“Welcome to the state of Colorado. Welcome to your home.”
Season 1 Episode 1 — September 6, 2024
This episode is supported by Pacific Mercantile Company.
Alyssa Nilemo is a fourth-generation Coloradan running for Colorado House of Representatives on a platform based on kindness. To understand why kindness is important to her, you need to know about the history of Colorado and the lives of Asian Americans who made this state their home. At a time when I felt disaffected with US politics, the opportunity to tell Alyssa’s story inspired me. Follow along as she competes to become the only Asian elected official in the Colorado state government.
Featured Guests
Alyssa Nilemo
William Wei
References
Alyssa4Colorado Official Campaign Website — alyssa4colorado.com
Colorado Census Bureau Profile — data.census.gov/profile/Colorado
Douglas County Census Reporter — censusreporter.org/profiles/05000US08035-douglas-county-co
Zoom In: The Centennial State in 100 Objects — historycolorado.org/exhibit/zoomin
Colorado Lotus Project — coloradoaapicircle.com/lotusproject
Transcript
[Advertisement] This episode of Middleweight is supported by Pacific Mercantile Company. For 80 years, Pacific has provided essential goods and services for Coloradans. Pacific Mercantile Company: Finest Asian Foods and Gifts.
Alyssa Nilemo: So back in 2018, I had just made like the first real leap forward in what I would say was from a job to a career.
Alyssa Nilemo and I first crossed paths six years ago in Tokyo when we participated in a niche but competitive leadership program for early career Japanese Americans interested in international relations. There were twelve of us in our cohort, united because of our common heritage and ambitions to advance our careers. Alyssa was an Executive Aide in the City Manager’s office in Westminster, a northern suburb of Denver.
Alyssa Nilemo: And I was really excited, and then I read everyone else’s resumes who was accepted into this program. And I have never felt more intimidated in my entire life. I was like, “What am I doing here?” Folks just, I mean, it was from all industries. But just, I mean, everyone in our class is just super impressive.
I know what she means when she says it was intimidating. Since the bios of all the participants were published in advance, it was hard not to size each other up before we got there.
Alyssa Nilemo: You could feel the direction they were going with their life. And I honestly—the motivation in my career was—I didn’t want to be without health insurance anymore, and I didn’t want to be in instable housing situations. Like I just needed to not be in poverty anymore. And had just gotten married like a few months before and now I’m jetting off to Japan to try to kick it with a bunch of badasses.
Over four days, we had meetings with leaders across professional sectors, and we were all in suits. Except, I remember noticing that what Alyssa was wearing throughout the conference wasn’t a suit, and I concluded maybe that the definition of business casual was just different in Colorado.
Alyssa Nilemo: And I’m so sorry I’m saying this because he’s such a sweet human, but I won’t say who it was.
Alyssa recounts the first night of the program when our class had dinner with the President and CEO of the organization.
Alyssa Nilemo: The bigwigs, right? And we’re all meeting, and we’re in this gorgeous restaurant. And he just needs to, like, exit the room to use the restroom. And I don’t remember if the doors were supposed to be, I think, a push or a pull.
Toshiki Nakashige: I remember this.
Alyssa Nilemo: And he just grabs them, and when it doesn’t go immediately, the response is to just violently shake the doors. And everyone stops and turns. And it’s just one of those moments that—it goes from like a drama to a comedy—and that, that moment for me, like, cracked my fear. He just handled it so differently than I would have with just like a very extroverted kind of funny personality. And I was like, “OK, we’re all humans, and like, sometimes you can’t open a door. And that’s fine, and no one, like, attacked him or whatever. But that’s like one of my sharpest memories of being there.
