Incumbent Republican U.S. Rep. Michael Coffman has so far outraised Democratic challenger Andrew Romanoff in the battle to represent Colorado’s 6 Congressional District, but just barely.
As of the April 15 reporting date past in what’s likely to be one of the most competitive races in the country, Coffman had raised about $2.61 million. About $1.8 million of that is from 1,455 individual contributions, and about $715,000 is from 329 political action committees. He’s got about $1.8 million left to spend.
Romanoff raised about $2.59 million from 6,293 individual contributions, and he’s got about $2.1 million of that on hand. Though he says he’s sworn off PAC money, many of the contributions were funneled through the website ActBlue, a Democratic political action committee that allows individual donors to designate where their money goes. Names of the donors are available on the Federal Election Commission’s website.
The face of the 6 District, historically a Republican safe zone, changed after redistricting in 2012 added northern suburbs like Brighton, Thornton and Henderson to the traditionally more GOP-friendly south-metro mix of communities like Littleton, Centennial and Highlands Ranch. While southern Aurora had long been in the district, it gained the remainder of Aurora, a Democratic stronghold. Gone from the district are conservative areas like Parker, Castle Rock and Elbert County.
Coffman succeeded Tom Tancredo, who held the seat for four terms until leaving to run an unsuccessful campaign for U.S. president in 2008. Coffman carried the 2008 and 2010 6 District elections with 61 and 66 percent of the vote, respectively.
After redistricting, Coffman defeated Democrat Joe Miklosi by just 2 percentage points in November 2012.