The first of the three believes the state Capitol is awash in pedophiles. The second says he helped kill a man when he was just 7 years old, though there is no evidence of the crime. The third has been a political insider for much of her adult life, but now says she can fix what is wrong with Colorado.
One of them will be the Republican nominee for Colorado governor.
This story was produced as part of the Colorado Capitol News Alliance. It first appeared at cpr.org.
A Republican hasn’t won a statewide office in Colorado since 2014, as the state has trended toward Democrats over the last decade. And Bill Owens is the only Republican elected governor in the past half-century. So some political realists believe that whoever secures the nomination will have their greatest impact on competitive down-ballot races.
“Even if the Republican nominee for governor is not winning, they have to be somebody who’s not dragging down the rest of the ticket,” said Dick Wadhams, the former chairman of the Republican Party in Colorado. “And that matters a great deal.”
Scott Bottoms
State Rep. Scott Bottoms speaks during a gubernatorial debate against State Sen. Barbara Kirkmeyer at Denver7 on May 14, 2026. (McKenzie Lange, CPR News, via the Colorado Capitol News Alliance)At the top of the Republican ballot is two-term State Rep. Scott Bottoms, a Colorado Springs pastor who claims, without presenting any evidence publicly, that Democrats are “buying children.”
“We are still pursuing the pedophilia in this building,” said Bottoms, in a recent interview at the Capitol. “I have been saying that for three years.”
He would only provide evidence to the FBI because he doesn’t trust state law enforcement. As governor, Bottoms said he would “clean out the corruption in this state.”
Bottoms has been a pastor at Church at Briargate in Colorado Springs since 2012, and he holds advanced degrees from small Christian schools, including a doctorate in ministry.
“All I’ve been is a pastor,” he said. “It’s been very boring for the last 35 years.”
Born in Colorado but raised in Texas, Bottoms said he joined the Navy when he was 17 years old and entered the ministry at 20 while still in the Navy. Out of the Navy, he said he worked in congregations in southern Colorado before leading Church at Briargate.
Bottoms describes himself as having always been “politically charged,” but didn’t seriously consider running for office until the House District 15 seat opened in 2022. Dave Williams, the former party chair, previously held the seat and was among those who encouraged Bottoms to run.
A colleague in the House, Rep. Stephanie Luck, asked him to pray on it, and Bottoms and his wife visited the Capitol, prayed, and felt strongly that he should run. He easily won the heavily Republican district, which covers the suburbs east of Colorado Springs.
Bottoms has little to show for his time in the legislature, if the measure is passing legislation.
He ran bills like prohibiting gender-affirming care or regulating abortion clinics. In an interview, he initially said he hadn’t passed a single bill since coming to the legislature, but he corrected himself: He’s listed as a prime sponsor for the “In God We Trust” license plate bill that was signed by Gov. Jared Polis. But he downplayed that accomplishment, saying it “was not my bill” and that lawmakers had put his name on it as a kind of leverage over him.
Bottoms did not back down from claims that Democrats are “buying children.” Bottoms would not provide any names or evidence, but said that he had first forwarded the allegations to the FBI outside of Colorado, then, more recently, sent the information to the FBI in Colorado. A spokesperson for the FBI said the agency doesn’t comment on contacts with individuals.
He said he doesn’t trust the Colorado State Patrol or the Colorado Bureau of Investigation to follow up on the allegations, citing what he described as connections to the governor’s office. As governor, he said he would root out the corruption in the state, including in state law enforcement.
Bottoms said as governor, he would also cut taxes, roll back regulations, and expand the oil and gas industry. He would get rid of all diversity, equity and inclusion, or DEI, programs, and would have freed former Mesa County Clerk and Recorder Tina Peters on day one. She is currently serving a prison sentence for a security breach at her office, following the 2020 election, but Polis took the air out of that campaign pledge when he commuted her sentence last week. Bottoms said he would go a step further and pardon Peters, erasing her conviction.
“We’re going to make sure that Tina Peters is free and that she’s completely commuted, pardoned completely,” said Bottoms.
Victor Marx
DENVER, COLORADO — Feb. 20, 2026: Republican gubernatorial candidate Victor Marx speaks to a group at a hotel in downtown Denver, Colorado, on Friday, Feb. 20, 2026. (Jesse Paul, The Colorado Sun)Next on the ballot is Victor Marx, a political newcomer, who claims he participated in a homicide when he was 7 years old. In an interview, he said his stepfather took him to a rural area of Mendenhall, Mississippi and ordered him to kill a man.
“Yes, I was made to shoot a man who I watched get buried, and that affected me deeply most of my life,” said Marx. “Which is why I went to 123 visits to a trauma specialist. And I’ve been on Depakote, Depakine, Prozac, so I’ve been on the medications. But I think I’m living proof that you can rise above being a victim and be victorious.”
Marx runs a ministry nonprofit called All Things Possible for “hunting predators as well as rescuing, restoring and empowering women and children who have been held captive by traffickers and other abusers,” according to its website.
Marx has about three million followers across Facebook, Instagram, YouTube and X. He has posted viral videos where he disarms people holding a dummy firearm to his head. He calls himself a “high-risk humanitarian,” delivering dried milk and toys to war-torn, impoverished nations like Iraq and Haiti. He said he was given the moniker “The Milkman of Mosul.”
Yet he was unknown to many within the Colorado Republican Party when he announced that he would run for governor.
“So it was really my bride that said, ‘babe, either you have to get into some aspect of politics, run for a position to help change the state for better or leave,’” Marx said in an interview from his podcast studio on his property in Black Forest.