I tell the story about the first day Alyssa and I met because we had parallel experiences. When we talk about it now, she says that reading my resume was intimidating. I was a chemistry PhD working in New York. I’m recovering now, but yeah, back then, I thought that in order to survive cutthroat environments I had to show off my academic pedigree. In comparison, she was a part-time student pursuing a bachelor’s degree at the age of 29. Alyssa and I have bonded over overcoming imposter syndrome when surrounded by the caliber of leaders in spaces like that. But what she didn’t know back then is that, out of all the people I encountered there, I was the most intimidated by Alyssa. In a room full of extroverts, there was Alyssa in her cowgirl boots. Someone who was perhaps shy, didn’t have a flashy business card, but nonetheless commanded attention and respect in a way I had never seen before. Over those four days, I only remember having two real conversations with her, but in those brief interactions, I was intrigued. I witnessed a glimpse of her style of leadership: a measured pragmatism whose edges are softened by kindness. She isn’t hopelessly idealistic, and her intelligence manifests quietly through a complex understanding of how people around her feel. Beyond the leadership program, 2018 was significant for Alyssa because it was the beginning of her political journey. If you trace the line from her position at the City Manager’s office working with the Westminster City Council, you can see how it led her to where she is today. She deepened her involvement in Asian American organizations and connected with leaders committed to advancing Asian representation in Colorado politics. She worked as the Deputy Director for a US congressional campaign in Denver and, all the while, started participating at the local level where she lives, in Douglas County and the Town of Parker. Alyssa and I crossed paths for the second time last November. We were in Washington, DC, attending the same conference, now as alumni of the leadership program. At one of the evening social events, we caught up. I was living in Japan. Although I was no longer doing chemistry research, I still found ways to slip in science metaphors into conversation. Alyssa, having completed her political science degree, worked in higher education in Denver. She had also been consulting for a solar startup, and she was at the conference to learn about what kind of startup growth was happening in the US-Japan markets. It was then that Alyssa told me she had decided to do this wild thing—to run for political office.
Alyssa Nilemo: So in order to be considered for the primary, you have to publicly announce, and you have to file specific paperwork. And like, you open your account. And so that was really what I had accomplished before that conference, was—it was like, “OK, I’ve announced. This is real. I have this website. I’m a candidate. Like we’re doing this.” But it was still in, like, it’s very baby fledgling phases.
By November, Alyssa was fully committed to becoming her party’s candidate in Douglas County, but in Washington, DC, she didn’t feel confident enough to talk about it publicly until one of our other classmates, Amy Watanabe, encouraged her to.
Alyssa Nilemo: And so I wasn’t going to say anything, but—and I will throw her under the bus by name—but Amy was like, “You’re telling everyone.” Like, “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Like that, “You wouldn’t say this.” Like, “You’re definitely telling everyone.” And she was like, “You brought your business cards, right? Start handing them out.” So very quietly, like the morning of, I think I told, like, our tabletop group, and I was like, “OK, checkbox. I told people. I’m done.” And then that night when we went out, Amy was like, you know, waits till the room is full and then gets, like, someone else hyped about it. And then she’s like, you know, “Everyone shut up. We’ve got an announcement to make.” And I about died. I was like, “Oh my God.” And she hyped it up. It was entirely her. I would not have taken advantage of that weekend like I should have, which led to people reaching out and being like, “Oh, I heard that you’re running.” She did that, dragged me kicking and screaming to make it.
Toshiki Nakashige: And I’m grateful that that happened because, you know, later that evening I was like, “How can I help?”
Alyssa Nilemo: Yes.
At the time, I wanted to get more into politics, but I was still deciding what exactly that would look like. With the presidential elections coming up, I considered moving to a swing state like Pennsylvania to volunteer for the Biden campaign. But for many reasons that I think a lot of Americans felt, my enthusiasm for national politics was dwindling. When Alyssa said that she was running for office, I was excited. Given that we had only met twice, I actually didn’t know a lot about her, but I knew enough to understand that she was a candidate whose story I think should be told.
Alyssa Nilemo: We were standing there, and you were like, “I really want to help with a campaign.” And I was like, “Oh, that’s cool. That’s fine.” And you’re like, “No, like, I really want to do this. I’m going to come out to Colorado. I have this plan I want to talk to you about. We don’t have to talk, you know, details right now.” But like, it’s like, “Oh, that sounds so fun. That’s really cool.”
In the months that followed, I thought about what I could do for her campaign. Over a Zoom call in March, I proposed that I move to Colorado for a few months, follow her around, and make a podcast.
Alyssa Nilemo: And then you followed up, and then we had these check-in calls. And then, and I do remember on like—and you’re going to laugh because I had already, like, committed and said. But we were like several more calls in before I looked at my husband, Korey, and was like, “I think he’s really going to do this.” And Korey was like, “You didn’t think before. Like, you’ve been doing so much.” I was like, “Well, I wouldn’t have held it against him if he didn’t.” I mean, life is crazy. That’s a huge commitment to pick up your life to come. Being on a campaign is not exactly like a lovely, relaxing experience. It’s not exactly at this level of lucrative experience. Like I would have never been—thought twice if you were like, “It just didn’t come together. I’m really sorry. I still support you.” You know? But yeah, at that time I was like, “Wow, he’s really gonna do it. How cool is that?” Like, that’s, that for me is one of the bonuses of campaigning is like other really cool things happen. And I think you coming out and getting to, like, have this other sort of ELP extended experience with you. Like that checks so many boxes for me.
