A Republican committee on Thursday night nominated Douglas County Republican Greg Lopez to run in a June special election to serve out the remainder of former U.S. Rep. Ken Buck's term.
Pitching himself as a "placeholder" candidate, Lopez argued that since he isn't running in the June 25 Republican primary for Buck's seat — which will appear on the same ballot as the special election — his nomination wouldn't tilt the scale toward any of the primary candidates and instead let voters decide who to nominate for a full term.
It took six rounds of balloting by the roughly 100 members of the GOP's 4th Congressional District central committee at a convention in Hugo before Lopez won a majority of the delegate vote.
The former Parker mayor and Small Business Administration administrator edged past former state Sen. Jerry Sonnenberg, a cattle rancher from Sterling, 51-46, in the final round.
"My opportunity is to make sure that we maintain a conservative voice for this district," Lopez told reporters after claiming victory.
Buck, the Windsor Republican who represented Colorado's most reliably Republican congressional district for nine years, resigned last week, triggering a special election to fill his vacant U.S. House seat, for only the second time in state history.
The other Republicans who vied for the nomination to the special election included primary candidates former state Sen. Ted Harvey, state Reps. Mike Lynch of Wellington and Richard Holtorf of Akron, business consultant and former 2nd Congressional District GOP nominee Peter Yu, former top congressional staffer Chris Phelen and Hispanic Energy Alliance chairman Floyd Trujillo.
Castle Pines nuclear energy executive Scott Melbye also billed himself as a placeholder candidate.
The remaining two primary candidates, U.S. Rep. Lauren Boebert and Deborah Flora, both opted against running in the special election. They both called on the special election convention's delegates to nominate a placeholder, so whoever won wouldn't have an advantage over the other primary candidates.
Democrats are scheduled to pick their nominee for the special election in an online convention on April 1.
Buck's resignation leaves House Republicans with a slim 218-213 majority, meaning the GOP can only afford to lose two Republican lawmakers on party-line votes. That margin narrows further in a few weeks, when Wisconsin Republican Mike Gallaghers's resignation takes effect.
Thursday's GOP convention is the latest turn in a twisty series of developments that began last fall when Buck announced he wasn't seeking reelection to a sixth term from the district, which covers suburban Douglas County and Colorado's Eastern Plains.
Over the next few months, a dozen Republicans launched campaigns for the seat. Still, the field reset in late December when Boebert declared that she was abandoning her bid for a third term from the competitive Western Slope-based 3rd Congressional District she represents and would instead run to replace Buck.
After nearly losing reelection in 2022 in the Republican-leaning 3rd Congressional District, Boebert faced an uphill battle to return to Washington. Democrat Adam Frisch, who came within fewer than 600 votes of beating Boebert last cycle and was seeking a rematch, outraised the Republican incumbent all year. At the same time, Boebert was facing a well-funded primary challenger from first-time candidate Jeff Hurd, a Grand Junction attorney who secured endorsements from a number of leading Republicans.
Days after Boebert said she was switching districts, Republican U.S. Rep. Doug Lamborn announced he wasn't running for another term. This set off a scramble in the heavily Republican 5th Congressional District and left all three of Colorado's GOP-held House seats open heading into this year's election.
But Buck's surprise announcement on March 12 that he was quitting Congress early threw the board in the air.
"Forcing an unnecessary Special Election on the same day as the Primary Election will confuse voters, result in a lame duck Congressman on day one, and leave the 4th District with no representation for more than three months. The 4th District deserves better," Boebert said in a sharply worded statement criticizing her fellow Republican's move.
Boebert and Flora — the only two Republicans who have qualified for the primary so far — announced this month that they would skip the special election and concentrate on winning the primary.
Both maintained the special election nominating process was unfairly tilted toward hopefuls from the district's sparsely populated rural counties, whose party officers make up a disproportionate share of the convention delegates.
Describing Buck's move as part of a "swampy backroom deal to try to rig an election," Boebert also said she didn't want to create another vacant House seat, since she would have to resign from the 3rd CD seat she currently holds if she won the special election, leaving her constituents without representation through the end of the year.
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