COLORADO SPRINGS – Colorado Republicans are determined not to get caught in the town hall trap that helped sink the reelection bids of U.S. Rep. Mike Coffman in 2018 and U.S. Sen. Cory Gardner in 2020 as local and national Democrats mount a pressure campaign aimed at the state’s most vulnerable members of Congress.
Democrats are demanding that Republican U.S. Rep. Gabe Evans of Fort Lupton hold an in-person town hall with his constituents, deploying the same tactics they used against Coffman and Gardner: a cardboard cutout of the congressman paired with relentless messaging.
U.S. Rep. Jeff Hurd, a Grand Junction Republican whose 3rd Congressional District seat is considered less endangered in 2026, is also a target of Democrats.
It’s a lose-lose situation for Evans and Hurd, according to interviews with current and former Republican staffers. They can rebuff the needling and give Democrats an easy line of attack, or they can relent and contend with news stories about how they were shouted down by angry constituents.
Gardner and Coffman, for instance, waited and waited, and were accused of hiding, before eventually relenting to the goading, leading to negative headlines and viral clips that only served to help build Democrats’ narrative that they were out of touch with voters.
The consensus among Republicans is that the wait-it-out approach is the best way to go for GOP members of Congress, filling the void with telephone and virtual town halls. Earlier this month, the National Republican Congressional Committee recommended as much to incumbents like Evans and Hurd, who have been in office for a little more than two months but already must begin gearing up for their 2026 reelection bids.
Hurd heeded the advice and held a telephone town hall in recent days. Evans, who represents Colorado’s 8th Congressional District, has signaled he will do the same.
The strategy is based on experience.
A senior aide to a former Republican member of Congress from Colorado told The Colorado Sun last week that it was a miscalculation on the part of the GOP to not call out the partisan motives of those who demanded that Coffman and Gardner hold in-person town hall meetings. The aide spoke to The Sun on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations.
Now, Republicans are more willing to say who they think is behind the town hall calls – people who were unlikely to ever support them anyway.
“We know paid liberal groups have been taking over town halls,” Evans’ spokeswoman, Delanie Bomar, said in a written statement. She said Evans wants any meetings with constituents to be productive conversations and not shout fests, effectively saying that in-person town halls are out of the question.
While there’s no evidence that all, or even the majority, of people calling for Evans and Hurd to hold in-person town halls are paid Democratic operatives, many of those organizing those people are.
ProgressNow Colorado, the liberal political nonprofit that doesn’t disclose its donors, was behind the cardboard Coffman and Gardner cutouts. They’ve now made one for Evans, too.
“Remember Cardboard Cory? Meet Better Gabe,” said the subject line of the ProgressNow email unveiling the Evans effigy.
ProgressNow even held an event Saturday in the congressman’s district hoping to highlight how Evans hasn’t held a town hall.
Meanwhile, the Democratic National Committee and Colorado Democratic Party jointly purchased a billboard in the 8th District labeling Evans a “coward” for refusing to hold a town hall.
On Friday, U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio Cortez, a New York Democrat, also took a jab at Evans during an appearance with U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vermont, in Greeley. That’s the heart of Evans’ district.
“I hear that you have a representative who has not done a town hall,” said Ocasio-Cortez, which elicited boos from the crowd. “If this is the best that you all are getting, I think you deserve better.”
Republicans feel they can justify doing telephone and virtual town halls instead of in-person events because they reach more people and are more representative of the electorate; can be more cost effective; and come without personal security risks.
From a political perspective, they’re also better because callers can be screened and those who duck the vetting can be cut off.
“My recommendation with all the real security threats would be focus on tele-town halls because you can connect with such a large audience, focus on the issues and not worry about the people who are distracting or interrupting,” said Jeff Small, the former chief of staff to Republican U.S. Rep. Lauren Boebert who is now a principal at the 76 Group, a conservative political firm.
Tyler Sandberg, a Republican operative who ran Coffman’s 2018 campaign, agrees, but said GOP campaigns should be more lenient when screening telephone town hall callers.
