The Colorado Secretary of State’s Office says more nearly 2.5 million voted in this election. That number surpasses the more than 2.05 million who voted in the last midterm election in 2014.
Nearly 2.9 million Coloradans cast ballots in 2016, a presidential year.
Here is a look at some of the top-watched races for state seats and measures:
Democratic U.S. Rep. Jared Polis defeated Republican state Treasurer Walker Stapleton in the Colorado governor’s race.
Polis’ victory Tuesday keeps the governor’s seat in Democratic hands. The 43-year-old Polis will succeed the term-limited John Hickenlooper to become Colorado’s first openly gay governor.
Polis is a five-term congressman and technology entrepreneur who promised to fight for universal health care, renewable energy standards and publicly funded preschool and kindergarten. He vowed to stand up to President Donald Trump’s efforts to dismantle former President Barack Obama’s health care law.
Stapleton is a two-term state treasurer who campaigned on defending Colorado’s constitutional restrictions on taxing and spending. The 44-year-old Stapleton insisted Polis’ ideas for funding K-12 education, roads and energy would bankrupt the state.
Colorado has not had a Republican governor since 2007.
Democrat Jena Griswold defeated Republican incumbent Wayne Williams in Colorado’s secretary of state race.
Griswold is a voting rights attorney and first-time candidate. Williams was seeking a second term in Tuesday’s election.
Griswold criticized Williams for giving a short-lived presidential commission on voter fraud access to Colorado’s voter database. Williams said anyone could have the data because it’s public record.
Williams’ office was lauded for enacting one of the nation’s strictest election security protocols and making Colorado elections and campaign information accessible to the public.
The office also oversees business and charity registrations and licensing, among other matters.
Colorado Republican Rep. Scott Tipton was re-elected to Congress.
Tipton defeated Democrat Diane Mitsch Bush on Tuesday to win his fifth term.
Tipton has previously survived Democratic challenges in a district that used to vote Democratic but is increasingly Republican. The 3rd Congressional District extends from Pueblo to the western slope.
Bush argued that Tipton was influenced to energy interests. Tipton argued that Mitsch Bush would kill rural jobs with her environmental proposals, and he tied her to national Democrats.
State Sen. Don Coram, a Montrose Republican, defeated Democratic challenger Guinn Unger, a Bayfield Democrat, with 55.13 percent of voters favoring the incumbent and 44.87 percent preferring the challenger, according to partial, unofficial results.
The results, reported on the Secretary of State Office’s election results website, come from all seven counties in Senate District 6.
In La Plata County, Unger claimed 55 percent of the vote, 15,281 votes, to Coram’s 45 percent, 12,285 votes, according to results from La Plata County Clerk and Recorder’s election website.
Senate District 6 covers Archuleta, Dolores, La Plata, Montezuma, Ouray, San Juan and San Miguel counties.
State Rep. Barbara McLachlan, D-Durango, cruised to victory in House District 59 with 56 percent of voters favoring her and 44 percent backing independent challenger Paul Jones of Gunnison, according to unofficial results from the Colorado Secretary of State’s Office.
Results in District 59 reported by the Secretary of State’s election website came from all the district’s counties – La Plata, Archuleta, San Juan, Ouray, Hinsdale and Gunnison.
McLachlan said the race was unusual as she faced an independent rather than a Republican.
McLachlan, who retired from Durango School District 9-R, touted her strong bipartisan relationship with state Sen. Don Coram, R-Montrose, and state Rep. Marc Catlin, R-Montrose, in representing Southwest Colorado and fighting proposals that would hurt the largely rural 59th House District.
She credits her 20 years as a teacher with making her a better listener as a legislator.
Democrat Dave Young has defeated Republican Brian Watson to become Colorado’s treasurer.
Young is a state representative from Weld County. He’s a member of the Legislature’s powerful Joint Budget Committee, which crafts the annual state budget.
Watson championed his entrepreneurial experience as an investor in seeking the post, which oversees state accounts and investments.
Democrat Phil Weiser held 49.7 percent of the vote to Republican George Brauchler’s 47.5 percent, according to results Wednesday morning.
Brauchler attempted to lean on his experience to gin up support. He is district attorney in Colorado’s 18th Judicial District and portrayed Weiser as seriously lacking courtroom experience. But Weiser gained a following with his pledges to defend the Affordable Care Act, protect public lands and fight the separation of immigrant families at the border. Weiser is a former University of Colorado Law School dean and former official in the Department of Justice under Presidents Barack Obama and Bill Clinton.
Weiser had painted Brauchler as unwilling to defend the rights of Coloradans in the face of Trump’s administration.
Proposition 109, which was defeated would have directed the state to raise $3.5 billion in bond for 66 identified highway projects. The bonds would have been paid for with existing state revenues, up to as much as $250 million per year. Its primary backer and funder, to the tune of $635,000, was the Independence Institute, which doesn’t disclose its donors through TRACER. However, SourceWatch claims the institute gets its money from the National Rifle Association and Donors Capital Fund, which is backed in part by Koch Industries.
Proposition 109 Proposition 109 would direct the state to raise $3.5 billion in bond for 66 identified highway projects. The bonds would be paid for with existing state revenues, up to as much as $250 million per year.
State issuance of bonds to pay for transportation ("Fix Our Damn Roads")
Opponents claimed the measure would require the state to take money from other priorities, such as education and health care, when the state hits another economic downturn.
Proposition 110, seen as an alternative to 109, also failed. It would have increased the state sales tax by 6 cents on a $10 purchase, and use those dollars to finance $6 billion of the state’s $9 billion transportation wish list, for about 137 projects. Proponents claimed the measure would create a long-term funding solution for transportation; opponents, including the Independence Institute, say a tax increase is unnecessary.
