Colorado Pols is reporting that in the most recent reporting cycle, Democrat Bill Ritter has outraised Republican Bob Beauprez by more than 3-1. Ritter has already made his big ad buys, and the election is less than two months away, with absentee voting starting in about a month.
I can't recall any significant election in recent Colorado history where the Republican has faired so much worse off in fund raising than a Democratic party challenger. Ken Salazar is the only Democrat whose held major statewide office in the Owens era, and his races weren't easy ones. Ritter is pretty safely to the left of Salazar, although still a moderate Democrat.
There is really only one more month of fund raising that matters. A big check in the week before the election, when a majority of the votes may have already been cast, won't matter. Assuming Ritter's ads are effective, this race could be a landslide.
"with absentee voting starting in a month"
ReplyDeleteI am glad you mentioned this. I think this is a huge factor.
I for one will finish my voting within 24 hours of receiving my absentee ballot. Now that they got rid of local precint voting in Denver I plan to vote via absentee ballot forever. I believe that more and more voters (those who actually vote as opposed to those who "plan to vote") will start voting early.
This means that many elections will be over 1 month ahead of "election day".
,dave