(C) Daily Kos This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . Democratic group is running ads boosting GOP election denier in Colorado congressional race [1] ['Jesse Paul', 'Sandra Fish', 'More Jesse Paul', 'More Sandra Fish', 'Political Reporter', 'Data Journalist', '.Wp-Block-Co-Authors-Plus-Coauthors.Is-Layout-Flow', 'Class', 'Wp-Block-Co-Authors-Plus', 'Display Inline'] Date: 2024-05-30 A Democratic super PAC is spending at least $84,000 — and counting — to air a television ad boosting the profile of an election conspiracy theorist it wants to see win the six-way Republican primary in Colorado’s 3rd Congressional District. The ad campaign is an effort by Rocky Mountain Values PAC to advance former state Rep. Ron Hanks to the general election because the group appears to believe he will be easier for the de facto Democratic nominee, former Aspen City Councilman Adam Frisch, to beat in November. It’s a strategy Democrats tried in multiple Colorado races in 2022, including Hanks’ bid for U.S. Senate that year. It didn’t work, however. The more moderate GOP candidates won their primaries, but lost in the general election. But propping up Hanks in the 3rd District, even if it’s with a relatively small amount of money so far, is riskier because it’s a part of the state that is more favorable to Republicans than Democrats, meaning there is a better chance than not that a GOP candidate wins in November. No Democrat has won the 3rd District since 2008. In other words: Democrats may play a role in helping advance an election denier to Congress because they view that gamble as their best chance to win the 3rd District. “RMV PAC is committed to defeating extreme Colorado Republicans,” Amber Miller, a spokesperson for the PAC, said in a written statement Wednesday. The PAC also is starting to run ads opposing Grand Junction attorney Jeff Hurd, one of Hanks’ opponents in the June 25 GOP primary. The ads will highlight how he’s refused to say whom he voted for in the 2106 and 2020 presidential races in an effort to question his loyalty to Donald Trump. (Trump won the district by 8 percentage points in 2020 and by 15 points in 2016.) Hurd has been endorsed by a list of big-name Republicans and has the financial backing of a major national conservative group. He’s seen as a leading contender in the crowded primary/ Rocky Mountain Values PAC is linked to a political nonprofit of the same name that doesn’t disclose its donors. The group has operated in opposition to Republican candidates in Colorado for several years. The 30-second ad, which is running on cable in the Denver, Grand Junction and the Colorado Springs/Pueblo TV markets, links Hanks to Trump and says they are on the same page when it comes to immigration policy. “We have to start rounding up people,” Hanks says in a clip included in the ad. “We have to stop the immigration.” Finally, a narrator in the ad says Trump and Hanks are “too conservative” as text flashes across the screen pointing out how both have been endorsed by the Colorado GOP. Rocky Mountain Values PAC is also sending mailers to voters in the 3rd District tying Hanks to Trump and calling him “too conservative for Colorado” — a backhanded way to build GOP support for Hanks. Hanks, who attended the rally preceding the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol, baselessly asserts the 2020 presidential election was stolen from Trump. He’s also a fierce abortion opponent. When he was a state representative, he was known for his hard-line conservative positions. “I don’t know who they are. I don’t know what their motives are,” Hanks told The Sun in an interview Wednesday about the Rocky Mountain Values PAC ad. “I just take it as it comes.” Hanks said a lot of people told him in 2022 that the ads Democrats ran to boost his profile in the Republican U.S. Senate primary that year helped them figure out who to vote for. (He still lost the primary.) Nick Bayer, a campaign adviser for Hurd, called Rocky Mountain Values “nothing but a sleazy front for corrupt Democrats trying to fool 3rd District voters.” Grand Junction lawyer Jeff Hurd, center, talks with Allan Thayer, as his daughter Gabriella Hurd, 12, listens Saturday in Towaoc. (Jerry McBride/Durango Herald) “Voters of all stripes should be enraged that Democrats are putting our democracy at risk instead of having a debate about the issues affecting