U.S. Rep. Ken Buck vehemently denied Thursday that his decision to resign from Congress before the end of his term was aimed at making it harder for Lauren Boebert to take over his 4th Congressional District seat as she and others have suggested.
“It’s ridiculous,” Buck, a Windsor Republican, told The Colorado Sun.
Boebert said in a written statement after Buck announced Tuesday that he would leave Congress on March 22 that the five-term congressman’s resignation was a “gift to the uniparty” and “a swampy backroom deal to try to rig an election.” Republicans aligned with Donald Trump often use the “uniparty” label to insult members of the party they think aren’t conservative enough or work too closely with Democrats.
The Republican congresswoman has also tried to fundraise off her claim about Buck, telling supporters to not “let the uniparty rig this race.”
“I’m not giving anybody an advantage or disadvantage,” he said, noting that he’s refrained from commenting when reporters have asked him recently about the arrest of Boebert’s ex-husband and 18-year-old son. “I have done my very best to stay out of this primary election.”
Buck, who hasn’t endorsed a successor, said the timing of his announcement and resignation date stemmed solely from his growing frustration with Congress’ inaction and his desire to advocate for election reforms to improve the caliber of candidates running for office up and down the ballot.
“I want to be a voice for change in our system,” said Buck, whose resignation will temporarily shrink Republicans’ already razor-thin majority in the House.
Additionally, he said his resignation was timed to limit the cost to taxpayers for the special election to replace him by having it coincide with Colorado’s June 25 primary.
“I thought that was really important,” Buck said.
Gov. Jared Polis is charged with setting the special election date 85-100 days after Buck’s resignation, and Buck said he told Polis that he preferred the special election and primary to overlap. The governor has said he intends to do just that, also noting the savings.
June 25 is 95 days after Buck’s resignation takes effect March 22.
Matt Crane, who leads the Colorado County Clerks Association, said holding the special election and primary in the 4th District on the same day will save money for counties, which administer elections.
“There’s added cost either way,” he said, “but if it’s combined with a primary there’s a lot less cost.”
Democratic and Republican vacancy committees will meet in the next few weeks to determine who will be the parties’ respective nominees for the special election to serve out the rest of Buck’s term, which ends in January.
Boebert – who called Buck “selfish” for not finishing out his term – has said she won’t seek the nomination and will focus instead on winning the GOP primary, which will effectively determine who wins the 4th District race in November since the district is so favorable to Republicans. She has also framed her decision as a way not to abandon her current constituents in the 3rd Congressional District.
“There’s no chance that I will participate in the special election because I’m not going to resign in the middle of my term to further imperil the House majority,” Boebert said Thursday on conservative talk radio, even though she would only be forced to resign from her 3rd District seat if she won the 4th District special election.
However, Boebert likely couldn’t have secured the nomination anyway since vacancy committees are made up of party insiders, many of whom have been skeptical of the congresswoman’s decision in December to move to the 4th District from the 3rd District to save her political career.
Boebert was facing dim reelection odds this year in the 3rd District, which is based on Colorado’s Western Slope, after narrowly winning reelection in 2022. The 4th District, which includes Douglas County, Loveland and the Eastern Plains, is about three times more favorable to Republicans than the 3rd District.
Any political advantage the Republican nominee for the special election will effectively be limited to an increase in how much money their donors can give them and their name appearing twice before voters on June 25. State elections officials are still trying to determine if the primary and special election in the 4th District will be on the same or separate ballots.
If Buck had resigned from his seat earlier, his immediate successor would have had the power of incumbency in the 2024 race – a much more consequential advantage.
But there’s a risk of voters being confused about being asked to vote in two elections at once.
Buck, who announced in November that he wouldn’t run for reelection, told The Sun that his first order of business once he leaves Congress is to unwind.
“I’ve been going pretty hard for nine-and-a-half years,” he said. “I just have to take a step back for a little bit.”
The congressman has survived cancer and a heart attack. He said his health currently is fine.
Once he is done recuperating, Buck said he plans to get involved with changing the electoral system – though he has no particular person or organization he is set to work with. He said he’s aware of the work Kent Thiry, the wealthy former CEO of the Denver-based dialysis giant DaVita, is doing in Colorado around open primaries and ranked choice voting but that he hasn’t reviewed those proposals in detail and couldn’t say if he supported or opposed them.
“I admire people like Kent Thiry who have been successful in life and want to help this country get to a stronger position,” he said.
