Update 11:04am, June 29, 2022: The Associated Press called the Democratic primary for Adam Frisch at 10:30 on Wednesday morning.
Republican Rep. Lauren Boebert handily beat back a primary challenge from state Sen. Don Coram.
As she took to the stage to accept the win, Boebert was introduced as “a mom of four, a restaurant owner, and a professional RINO hunter” to huge applause from the crowd.
“And I hope this is a big, huge message to any RINOs who try this in the future. You can try to get Democrats to influence our election. It ain't gonna work,” she told the crowd. RINO stands for Republican in Name Only.
A grassroots effort tried to make Democrats unaffiliated voters so they could participate in the primary, which some thought was the best shot of ousting the far-right Republican.
The first-term congresswoman has been a lightning rod of controversy, but her bombastic, no compromise conservative style continues to have strong support among the Republican base in the Western Slope. In her acceptance, she spoke about Supreme Court victories, Second Amendment rights, abortion and prayer in schools.
Republican Miles Scheer of Montrose said keeping Boebert in office was important for him. “I think she’s a loud voice for the freedoms that this country is trying to demolish, and so I stand with her. She’s a loud voice, but you know what, I’m fine with that.”
At her victory party in Grand Junction, she also got a boost from the former president. Donald Trump called into the party and was put on speaker to loud applause from the crowd of a couple of hundred.
“You have one of the greatest congresswomen, I think, in history,” he said. “We love her. She’s special.”
Some voters said they appreciate her conservative Christian stand. Salvador Lopez from Basalt said he didn’t believe information being spread about Boebert by left-leaning organizations, but even if those things had been true, he said it wouldn’t matter because she’s “submitted herself to God.”
“The first thing she did tonight was pray and worship and give glory to God before anything else like, ‘Hey, it's not about me. It's about God first,’ and then yeah, we're celebrating this for her, but it shows where her heart's at,” Lopez said.
Boebert goes into the general election with two advantages: lots of campaign cash and a district with a large Republican tilt.
She will face former Aspen council member Adam Frisch in the fall. Frisch narrowly defeated community activist Sol Sandoval of Pueblo for the Democratic nomination.
“I am building the needed coalition of Democrats, unaffiliated, and the growing number of disenfranchised Republicans to defeat Rep. Boebert in the fall and to save our Democracy from a radical conspiracy nut,” Frisch said in a statement.
Frisch is a businessman who has put his own money into the race, with over a million dollars in campaign cash as he heads into the general election. He’s running as a centrist focused on economic issues.
Editor's Note: This story has been corrected to reflect that the description of Boebert at the top of the story was made by the person introducing her and not Boebert herself.