Alyssa accepted my proposal, and has since granted me access to her campaign and a closet in her house to set up a recording studio. And so now, I’m here in Parker, Colorado, where Alyssa Nilemo is running for Colorado House of Representatives District 44.
Imagine a physics classroom demo on space-time. A heavy object is placed at the center of a stretched-out bedsheet, and as marbles roll across the warped fabric, they follow circular paths around the weight in the middle. What if every part of ourselves was one of these middleweights that attract other bodies in the universe toward us? Alyssa Nilemo and I possess middleweights that exhibit gravitational forces bringing us together. Welcome to Middleweight, a podcast about the interlacing connections that create communities and cultures. My name is Toshiki Nakashige. This is District 44, Episode 1: “Welcome to the state of Colorado. Welcome to your home.”
I arrived in Colorado in early August. My first week, there were thunderstorms every afternoon, which I understand in the summer has to do with the cold air from the Rocky Mountains in the West colliding with warmer air from the Great Plains in the East. Parker is a town with a population of about 60,000, and it’s located southeast of Denver, toward those plains. It’s part of Douglas County, which comprises a few other cities, towns, and what I recently learned are called unincorporated communities, totaling nearly 400,000 residents. I was born and raised in Dallas, Texas, and went to school in a suburb called Plano. Parker reminds me a lot of what it was like growing up there. The sky is big, and rows of houses are sprouting up from open fields. What’s different is that I didn’t grow up seeing mountains in the distance or a network of trails that weave through residential neighborhoods like they do in Parker. And although we were nowhere near a majority in Plano, there are noticeably much fewer Asians here. Unless I’m with Alyssa, I’m almost always the only Asian in sight. This is a story about Alyssa Nilemo, so you’re going to hear from her a lot throughout the series. But you’ll also hear from other people too. Even before I arrived, when she was telling me about her community—the people who raised her, inspired her, and shaped her to be the political candidate she is today—it became clear to me that I couldn’t put together the parts of this collage without including their voices. Furthermore, to understand her, you have to know a little bit about Colorado. Before coming here, I knew that the elevation of Denver is a mile and that there are a number of tall mountains people like to climb called 14ers. The people here really like how high they are. To set the stage of where Alyssa’s story is happening, I want to first dive into the history of Colorado.
William Wei: I am William Wei, Professor of Modern Chinese History at the University of Colorado, Boulder, and the 2024-2025 Colorado State Historian.
An important thing to know about Alyssa is that she’s well connected in the Denver area. So when I asked her, “Is there anyone I can talk to about the history of Colorado?” she casually introduced me not just to a Colorado historian but to the Colorado historian.
William Wei: We first met at the 2022 Asian American Heroes of Colorado Award Ceremony.
William and Alyssa met a couple years ago at an awards ceremony hosted by the Colorado Asian Culture and Education Network. Alyssa was recognized for her work as part of the Asian Chamber Foundation of Colorado, the Denver Buddhist Temple, and a leadership program offered by the Sakura Foundation. William is a board member of the Colorado Asian Pacific United and wrote the book, Asians in Colorado: A History of Persecution and Perseverance in the Centennial State. Among several projects engaging the public, he was also the lead advisor for an exhibit at the History Colorado Center in Denver called Zoom In: The Centennial State in 100 Objects.
William Wei: Throughout its history, Colorado has been inhabited by Native American tribes, such as the Ute, Arapaho, and Cheyenne. The state was part of the Louisiana Purchase in 1803 and became part of the Kansas Territory in 1854. Another important thing to keep in mind is that, in 1859, there was the Pike’s Peak gold rush, which brought thousands of prospectors to the area. And they established numerous mining towns and the eventual creation of the Colorado Territory in 1861. The discovery of silver in the 1870s further fueled the state’s economy and population growth.
Colorado is known as “The Centennial State” for being established a hundred years after the signing of the Declaration of Independence.
William Wei: Colorado officially became a state on August 1st, 1876, with Denver as its capital.
All right, I’m going to sound like someone who has only lived in states with distinguishable shapes. Colorado is a big rectangle. Let’s approximate that Denver is in the middle in that rectangle, and I-25 runs through the city and cuts the state roughly in half vertically. To the West are the mountains, and to the East are some hills and mostly plains. This unique geography provided different types of businesses to flourish.
