The Colorado Sun reports that U.S. Sen. Michael Bennet loaned his gubernatorial campaign $950,000 on May 29, while Michael Bloomberg’s donations to Rocky Mountain Way, the super PAC supporting Bennet, have now topped $4.6 million. The Sun says Rocky Mountain Way raised about $2.2 million in the latest reporting period, including $2 million from Bloomberg, and has raised $10.3 million total to support Bennet’s run against Attorney General Phil Weiser.
So the Democratic primary for Colorado governor has become a luxury auction with yard signs. Bennet is not limping around with a coffee can outside King Soopers asking folks to spare a twenty for democracy. He just opened his own checkbook for nearly a million dollars while a New York billionaire’s political forklift keeps stacking cash behind him. The “people-powered future” has apparently been outsourced to donor rooms, super PACs, and rich-guy hydraulics.
The Bullet Point Brief
- Bennet loaned his own campaign $950,000, and the campaign immediately poured money into ads. That does not smell like confidence. That smells like panic wearing a Patagonia quarter-zip.
- Bloomberg has now given more than $4.6 million to Rocky Mountain Way, the pro-Bennet super PAC. Remember this the next time Democrats start doing community theater about sacred democracy and big money in politics.
- The campaign money and super PAC money are legally different buckets. Bennet’s campaign controls its own dollars. Rocky Mountain Way spends independently to help him. But voters are not stupid. They know when the same rich ecosystem is trying to drag a candidate across the finish line with a gold-plated tow rope.
- The Sun says the spending is the latest sign the Bennet-Weiser race has tightened. Translation: the product may not be selling as naturally as the consultants promised.
- Meanwhile, normal Coloradans are getting mugged by housing costs, taxes, fees, insurance, groceries, and general Front Range unaffordability while the ruling class treats the governor’s race like a private equity acquisition with fleece vests.
My Bottom Line
Michael Bennet has spent years cultivating the nice-guy, public-school-reformer, serious-grownup routine. Fine. But nothing says “grassroots Colorado momentum” quite like loaning yourself nearly a million bucks while Michael Bloomberg backs the truck up to your super PAC.
No one has to claim corruption to smell the rot in the optics. This is the same political class that lectures everyone about democracy, equity, fairness, and the corrupting influence of money. Then, when their own primary gets tight, suddenly a sitting U.S. senator’s personal loan and millions in billionaire muscle are just normal civic participation with better stationery.
And spare us the mystery act. Bennet says he does not know why Bloomberg is spending so much to help him. Maybe so. But voters are allowed to notice that Bloomberg keeps showing up in Democratic politics like a billionaire fairy godmother with a checkbook wand and no interest in explaining the spell.
Colorado does not need more donor-class insulation. It needs a governor who understands what families and small businesses are actually living through. If Bennet needs a million dollars from himself and millions more in outside billionaire firepower to convince Democratic voters he should run the state, maybe the machine is not as beloved as the Boulder applause circles thought.
Fort Collins forums, Denver donor rooms, glossy ads, super PAC mailers, and the rest of us watching democracy get invoiced back to us one rich-guy check at a time. Beautiful system they’ve built. Very sacred. Very affordable. Very normal.
Source: The Colorado Sun
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