southern and western Colorado,” he said. Democrats, observers think Hanks will be easiest to beat Democrats and political observers believe that Hanks presents their best opportunity to win in the 3rd District, where Frisch lost to Republican U.S. Rep. Lauren Boebert in 2022 by just 546 votes. The district spans the Western Slope into Pueblo and southeastern Colorado. Boebert’s narrow victory, however, was largely chalked up to her behavior in Congress. She moved into the 4th Congressional District, which sweeps across the Eastern Plains and into Douglas County and is more favorable to Republicans, to run for reelection this year when it became seemed she would lose in the 3rd District in 2024. “Boebert’s ability to draw negative attention to herself was the main reason her party was in jeopardy of losing the Western Slope 3rd District in the first place,” Dave Wasserman, senior editor and elections analyst at the nonpartisan Cook Political Report, wrote in a December analysis of the district. There’s little evidence to suggest a Democrat can win in the 3rd District if Boebert isn’t the Republican nominee. The district hasn’t sent a Democrat to Congress since 2008. And when redistricting happened in 2021, the 3rd District was made more favorable to Republicans. The Daily Sun-Up podcast | More episodes If you exclude Boebert’s 546-vote win in 2022, the closest 3rd District race since Republicans took control of the district in 2010 happened that year, when Scott Tipton beat incumbent Democratic U.S. Rep. John Salazar by 4 percentage points. (Boebert beat Tipton in the Republican primary in 2020.) The second-closest 3rd District race since 2010 other than Boebert’s close shave in 2022 was Boebert’s 6-point victory in 2020 over former state Rep. Diane Mitsch Bush, a Democrat. On the other hand, Frisch has amassed a massive war chest by fundraising off of Boebert’s national unpopularity. And Democrats believe Hanks’ embrace of election conspiracies could make him as vulnerable as Boebert, though his profile is much smaller than the congresswoman’s. Adam Frisch, the Democratic candidate for the 3rd Congressional District, gives an interview at the election night party at BellyUp in downtown Aspen on Election Day, Tuesday, Nov. 8, 2022. (Kelsey Brunner, Special to The Colorado Sun) Frisch could use his campaign cash, however, to spread the negative message about Hanks should he be the Republican nominee. “Hanks is probably about as toxic as Boebert would be,” said J. Miles Coleman, associate editor of Sabato’s Crystal Ball, the nonpartisan election prognosticator at the University of Virginia Center for Politics. Coleman said Democrats have made the calculation that running the risk of Hanks winning in the 3rd District is worth it if his being the nominee gives Frisch an advantage in November. But for Frisch to win, he said, President Joe Biden also must perform well in the district. More Republican primary TV ad spending in the 3rd District Rocky Mountain Values PAC isn’t the only group airing TV ads in the Republican primary in the 3rd District. Another super PAC, Our American Century, reported spending $96,000 on ads supporting retired businessman Lew Webb of Durango, another GOP primary candidate in the district, and opposing Hurd. The ad calls Webb an “America First Republican” and Hurd a “chamber of commerce, Liz Cheney type” as the words “country club Republican” appear on screen. Our American’s Century’s sole donation this cycle through the end of April is $100,000 from Apex Spendthrift Trust. No previous contributions from the trust appear in FEC data. Americans for Prosperity Action, a political action committee associated with the national conservative political nonprofit of the same name, has spent more than $252,000 on mailers, digital ads and canvassing in support of Hurd. The group has endorsed Hurd. Hurd’s campaign is also airing TV ads in the 3rd District. It has spent about $37,000 so far. Colorado Board of Education member Stephen Varela, another GOP candidate in the 3rd District Republican primary, started airing an ad of his own on cable Tuesday. And Russ Andrews, a Carbondale investor and another GOP primary candidate in the district, began airing ads Wednesday, spending at least $15,000, based on contracts filed with the Federal Communications Commission. 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