2022 United States Senate election in Colorado

The 2022 United States Senate election in Colorado was held on November 8, 2022, to elect a member of the United States Senate to represent the State of Colorado. Incumbent Democratic Senator Michael Bennet won reelection to a third full term, defeating Republican businessman Joe O'Dea. Originally appointed to the seat in 2009, Bennet won full terms in 2010 and 2016.

Bennet won by nearly 15 points, significantly outperforming his polling. His margin was the highest for a Democrat in a Senate election in Colorado since 1974. This was the first time in Bennet's Senate career that he received a majority of the vote.

The election resulted in both the best performance by a Democrat, and the worst performance by a Republican in the Class 3 seat since 1974.

Candidates
Bennet was appointed in 2009 by Governor Bill Ritter following the resignation of Ken Salazar to become the Secretary of the Interior under President Barack Obama. Bennet was then narrowly elected in 2010 for his first full term. In the 2016 election, he was re-elected to a second term with 49.97% of the vote over Republican El Paso County Commissioner Darryl Glenn.

Due to some of his centrist positions, such as his opposition to Medicare for All and his support for fracking, Bennet faced a potential challenge from the left, particularly from Joe Salazar, a former state representative. Salazar ultimately opted to run for Colorado's State Senate, and thus Bennet was easily renominated at the Democratic convention.

Nominee

 * Michael Bennet, incumbent U.S. Senator

Eliminated at convention

 * Karen Breslin, lawyer and university instructor

Declined

 * Joe Salazar, former state representative and candidate for Colorado Attorney General in 2018 (ran for state senate)

Candidates
Originally, a wide field of candidates declared their intention to run for the Republican nomination, with former Olympian Eli Bremer being thought as the best candidate to take on Bennet. However, instead of gathering the required number of signatures to be placed on the primary ballot, Bremer and most of the other candidates sought to get 30% of the delegate vote at the Colorado GOP convention in April 2022. Due to the wide field of candidates, delegate support was split, with the only candidate to achieve the threshold being State Representative Ron Hanks, while Debora Flora, a radio show host, missed the ballot by a single percentage point, getting 29% of the vote, and Bremer getting third place with 15% of the vote.

With the other candidates eliminated, Ron Hanks and construction CEO Joe O'Dea were the only two candidates on the primary ballot. The contrast between the two Republicans was stark, with Hanks, who supported a complete ban on abortion and echoed former president Donald Trump's claims of voter fraud in the 2020 presidential election, getting pitted against O'Dea, a moderate who supports LGBT rights, some abortion rights, and did not believe in widespread voter fraud.

Hanks was considered the underdog due to O'Dea consistently outraising him, however he received a boost when Democrats began spending over $4 million to influence the Republican primary, launching ads attempting to drag down O'Dea due to his prior support of Democratic candidates, and prop up Hanks as "too conservative". This was done in the hopes that Hanks would be an easier opponent for Bennet to beat than O'Dea, who can appeal to moderates. This attempt to interfere in the GOP primary was denounced by numerous former Colorado Democratic officials, including former governor Roy Romer, and former senators Mark Udall, Tim Wirth, and Gary Hart, who previously mounted unsuccessful attempts to win the Democratic nomination for president in 1984 and 1988. Ultimately, despite the boost from the Democrats and his attempts to receive the endorsement of Donald Trump, Hanks would lose the nomination to O'Dea by 9 points. He performed best in the rural parts of Colorado, which are typically the most conservative counties that typically vote Republican in landslide margins in general elections, while O'Dea performed best in urban counties, such as Denver.

Nominee

 * Joe O'Dea, construction company owner

Eliminated in primary

 * Ron Hanks, state representative for the 60th district (2021–2023) and nominee for CA's 1st congressional district in 2010

Eliminated at convention

 * Eli Bremer, Olympic athlete, U.S. Air Force major and former chair of the El Paso Republican Party
 * Gino Campana, former Fort Collins council member, city developer
 * Deborah Flora, former radio host
 * Daniel Hendricks, small business owner
 * Juli Henry, nonprofit founder
 * Gregory J. Moore, Colorado Christian University professor
 * Peter Yu, businessman and nominee for Colorado's 2nd congressional district in 2018

Withdrew

 * Erik Aadland, Army veteran (became Republican nominee for Colorado's 7th congressional district)

Declined

 * Ken Buck, U.S. Representative for Colorado's 4th congressional district, chair of the Colorado Republican Party, and nominee for U.S. Senate in 2010
 * Heidi Ganahl, University Regent (ran for Governor)
 * Cory Gardner, former U.S. Senator from Colorado (2015–2021)
 * Darryl Glenn, former Colorado Springs city councilman (2005–2011), former El Paso County commissioner (2011–2019), and nominee for U.S. Senate in 2016 (ran for Mayor of Colorado Springs)
 * Clarice Navarro, former state representative
 * Bill Owens, former governor of Colorado (1999–2007)
 * Steven Reams, Weld County sheriff (ran for re-election)

Results
[[File:Colorado U.S. Senate Republican primary, 2022.svg|thumb|250px|Results by county: {{legend|#e27f7f|O'Dea}}

{{legend|#e27f7f|50–60%}}

{{legend|#d75d5d|60–70%}} {{legend|#ff9955|Hanks}}

{{legend|#ff9955|50–60%}}

{{legend|#ff7f2a|60–70%}} ]]

General election
In recent years, Colorado has started voting more Democratic in the federal level, transitioning from a purple state to a moderately (and increasingly strongly) blue state, and the shift was largely contributed to the left-wing shift in the growing Denver metropolitan area, with President Joe Biden winning the state by 13.5% in the 2020 election, almost nine points to the left of the national result of around 4.9%. Prevailing in 2010, a year where Colorado was considered a swing state and Democrats performed very poorly, Bennet had a generally strong electoral history. He also outperformed Hillary Clinton on the same ballot in 2016. Ahead of 2022, Bennet was generally favored to win, though polling showed him as potentially vulnerable, largely due to the state of the economy and President Biden's low approval ratings. Colorado had not elected a Republican to the U.S. Senate since Cory Gardner in 2014, another very strong year for Republicans nationwide and while Colorado was still considered a swing state, even then Gardner only won narrowly. Bennet ultimately won reelection by a comfortable 14.6 point margin, outperforming Biden's victory two years prior and his own polling averages. Bennet also flipped three counties he had lost in his 2016 re-election bid, flipping Grand County by a narrow 1.1% and Chaffee County, and Garfield County by wide margins. However, O'Dea did narrowly flip Conejos County by a slim 1%.

Polling

 * Aggregate polls


 * Graphical summary


 * Michael Bennet vs. Ron Hanks


 * Michael Bennet vs. Eli Bremer
 * Michael Bennet vs. Gino Campana
 * Michael Bennet vs. Lauren Boebert
 * Michael Bennet vs. generic Republican
 * Michael Bennet vs. generic opponent
 * Generic Democrat vs. generic Republican

Counties that flipped from Democratic to Republican

 * Conejos (largest city: Manassa)

Counties that flipped from Republican to Democratic

 * Chaffee (largest city: Salida)
 * Garfield (largest city: Rifle)
 * Grand (largest city: Granby)

By congressional district
Bennet won 5 of 8 congressional districts.