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Two Western Slope Republicans hope to move state GOP past Dave Williams era
Editor’s note: Brita Horn on Saturday, March 29, was elected chair of the Colorado Republican Party and Russ Andrews was elected secretary of the party.
A pair of Western Slope Republicans vying for Colorado Republican Party leadership slots at Saturday’s statewide GOP reorganization meeting in Colorado Springs say it’s time to move past the bitter divisiveness of the Dave Williams era and welcome all comers in a bid to beat Democrats.
“The chair’s job is to elect more Republicans and grow the party and fundraise,” chair hopeful Brita Horn of McCoy said in a phone interview this week. “Over 18 seats went unopposed last year — house districts, senate districts, a board of education seat, a whole bunch of [district attorneys] were open. Uncontested Democrats won hands down. And then [outgoing chairman Williams] took their money and they went and spent it on other races and we lost other races.”
Williams announced in February he would not seek a second term. Democrats, who dominate the state legislature and statewide offices, reelected Colorado Democratic Party Chairman Shad Murib, also a Western Slope resident, on March 13.
Horn, 62, a self-described, “ranchwife and a mother … first and foremost” who served six years as Routt County treasurer, is part of a large group looking to take the reins from Williams, whose tenure was marred by intense infighting, lawsuits and bigoted attacks on the LGBTQ community.
“This needs to be a big tent,” Horn said. “My job isn’t to sit there and have a purity test and see if you pass my judgment. It’s not about that. The tent is really big and let everybody in. I’m seeing right now there’s a whole bunch of young, female Hispanics in Denver going, ‘We’ve got to stop this; we have to make Denver red.’ I’m like, ‘I love you. Can we have coffee?’”
Russ Andrews of Carbondale, a financial advisor, former engineer and conservative radio commentator, is seeking the party secretary slot at the urging of Republican U.S. Rep. Jeff Hurd of Grand Junction, who beat Andrews and several others in last summer’s primary election to replace Rep. Lauren Boebert in Colorado’s 3rd Congressional District.
“We have to stop the internecine fighting,” Andrews said by phone, describing the Williams era. “We have to get back to blocking and tackling. We need to understand that we need the left, the secular part of our party, as well as the hard right. We need to come together as a party. We need to start increasing our membership and fundraising. And that’s what I’m all about.”
Initially, Andrews said Hurd – for whom he campaigned after the primary – asked him to seek the party chair.
“He just likes my style. He knows that I’m a party player. I’m not a finger pointer,” Andrews said of Hurd. “So he asked me to run for party chairman, and I looked at it and I looked at it, and I said, ‘No, I will run for secretary though. I’m not messing around with [party chair]. There’s eight people in the chair race for now, and who knows, there might be 10 by the time we’re done.”
Horn said she’ll back Andrews for secretary on Saturday: “We really need him for his strength. There’s a lot of strengths that he has as a businessman. I look forward to him to being our secretary.”
But Andrews said in an email: “I have been asked to join three separate slates. I decided early on that I would run independently of all other candidates. I can work effectively with any of the announced candidates who move on to win their elections for chair and vice chair.”
Andrews previously told the Colorado Times Recorder Trump did not lose the 2020 election: “Did Donald Trump have the election stolen from him? Absolutely not. Donald Trump lost the election because of his big mouth.” But Horn was not nearly as definitive in a 9News interview with Kyle Clark.
Following her tumultuous tenure as treasurer in Routt County, during which she sued the Routt County Commissioners over $552, racked up substantial outside legal bills instead of using the county attorney for less, and went after Peabody Energy for interest and fees on back taxes, Horn unsuccessfully ran for Colorado State Treasurer in 2018.
“I made everybody mad and I didn’t care because I was doing what was right for the taxpayers who were very happy with what I did,” Horn said. “So, as I say now, I was DOGE before DOGE was DOGE.”
That’s a reference to the Trump-created Department of Government Efficiency spearheaded by the richest man in the world, Elon Musk, who has been ruthlessly slashing federal staffing and funding while being relentlessly sued across the country.
Fire chief for the Rock Creek Volunteer Fire Department, Horn said she’s not worried about Interior Department funding cuts for wildland firefighters on public lands that make up much of the Western Slope.
“I don’t fear it. I think we’re going to get it cleaned up,” Horn said. “But I know they’re going to still honor these grants and these pieces that we need and they’re essential. The wildland firefighters are essential. We’re the first to arrive, but I still need to hand it over to somebody because it’s on Forest Service or it’s on [Bureau of Land Management land].”
Similarly, she doesn’t think Medicaid cuts or other decreases in health care spending by the federal government will not adversely impact rural hospitals. Slashing government spending is just part of a process to make everything ultimately work better, she says.
“I think we have the concerns, but I don’t think we’re going lose essential services,” Horn said. “It’s just weeding out everything … because when I’m an emergency responder and somebody’s bleeding out, we put a tourniquet on them and we stop the bleeding. You have to stop it to figure out what you can do to save the life.”
Editor’s note: This story first appeared on the Colorado Times Recorder website. This story has been edited to correct the location of Saturday’s meeting.
David O. Williams
