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2008 United States Senate election in Colorado

election

Layered newspapers, civic records and oral-history reels arranged as chronological evidence
History and societyInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionSep 13, 2026
Entity authorityQ7891430 ↗
Source-derived summary

The 2008 United States Senate election in Colorado was held November 4, 2008. The primary elections were held August 12, 2008. Incumbent Republican U.S. Senator Wayne Allard decided to retire instead of seeking a third term. Democratic nominee Mark Udall won the open seat, making this the first time a Democrat won this seat since 1972, and that Democrats held both Senate seats since 1979.

Democratic primary

Candidates

Mark Udall, U.S. Representative

Results

Republican primary

Candidates

Bob Schaffer, Colorado State Board of Education member, former U.S. Representative and candidate for the U.S. Senate in 2004

Results

General election

Campaign

The election featured an open contest because incumbent U.S. Senator Wayne Allard declined to seek re-election. He honored his 1996 pledge to serve no more than two terms in the U.S. Senate and announced that he would retire from his service to the US Senate and not seek a 3rd term, leaving Colorado's Class II Senate seat open. Both parties believed this senate contest would be one of the most competitive senate races during the 2008 election.

Predictions

Polling

Results

Counties that flipped from Republican to Democratic

Alamosa (largest municipality: Alamosa)

Arapahoe (largest city: Aurora)

Broomfield

Chaffee (largest city: Salida)

Conejos (largest municipality: Manassa)

Eagle (largest municipality: Edwards)

Grand (Largest city: Granby)

Garfield (largest municipality: Glenwood Springs)

Jefferson (largest city: Lakewood)

Larimer (largest city: Fort Collins)

Mineral (Largest city: Creede)

Ouray (largest city: Ouray)

San Juan (largest municipality: Silverton)

See also

2008 United States Senate elections

References

External links

Elections Center from the Colorado Secretary of State

U.S. Congress candidates for Colorado at Project Vote Smart

Colorado, U.S. Senate from CQ Politics

Colorado U.S. Senate from OurCampaigns.com

"Colorado U.S. Senate race, from 2008 Race Tracker". Archived from the original on June 24, 2008. Retrieved June 22, 2008.

Editorial summary

“2008 United States Senate election in Colorado” enters the record as election. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what United, States and Senate can confirm, complicate or overturn.

Editorial reviewMost valuable as an event-and-institution map that identifies actors, dates and record creators for deeper historical inquiry. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—2008, 1972, 1979, 2004—that can be checked directly. The selected authority fields contribute no independent date. Its strongest next move is a source search built around United, States and Senate.
Editorial analysis

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“2008 United States Senate election in Colorado” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, United, States and Senate provides the most credible route into that argument.

Evidence profile

Contemporary correspondence, administrative files and participant testimony can test how later narratives organized the event or institution. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 13, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q7891430. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 2008, 1972, 1979 and 2004.

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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “2008 United States Senate election in Colorado” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.