AP
Denver — An automatic recount confirmed Monday that Republican Rep. Lauren Boebert won her reelection bid against Democrat Adam Frisch. The nail-biter race showed the renowned conservative firebrand’s combative style is wearying voters in her conservative Colorado district.
Secretary of State Jena Griswold announced the results Monday evening. Frisch netted a total of four votes in the recount, far from enough to close a 500-plus vote gap with Boebert. An Aspen City Councilman, Frisch had already conceded the race last month.
Few expected the race to come down to such a narrow margin. In her first term in office, Boebert rocketed to national renown for her staunch support for former President Donald Trump, aggressive use of social media and willingness to engage in personal feuds with Democratic representatives.
Frisch ran against what her called her “angertainment,” saying he wouldn’t back U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi as party leader and describing himself as a nonpartisan problem-solver.
Few gave him much of a chance in the conservative 3rd Congressional District, which edges up against some famed, liberal ski towns but is dominated by vast, less glamorous and energy-rich swathes of rural Colorado.
While Boebert gained widespread notoriety and a spot on the so-called “MAGA Squad,” the fact that the race wound up in a recount was an indication that the Trump loyalist’s provocative style has its political downsides. Until election night, Boebert had been heavily favored to win reelection after redistricting made the sprawling, conservative district more Republican.
Her razor tight margin against Frisch surprised the political establishment as much as the 2020 GOP primary defeat of a five-term congressman that helped put her in office. The one-time owner of a gun-themed restaurant in Rifle, Colorado, Boebert comfortably won the district in 2020′s general election and swiftly established herself as a partisan flashpoint in Washington.
She filmed an ad of herself strolling the streets of the capital while packing her pistol, pushed to carry it on the floor of the U.S. House of Representatives, and picked fights on social media with high-profile liberal Democrats like Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Ilhan Omar. Frisch said earlier Thursday, “I think 99% of the story is here.”
