Boomers Dominated the Primary. Help Give One of Their Own the Prize

The Baby Boomers, now spanning 56 to 75 years old, are only 28 percent of the national electorate, but were 43 percent of the Colorado primary voters, and with their older cohort, the Silent Generation (75 and older), were more than half the electorate (56%). Polls showed John Hickenlooper (68 years old) benefitted from the nostalgia vote, winning his biggest percentage from Boomers and older.

The often discussed Millennials and the new Generation Z together only represented 22 percent of the primary voters. (They were well under their potential according to Pew Research; i.e., 37%). But, they were a bigger share of the Democratic vote, representing 27 percent. Not surprising, the Republican electorate was older – two-thirds were the Boomer and Silent cohorts (67%, Democrats were 51%) and only 14 percent Millennial or younger.

As typical of electorates around the country, women were better represented than men by 54 percent to 46 percent. Again, no surprise, they were an even larger percentage of the Democrats (57%), or 125,000 more voters than men. Republicans were evenly divided between the genders, with only 2,000 more women than men voting.