“I wouldn’t screen things to make them sterile,” he said. “If someone is frustrated, have it out. You can’t run from anger. That only makes it build.”
Democratic strategist Ian Silverii was one of the architects of the town hall pressure campaigns against Coffman and Gardner. At the time, he was leading ProgressNow Colorado. He’s also married to U.S. Rep. Brittany Pettersen of Lakewood, the Democrat who represents Colorado’s 7th Congressional District.
Silverii doesn’t think Republicans’ wait-it-out strategy will work.
“You don’t do your town hall, people start protesting you at the airport, your official offices,” he said. “The tension just builds up – the resentment builds up. If you don’t face the music and justify what you’re doing and explain yourself to your voters, you’re done for.”
Silverii also said a telephone or virtual town hall won’t work as a substitute.
“That’s totally their right,” he said. “But it’s going to cost you.”
On the one hand, U.S. Sen. John Hickenlooper, a Democrat, recently held a virtual town hall and defended them as the best way to reach the most constituents. U.S. Rep. Diana DeGette, D-Denver, is also a frequent tele-town hall user.
On the other hand, there are signs Silverii is right that Evans can’t wait it out forever.
Evans, a former state lawmaker, visited the Colorado Senate last week, where a handful of Democratic senators took the opportunity to confront him about Republican efforts to slash Medicaid funding.
State Sen. Cathy Kipp, D-Fort Collins, raised her voice as she chastised Evans, who responded with a half-grin-half-grimace.
State Sen. Julie Gonzales, D-Denver, went a step further, needling Evans during a speech on the Senate floor during an immigration-centered speech on Latino/a Advocacy Day.
“I’m glad that he has made time (to be here),” Gonzales said. “And I hope that he will also visit with his constituents while he is here to talk with them about what he hopes to accomplish on these issues. I also personally really want to understand when he’s going to have his next town hall.”
Most of Colorado’s Democratic members of Congress, meanwhile, have been on an in-person town hall blitz across the state.
That serves two purposes: adding pressure to their Republican colleagues to do the same thing while also acknowledging calls from their increasingly frustrated base to do more to push back against the Trump administration.
At U.S. Sen. Michael Bennet’s in-person town hall Thursday night in Colorado Springs, for instance, headlines touting the Colorado Democrat’s battles against the Trump administration were shown to attendees before he took the stage. Bennet, who has faced criticism for voting in favor of some of Trump’s political appointees, also held town halls last week in Greeley and Golden.
The Colorado Springs crowd appeared uniformly friendly to Bennet, albeit frustrated with how he and other Democrats have responded to Trump’s second presidency.
Audience members selected at random asked questions about America’s crumbling international standing, the Trump administration’s refusal to follow court orders, and how Democrats can convey a stronger anti-Trump message.
“I’m hoping to hear what we can do to stop the chaos and fight what’s happening in this country,” Kathryn Cavanaugh-Partridge, a 64-year-old Monument Democrat, said before the Colorado Springs town hall. “I’d like to see somebody stand up and be a rallying cry and tell us whatever we should be doing out here. I’ve been to rallies up in Denver. I’m trying to get involved and do something. I don’t think the message is getting out.”
Bennet acknowledged the frustrations of those at the town hall – “I do think the Democratic Party needs to think very hard about how we lost to this guy” – and urged them to get involved, either through activist groups or by donating to Democratic candidates and causes.
Some in the crowd sounded unsatisfied.
“Where you see opportunities where you think I can fight harder,” Bennet said, “I want you to let me know.”
“Fight harder!” a chorus of people shouted back.
Town hall attendees seemed to suggest that if Trump and his allies weren’t following the rules – from the traditional political norms to court orders – why should Democrats?
Bennet said trying to match Republicans’ tactics would be a mistake for his party.
“I don’t think the answer to Donald Trump’s unconstitutional behavior is to have our own unconstitutional behavior,” he told reporters after the town hall. “I think that kind of a race to the bottom is only going to destroy our democracy.”
Lucas Brady Woods of KUNC contributed to this report.
