The Story:
After two rounds of debates, and with the tightening of requirements for entry into the third (September) round, the Democratic party’s field of Presidential aspirants may be due for a winnowing. One of the marginal candidates, former Colorado Governor Hickenlooper, is said to have his eye on a fall-back office: he may run for the Senate seat now held by Republican Cory Gardner.
Gardner’s Vulnerability:
The website Roll Call says that Gardner is “the most vulnerable Republican Senator” looking for re-election in 2020. He looks so vulnerable because he won the seat six years ago running as a moderate independent-minded sort of Republican, which is the type of GOP candidate who does best in the Centennial State.
But in the last three years Gardner has been a loyal soldier for President Trump, and he chaired the National Republican Senate Committee in 2018. This may have weakened his ‘independent’ cred.
The Thing to Know:
Should Hickenlooper despair of a Presidential nomination, he might want to seek the nomination of the Democratic Party for Gardner’s seat instead. But it is not obvious that he could get that. There are at least a dozen other Democrats interested in challenging Gardner, and few of them, if any, would step aside in Hickenlooper’s favor.
