When it comes to voter registration, Colorado may appear more purplish than ever, but that is not showing up in the election results.
Unaffiliated voters are the largest and fastest-growing political group in the state, with more registered voters than the Democratic and Republican parties combined. But Democrats dominated the 2026 midterm elections, continuing their control of state government — and showing they likely have the support of many of those unaffiliated voters.
Nearly 46% of ballots in this election came from voters who don’t belong to a political party. That’s compared to 23.6% from Republicans and 28% from Democrats. The other 2.5% came from people affiliated with other parties.
Ad:The number of unaffiliated voters — and their impact on elections — has grown by leaps and bounds. Colorado has counted about 1.3 million unaffiliated ballots, compared to just over 1 million unaffiliated votes in 2022.
The unaffiliated wave continues to play out across the state, with unaffiliated voters representing a larger portion of the electorate in all eight congressional districts. The greatest jump was in the 5th Congressional District, where unaffiliated voters grew from 39.9% of the vote in 2022 to 46.7% of the vote in 2026. Democratic challenger Jessica Killin unseated Republican Rep. Jeff Crank in the Colorado Springs-centered district.
Across the state, Colorado’s congressional results suggested a significant enthusiasm gap — with Democratic voters outperforming their turnout in recent elections, and more Republicans choosing to toss their ballot in the trash instead of a drop box.
In the 8th Congressional District, Democrat Rep.-elect Manny Rutinel beat the incumbent Republican Rep. Gabe Evans 55.4% to 40.7%, a difference of 42,182 votes.
The Republican stronghold of Weld County voted more for Gabe Evans, while the sections of Larimer County and Adams County that fall in the district went for Rutinel, according to the Associated Press.
Overall, Democrats in that district turned out in force. About 73.3% of active Democratic voters returned their ballot, a gain of 9.3 percentage points over 2022. Meanwhile, Republican turnout was down by 2.3 percentage points.
But unaffiliated voters may have had the greatest impact. The number of unaffiliated voters in the district has grown significantly, and they were more likely to vote this year.
Seth Masket, a political science professor at the University of Denver, said even though voters register as unaffiliated, most still have political leanings that tend to align them with one party or the other. In this year’s Colorado midterm elections, that benefited Democratic candidates.
“I think we’re clearly seeing that there was just less motivating Republicans for turnout than there was for Democrats this year,” Masket said. “Particularly in the governor’s race, there was barely a campaign. There was barely much of an ad war on TV. There weren’t really debates. So just a lot of things that usually mobilize people to turn out and vote just were not there for Republicans this year, and I think we see the consequences of that all the way down the ballot.”
In the 4th Congressional District, which encompasses the Eastern Plains along with Douglas, Larimer and Elbert counties along the Front Range, Democratic turnout rose to 79.3% while Republican turnout fell to 75.7% among active voters. Republican voters still outnumbered Democrats, since there are many more conservative than liberal voters in the district.
But the voters who turned out — including a growing number of unaffiliated voters — still appeared to reject Republican Rep. Lauren Boebert. In Douglas County, traditionally known as a red county, the Democratic challenger Eileen Laubacher won by more than 21,000 votes, according to the Associated Press.
Masket said given any other year, Boebert could have won a race, but not in a year that turned into a referendum on MAGA and her record. “She’s also basically only been known for scandals,” Masket said. “And that’s most of her coverage, and for just bombastic, outrageous comments, which may work for President Trump, but they don’t necessarily work for others.”
But the trend towards Democratic candidates bears out in the two other races that flipped. In the 3rd Congressional District, Republican turnout was down 4.3 percentage points, and in the 5th, it was down 2.5 points, while Democrats in both rose.
Young Voters turnout to vote
Another Colorado voter trend is the number of young voters returning their ballots. It is way up across the state.
The youngest group — people ages 18-24 — turned in nearly 200,000 ballots, an increase of more than 40,000 votes from the 2022 cycle. Their turnout rate rose 5 points, to 45%, among voters who received a ballot.
Masket points out it is unusual to see this high of turnout in this demographic in a midterm election, which could also explain the growing number of unaffiliated voters on the rolls. “One thing we know about younger voters is they tend to be less attached to political parties than older voters are,” he said.
Voting in the 25-34 age group was just about steady when compared with 2022. Meanwhile, voting in the oldest groups was flat or trending down. However, it’s worth noting that turnout among older voters was still far higher than among young voters.
The rise in unaffiliated voters is likely to bring more flip-flopping in future elections, Masket said.
The 2024 Presidential election produced a 4-4 split in Colorado’s congressional delegation for the House of Representatives. That split is now likely to be 7-1 with Rep. Jeff Hurd as the only Republican representing Colorado in Congress following the 2026 midterm elections. Eileen Laubacher appears to have won in the 4th Congressional District; CNN has called the race for Laubacher, but the Associated Press still hasn’t made a definitive call.
“People have been losing interest in the major parties for a long time,” especially in Colorado, Masket said. “Colorado makes it really easy to participate in the political system without being a member of a party, which is why we tend to see roughly half the state being undeclared.”
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