Lauren Boebert Saves Her Seat AND Her Career

Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-CO)

Yesterday, Rep. Lauren Boebert, someone who is known for surprising the political press, managed to pull off yet another surprise.  But this wasn't to do with her colorful personal life, or about her extreme MAGA beliefs, but instead about her political standing, and I'll be honest-pulling maybe the savviest political move I've seen in a while from a MAGA Republican.  Boebert, who was facing a tough reelection in her right-leaning (but marginal) 3rd congressional district announced that she would run for reelection not in her current district, but in the open 4th congressional district on the other side of the state, where Rep. Ken Buck is retiring.  I had written a few months ago about the sex scandal that appeared likely to doom Boebert's congressional career, either in a primary challenge or in the general election against Democrat Adam Frisch.  Boebert, with this move, may well have proven me wrong-she might get to return in 2025 and allow the Republicans to hold the 3rd congressional district, which didn't seem possible 48 hours ago.  Let's talk about why.

First, let's get a little bit of the lay-of-the-land.  Boebert, for those unfamiliar, is a second-term congresswoman who made national headlines first for beating Rep. Scott Tipton in 2020 in a Republican Primary by running to his right (Tipton was so caught unawares by this he was actually in DC on the night of the election, not even canvassing for votes on the day he lost his seat).  It was a major screw-up on Tipton's part, and Boebert was able to win the general election a few months later.  Since then, she's made national headlines for a variety of reasons, starting just three days into her time in Congress when she tweeted Speaker Pelosi was no longer in the Capitol during the January 6th terrorist attacks, which some said was aiding the insurrectionists.  But the biggest issue for Boebert's reelection was when she was caught (on camera) sexually pleasuring a man during a public performance of Beetlejuice in Denver.  Most, including me, assumed this was the end of her career-she'd either lose in the primary next year to a more palatable Republican, or she'd lose the general election to Adam Frisch, who nearly beat her in 2022 in an election night surprise.

Her move, though, means that Boebert just needs to win the primary.  Colorado's 3rd district is right-leaning (Trump won it by 8-points), but Democrats have gotten close there (Michael Bennet only lost it by 1-point last year).  Colorado's 4th, though, is unwinnable for the Democrats.  Donald Trump won it by 18-points in 2020, and the Republican House nominee will win no matter whom they are, even if they might under-run Trump (which will surely be the case for Boebert).

Boebert is toxic to Democrats, and even to certain sections of the Republican Party, but there's a genius in her move here, and here's why-she doesn't need to win a majority of the primary vote to get a victory in CO-4.  Colorado doesn't have a runoff law, and there are currently 6 candidates running for Buck's open seat, meaning Boebert can probably win this with 30-35% of the vote unless Republicans drop out to stop her, which I would assume is going to be unlikely to happen, since all will assume they can beat an unpopular frontrunner if they know the magic words (see also the 2016 & 2024 Republican Presidential nominations).  Boebert will have the most name recognition, a much redder electorate in her primary, the most money, and a type of incumbency that won't help with voters but will help with House leadership.  Speaker Mike Johnson won't want to piss off one of his incumbents in such a marginal Republican House majority, and will probably endorse Boebert (and may well fundraise for her) just to keep things calm on Capitol Hill.  Allegations of carpetbagging will be brought up, but they'll be hard to make stick because A) there won't be an obvious candidate for Republicans to rally behind in a splintered field and B) Colorado is not a state where carpetbagging is going to sink in.  Carpetbagging allegations usually work best in states with a lot of native-born population-think John Fetterman going after Mehmet Oz in 2022.  But while Pennsylvania has 70% native-born population, Colorado only has 40%, and is unlikely to care that much.  Republicans like Darrell Issa & Pete Sessions have proven that district-hopping to help your reelection chances isn't a death knell...both pulled it off in 2020 after their 2018 districts went blue.  Pretty much every piece of evidence points to Boebert making a smart, if risky, move here.  Unless her primary opponents start to drop out, I'd now say she's favored to be in the House in 2025.

And with this move, she also helped the chances she'll be in a House majority, albeit by one-seat.  Colorado's 3rd congressional district is a right-leaning, left-trending district, but it's a seat that Donald Trump seems near-certain to win next year.  As a result, Adam Frisch, the Democrat running there, needed to find a way to win some crossover balloting in an era where that is going out of style.  That was possible with Boebert.  Her polarizing figure and the double standard bias that comes from sex scandals involving female politicians meant that Trump could outrun her, and give Frisch room to score a victory if Biden kept Trump's win to less than 3-4 points.  With Boebert gone, an open seat Republican is going to have the advantage.  Frisch has mountains of cash (he's raising like a Senate candidate), but if we're being honest-his only realistic path to winning an actual term in Congress was against Lauren Boebert, which is no longer happening.  I've seen a lot of Democrats on social media trying to what if this scenario (refusing to believe someone they hate as much as Boebert would be capable of such a savvy political move months after most wrote her political obituary), but the Colorado congresswoman has appeared to do the impossible with this move-she has saved her political career and saved her district for the Republicans.  If Democrats want a House majority in 2025, it won't be something that will come from her.