Boigon Out; Who Is Left In The Running To Be Mayor Of Denver?

The race to bethe mayor of Denver has lost its highest polling female candidate, city council woman at large Carol Boigon, who in turn endorsed Michael Hancock. 

It isn't obvious, however, that many voters will be swayed by her endorsement of her city council ally.  He needs a boost in support if he is to displace Romer or Meijia, who are currently on track to make it to a runoff election in a race where no candidate is likely to win majority support in the first round.

Chris Romer, James Meijia, Michael Hancock and Doug Linkhart, in that order, are the strongest polling candidates remaining in what is now a nine way race for Mayor.  Boigon had been polling in fifth place with 8% support.  It isn't obvious whom supporters of eliminated candidates would support in a second round runoff election. 

Theresa Spahn, who was polling even more weakly than Boigon before Boigon dropped out of the race is the only woman left in the running, and may pick up Boigon supporters who would like to have a female Mayor.  Also running, but very unlikely to either win or even make it into the second round of voting are: Danny F. Lopez, Jeff Peckman, Kenneth Simpson, and Thomas Wolf.

Some people have characterized this race as a Romer v. not Romer race, but it isn't obvious that this is the case. Strategic voters who recognize that their favorite candidate is unlikely to make a runoff election may choose to vote for Meija or Hancock to influence who makes it into a runoff election.


The race looks likely to track the election that ultimately put Hickenlooper in office the first time around, with African-American plurality precincts likely to favor Hancock, Hispanic plurality precincts likely to favor Mejia and white plurality precincts likely to favor Romer.

Republicans in Denver have been most public in supporting Romer and Hancock in this official non-partisan race, although the momentum of Republican support appears to have swung towards Romer.  Linkhart is the most prominent progressive leaning social liberal in the race who has devoted much of his efforts while in office towards developing a less punitive and less expensive stance on criminal justice issues.

I hope to find time for another post on this race before votes are cast that sums up the key points that distinguish each of the mayoral candidates, as I will need to do that in any case before voting myself.
Ballots in the all mail election are already in the hands of voters, and they must be received by May 3.