“We love Colorado, we love the people, but the affordability became a real issue. And safety. Safety has affected us,” Marx said. “Someone tried to, I know, tried to kill me right on our property.”
Authorities believe that it was a family dispute.
In 2023, Marx went to check on his brother-in-law, Kenneth Breining, who was living in a trailer on the property. According to an arrest affidavit, Breining shot at Marx from inside the trailer. Marx was not hit. Breining also shot two more rounds while an El Paso County deputy was on scene, before he was taken into custody, according to court records. Breining bonded out and was later implicated in a woman’s murder in Nevada County, California, where he remains in jail.
Breining’s attempted murder case is still open in Colorado.
It’s just one of the extraordinary, cinematic stories that weave through Marx’s life. Born in Louisiana, Marx said he was tortured by his stepfather. That same stepfather was the one who compelled Marx, at just 7 years old, by his telling, to kill a man in a rural area of Mendenhall, Mississippi.
Sheriff and police authorities in that part of Mississippi told CPR News they had no information on any unsolved homicides from that time. Many years later, Marx said a friend at the FBI told him there was little he could do decades later, especially since Marx had no more details. Still, Marx called the sheriff, he said, and told them what he could. There are no available reports of that contact.
Marx said he joined the U.S. Marine Corps in 1983 after the Beirut bombing attack that killed 241 U.S. personnel. After spending three years in the military, he worked in ministry in Southern California, ran a martial arts gym in Hawaii, and was an assistant for three years for Dr. James Dobson at Colorado Springs-based Focus on the Family. Marx now runs his ministry nonprofit with his family, which says it helps women and children escape dangerous situations, among other things.
Marx said as governor, he would focus on affordability and public safety. He’d cut regulations to expand housing and childcare. He would work to increase energy production to lower utility costs. He would cooperate with federal immigration authorities (though he has not offered details on how he would square that with Colorado laws prohibiting such cooperation), and he promises to launch a task force on fentanyl and trafficking networks.
“There’s going to have to be a little bit of house cleaning. There’s going to have to be hard decisions made if we want to make our state affordable and safe again,” said Marx.
Marx may be little known within the party establishment, but he dominates campaign contributions in the Republican primary. His fundraising total of more than $2.5 million is more than Kirkmeyer ($549,498) and Bottoms ($223,092) combined.
Barb Kirkmeyer
State Sen. Barbara Kirkmeyer speaks during a gubernatorial debate against State Rep. Scott Bottoms at Denver7 on May 14, 2026. (McKenzie Lange, CPR News, via the Colorado Capitol News Alliance)The last name on the GOP ballot is State Sen. Barb Kirkmeyer, who has spent most of her working life in government, including five terms as a Weld County commissioner, an administrator for former Republican Gov. Bill Owens, and six years as a state senator, where she’s been a respected voice on budget issues as a member of the Joint Budget Committee.
“I think people want a common sense conservative who can go in there and whip that budget into shape and start figuring out how we can lower taxes, lower the fees, and roll back the regulations that are making our lives so much unaffordable,” said Kirkmeyer in an interview.
Kirkmeyer was confident that her fundraising would be enough, and now that the legislature has wrapped up, she will have more time to devote to the campaign. She is a leading conservative voice in the General Assembly, routinely jabbing Democrats for what she says is making a mess of the budget.
As a member of the Joint Budget Committee, which does a lot of the heavy lifting on preparing a balanced budget every year, her days have been full through the session. Partly because she’s on the JBC, which writes the budget and sponsors budget-related bills, her legislative record is extensive.
“It’s not that I’m just a fighter or budget hawk. I’ve actually accomplished things in this state that delivered for the state of Colorado,” said Kirkmeyer, who has passed legislation, working with Democrats at times to secure funding for law enforcement, expand the rape shield law, and ban state nondisclosure agreements.
“So I do work across the aisle, and it’s for what I believe the betterment for opportunities for children and the betterment of the people of the state of Colorado.”
Kirkmeyer grew up on a dairy farm in Jefferson County, went to CU Boulder, and came to work in agriculture in Weld County. She was inspired to run for office after her Weld County commissioner was dismissive of concerns from her rural area. As a five-term commissioner, across two different stints with the county, she was a passionate advocate for oil and gas and agriculture.
“It’s not just about the jobs, though. It’s also just about how it strengthens our communities and strengthens our economy,” said Kirkmeyer.
She has many of the establishment endorsements, from former Attorney General John Suthers to former Gov. Bill Owens. But Kirkmeyer resisted the “establishment” label, instead saying those endorsements were because they know her and know she can “get things accomplished” as governor.
Kirkmeyer said she’s uniquely qualified to cut waste and fees and rein in spending at state agencies. She would freeze non-essential hiring as governor and get rid of burdensome regulations affecting housing, energy and grocery costs.
“Just let me be governor,” Kirkmeyer said. “I’ll get our budget in shape within six months.”
For Wadhams, the race comes down to whether Bottoms and Marx split the vote among the hardest of hard-core conservative Trump voters, while Kirkmeyer is propelled to a win by moderates and crossover unaffiliated voters. Bottoms joined a lawsuit to prevent unaffiliated voters from participating in the June 30 Republican primary, but it was rejected by a judge.
“I see Bottoms and Marx are both competing for, in some ways, the same part of the Republican Party,” Wadhams said, adding that could benefit Kirkmeyer because she “is the only candidate that does not come from that MAGA wing of the party.”
Ballots will go in the mail starting June 8.
This story was produced by the Capitol News Alliance, a collaboration between KUNC News, Colorado Public Radio, Rocky Mountain PBS, and The Colorado Sun, with support from news outlets throughout the state. Startup funding for the Alliance was provided in part by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.
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