has pushed people off of Medicaid.”
- “These are not issues that are going to solve themselves,” Bennet said of housing affordability. “If they have solved themselves, we wouldn’t be sitting here with the current administration in Denver with a $650,000 median house. We wouldn’t be sitting here with the fifth-highest child care cost in America. We wouldn’t be sitting here with a health care system that is getting worse for struggling families, not better. That is the leadership that I am offering to address.”
When asked about Bennet’s criticism of Polis, a spokesperson for Bennet’s campaign acknowledged that the governor has made gains. But she said more needs to be done.
“Gov. Polis has made real progress, including on capping drug prices and making it easier to build housing, but we still have a lot of work to do,” said Jordan Fuja, the spokesperson. “Coloradans are still working harder than ever and paying more for everything from housing to child care to health care.”
Weiser, by comparison, hasn’t been publicly attacking Polis’ record on the campaign trail. In fact, Weiser didn’t even mention Polis by name, or use the word “governor,” this week in a written statement saying he opposes Polis’ apparent plans to reduce the prison sentence of convicted former Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters.
Polis, who hasn’t endorsed a successor and said he doesn’t plan to wade into the Democratic primary, acknowledged through a spokesperson that there’s more work to do, but defended his work against Bennet’s criticism.
“Gov. Polis is very proud of his track record, including leading through an unprecedented global pandemic, historic wildfires and achieving free full-day kindergarten and universal preschool,” Shelby Wieman, a Polis spokesperson, said in a written statement. “As a resident of this state he hopes his successor will be even more successful in this important work to save people money. There is a lot more work to get done.”
The Democratic primary for governor will be held June 30.
