DENVER – Two feisty debates Thursday night for U.S. Senate and gubernatorial races in Colorado marked the heat of the election season.
In Fort Collins, Democratic Gov. John Hickenlooper and Republican challenger Bob Beauprez traded jabs over attack ads by special interests. The debate was held on the Colorado State University campus and moderated by KUSA-TV 9News.
Just 175 miles away in Pueblo, Democratic U.S. Sen. Mark Udall and Republican challenger U.S. Rep. Cory Gardner battled over immigration reform. The debate took place at Memorial Hall and was moderated by The Pueblo Chieftain.
Beauprez recently tried to turn Hickenlooper’s pledge to run a clean campaign against the governor, demanding that Hickenlooper denounce attack ads by special interests.
Beauprez pointed to a debate on Sept. 30 in which Hickenlooper offered Beauprez a handshake, calling on Beauprez to commit to not running negative ads.
“He did a phony stunt last week. He broke his pledge by not denouncing what he knows to be patently false, misleading, deceptive and unfair,” Beauprez said, referring to a $1 million ad buy by the Democratic Governors Association that lambasts Beauprez for rolling back abortion rights.
Hickenlooper laughed when Beauprez said that competing attack ads run by the Republican Governors Association against Hickenlooper are “based on facts.”
“I wish they would take them all down,” Hickenlooper said. “If I could turn them all off, I would.”
Over in Pueblo, a rowdy audience listened to the two U.S. Senate candidates have a tense exchange over immigration.
Gardner continued to hit Udall on a 2005 vote for a bill that would have made being in the U.S. illegally a felony. Udall said at the time that he opposed the criminal penalties but backed border security provisions in the bill.
“Perhaps you would like to explain to Southern Colorado why you voted to make undocumented individuals felons,” Gardner said.
Udall has long supported a path to citizenship as part of an immigration reform package, which has been blocked in the U.S. House, where Gardner serves in the Republican majority.
“Some days when I listen to you I think that you don’t believe in the precept that we’re strong not in spite of our diversity, but because of our diversity,” Udall said.
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