Status quo remains for Western Slope legislative seats, but some margins of victory see sharp change
Chris Dillmann/Vail Daily
Though Democrats and Republicans on the Western Slope retained power over their respective state legislative seats up for election this year, a closer look at the results shows voters’ opinions took drastic shifts in some areas.
Some races saw huge chasms form between the winners’ and losers’ share of votes compared to previous elections. Others saw districts go from slam dunks for one party to razor thin margins.
In 2022, for instance, Steamboat Springs Democrat Meghan Lukens won the election to represent House District 26 in the northwest corner of the state with 54% of the vote while her opponent received 46% of the votes. That’s a 7 percentage point margin.
She won again in the election last week, but with a significantly larger margin of nearly 18 percentage points, according to the unofficial results. In the race against Republican Nathan Butler, Lukens won 59% of votes while Butler won 41%.
This year was only the second time an election has taken place in all of Colorado’s state House districts since their lines were redrawn in the 2021 redistricting process. At that time, House District 26 was graded by nonpartisan staffers as only slightly favoring Democrats.
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Meanwhile in the southwest corner of the state, the margin of victory for House District 59 went from Rep. Barbara McLachlan, D-Durango, winning her 2022 election by nearly 14 percentage points to Katie Stewart winning by only about 2 points.
Voters in that district behaved somewhat more in line with nonpartisan staffers analysis from 2021. They predicted then there would only be a slight favoring for Democratic candidates there.
In 2022, Republican Marc Catlin won in House District 58, which stretches from Gunnison County to the state’s western border, by nearly 14 percentage points. Last week, Republican Larry Suckla won there by only about 6 points. That district was predicted to lean strongly in favor of Republican candidates.
While the changes in margin could be related to shifting voters in those districts, they could also be attributed to the name recognition and reputation of the candidates in those races.
Lukens was an incumbent, while Stewart and Suckla were both running for an open seat after McLachlan and Catlin were term-limited.
Some race margins saw less significant changes. House Speaker Julie McCluskie, D-Dillon, won in House District 13, which spans from Jackson to Chaffee counties, by 12 percentage points in 2022 and about 10 this year.
Rep. Elizabeth Velasco, D-Glenwood Springs, won her House District 57 seat in Garfield, Pitkin and part of Eagle counties by 8 and 11 percentage points in 2022 and this year, respectively.
Matthew Martinez, D-Pueblo, who represents House District 62 covering the San Luis Valley, won by 11 points in 2022 and 8 points this year.
The Senate district elections this year were the first contests since the districts were redrawn. Two of the most watched Senate races in the state were on the Western Slope.
In Senate District 5, which is located south of Interstate 70 in Garfield County through Hinsdale County and was graded in 2021 as slightly favoring Republicans, Catlin won by about 4 percentage points last week.
In Senate District 6, which stretches from the San Luis Valley to the Four Corners region and was predicted to be a toss-up district, Republican incumbent Cleave Simpson defeated his opponent last week by more than 10 percentage points.
The next state lawmaking session will begin in January.
