Turnout Low and More Votes in Republican Primary

Credit: KOA

As opposed to the 2018 primary when more votes went to the Democratic candidates, the Republicans dominated the turnout in 2022 when they had the competitive primaries. It was also a quieter political year. Turnout dropped from 37 percent to 31 percent.

In 2018, 1.1 million voted, with 637,000 in the Democratic primary for governor (Jared Polis won), the top vote-getting race, and 503,000 voted for the Republican gubernatorial candidates (Walker Stapleton won). Today, the total vote with about 99 percent counted is the nearly the same at 1.2 million in spite of 500,000 more registered voters (3.3 to 3.8 million). The Republican primary attracted more voters (617,000 to 497,000).

High Unaffiliated Voter Turnout in Republican Primary

Unaffiliated voters broke two records – one for total turnout, 100,000 more than 2018, and another for voting in the Republican primary.

In 2018, 290,000 unaffiliated voted, with about two-thirds (200,000) voting in the Democratic primary and 90,000, or one-third of the total voting Republican. This year, 400,000 voted. It was 41 percent voted Republican and 30 percent Democratic.