ByKELLY HARTOG/JTAJULY 1, 2026 18:17The son of a woman born at Buchenwald two days after the concentration camp’s liberation in 1945 will be the Democratic candidate for governor in Colorado.Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser, a strong supporter of Israel, defeated Sen. Michael Bennet in the state’s Democratic primary for governor on Tuesday by roughly 55%-45%. Elsewhere in Colorado on Tuesday, candidates with differing views of Israel prevailed; Melat Kiros’ win in the state’s 1st Congressional District, which includes the more Democrat-friendly Denver, puts an anti-Israel candidate on the Democratic ballot there. But voters statewide will not get a chance to back a similar candidate in the Senate race. There, incumbent John Hickenlooper defeated his progressive challenger Julie Gonzales by approximately 57%-43%. Gonzales, a state senator from Denver since 2019, had accused Israel of committing genocide and called for an arms embargo during the campaign.In the hotly contested 8th Congressional District, however, the candidate endorsed by the group Democratic Majority for Israel, Shannon Bird, lost to State Rep. Manny Rutinel. Rutinel will face Republican Rep. Gabe Evans in November.Colorado gubernatorial candidate, state Attorney General Phil Weiser speaks at an election-night watch party after winning the Democratic primary, at Ace Eat Serve on June 30, 2026 in Denver, Colorado. (credit: Michael Ciaglo/Getty Images)In the governor’s race, Bennet initially had the momentum as a three-term senator and the former superintendent of the Denver Public Schools. But voters ultimately chose Weiser, the two-term attorney general and former clerk for the late Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.“They counted us out, and they underestimated all of you. Together we pushed forward. We did the hard work, and we proved the establishment wrong,” Weiser said in his victory speech. “We are excited for the work we can do here in Colorado, including getting corporate money out of our politics and making sure that the government delivers for all of us, not only the wealthy few.”Both candidates JewishWith Weiser and Bennet the only candidates running in the Democratic primary, the result guaranteed that a candidate with a Jewish background would advance to the November general election. Both come from Holocaust survivor families, with Bennet’s grandparents and his mother surviving the Warsaw Ghetto.Weiser has been outspoken about his support for Israel and against the rise of antisemitism.He condemned the June 2025 firebombing attack in Boulder, in which one person was killed, and seven others suffered burns during a demonstration to release Israeli hostages taken on Oct. 7, 2023, and being held by Hamas in Gaza. Noting a rise in antisemitic attacks since Oct. 7, Weiser said at the time, “These attacks are fueled by hatred, demonization, and, in this case, a dangerous and abhorrent belief that politically motivated violence is justified.”Weiser’s primary win came as voters in Denver chose a democratic socialist who declined to condemn the Boulder firebombing as antisemitic as their congressional candidate, adding to a surge of wins for anti-Israel candidates in multiple states.Weiser, whose children attended a Jewish day school and is a longtime member of a Denver synagogue, has emphasized his support for Israel’s existence and has said he identifies as a Zionist.“It is not hard to explain that being a Zionist means you believe that Israel has a right to exist,” he said in May 2024 during JewishColorado’s Celebrate Israel event. “It does not mean that you necessarily support all of the actions or policies of the current government. It does not mean that Israel has not made mistakes in the war against Hamas. And, most importantly, it does not mean that Jews don’t care about the deaths of Palestinians during this war.”Opponent also JewishWeiser is seeking to replace current Democratic Gov. Jared Polis, who is also Jewish. Polis drew backlash after recently commuting the nine-year prison sentence of former county clerk Tina Peters, who was convicted of tampering with election equipment in the 2020 election and claimed the election was rigged against President Donald Trump. Peters was released on June 1 after serving four and a half years of her sentence.Weiser has been outspoken about opposing Polis’ decision to commute Peters’ sentence. He has also brought a slew of cases against the Trump administration, cementing his status as a public adversary of the president, who is deeply unpopular among Democratic voters.The race for Weiser’s Republican opponent was still too close to call as of publication. In the three-way runoff, State Sen. Bab Kirkmeyer had a narrow lead over Pastor Victor Marx. State Rep. Scott Bottoms, who said during a GOP debate that he would give a podcaster friend of his a job in his administration “assuming it’s not around Jewish people,” trails in third place.Marx, who runs a Christian ministry, has been a vocal supporter of Israel. He visited the country following the Oct. 7 Hamas attack and said he brought “1,200 lions and lambs” - stuffed animals - as “trauma toys” for children.Trump did not endorse any of the three candidates in the race. But Marx received support from Lauren Boebert, the far-right Colorado congresswoman, and said he was proud to “stand alongside battle-tested Conservative leaders” like her.Hickenlooper, for his part, will face Republican state Sen. Mark Baisley in the November general election after beating Gonzales.In an interview with the Colorado Sun, when asked about whether she supported continued military funding to Israel, Gonzales stated, “I believe that because Israel is engaged in war crimes - and I believe genocide - I would no longer support continuing to provide aid.”In the 8th Congressional District race, the winner Rutinel publicly condemned the Boulder attack, but DMFI argued that Bird was the stronger pro-Israel candidate, at one point reposting a story about Rutinel’s attendance at a Students for Justice in Palestine protest while in college in 2014. The group spent against Rutinel without success.Follow us on Google