William Wei: And the state’s economy continues to grow with the development of industries, such as, well, agriculture, manufacturing, and tourism. The one thing I can say is: This place attracts a lot of tourists, you know, from across the country and from around the world. Simply put, Colorado is a beautiful state.
There are about 5.7 million people who live in this beautiful state. Between 2010 and 2020, the population increased 14.8%, which made it the sixth fastest-growing state in the country.
William Wei: Throughout the 20th century, Colorado experienced, well, significant population growth and urbanization, which is, you know, common actually across the nation. And this urbanization, this growth, it was particularly true for Denver, the Denver metropolitan area.
The areas with the highest increases in residents are the suburban counties surrounding Denver.
William Wei: Today, I can say that Colorado is a very diverse and thriving state with a strong economy. If I were to summarize the history of the state, I would say its history is shaped by Native American heritage, the mining boom, and the ongoing growth and development. As you can tell, I’m a Colorado booster. I love this state. It’s a great state.
William loves Colorado I think for the same reasons that led to its rapid increase in population over the past few decades. There are beautiful landscapes, powder skiing, and when you’re tired of climbing mountains, there are options for art and entertainment in the urban centers. Along with sheer population growth, Colorado became a more diverse state racially and ethnically. About 70% of the population is White, and of the other 30%, Hispanic or Latino and Black or African American are the largest racial groups. Asians account for about 4.5% of the population of Colorado. That’s a little less than the 7% Asian population nationally, but it’s still a sizable number. It’s a little different for Latino and Black communities, but I think when we talk about Asian Americans in the US, there’s an assumption that we’re referring to recent immigrants, rather than Asians who migrated earlier, say before World War II. Granted, there are relatively few descendants of prewar Asian immigrants, and of course, recent immigrants continue to shape the fabric of American society today. I wouldn’t be here if my parents didn’t come to the US 40 years ago. But the assumption that Asians don’t have a deep history in this country ignores the existence of those who lived in places like Colorado generations ago, like Alyssa’s ancestors. The history of Asians living in Colorado is just as long as, if not longer than, the history of the state itself. I continue talking with William about his work on Asian Americans in Colorado after this quick break.
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Alyssa Nilemo is a fourth-generation Coloradan, and the long history of Asian Americans here was integral in keeping her grounded. Professor William Wei curated an exhibit of 100 objects that represented Colorado history. I asked whether there was an object in the collection that could give us a glimpse into the lives of some of the first Asians in the state.
William Wei: We were very fortunate to get a—well, let’s refer to it as a wedding garment. And it was contributed by Chin Lin Sou’s family’s descendants. They were like a seventh-generation pioneering family. The History Colorado collection, unfortunately, doesn’t have that many objects from the Chinese community. Many things they have, quite frankly, I didn’t want to include, you know, like opium pipes. I didn’t think that was particularly representative of what the community was like. So this wedding dress was good because it allowed me to tell the story of Chin Lin Sou, who is sometimes referred to as the mayor of Chinatown back then. And he was a very successful, well, entrepreneur, labor contractor, miner. He was originally a person who worked for the Central Pacific Railroad, which was the western half of the famous Transcontinental Railroad. The Central Pacific was built mainly by Chinese laborers. And they had to negotiate the toughest part of the Transcontinental Railroad because they had to cross the mountains and plains, such as the, well, Sierra Nevadas, the Rocky Mountains. They had to go through, you know, many bitter experiences to build that half.
There were more than 10,000 Chinese laborers who worked on the Central Pacific Railroad, and after its completion in 1869, many were released to find jobs in the Western market. Some, like Chin Lin Sou, ended up in Colorado. Chin is recognized to be the first Chinese person in Colorado, and it’s documented that he settled in Denver in June 1869, which was actually seven years before Colorado was established as a state. So that means Chinese Americans have lived here throughout the state’s existence. A pioneer for other Chinese Americans, Chin helped form a Chinatown in Denver’s Lower Downtown. I wish I could say that Chin and Chinese Americans like him were able to live happily ever after in a place like Colorado following years of challenging work building such important infrastructure for the country. In some ways, their community did thrive. William recounted being able to connect with the seventh-generation descendents of Chin Lin Sou. Nevertheless, it’s an understatement to say that the Chinese community in Denver endured hardships. The Chinese were forced to do jobs that white people didn’t want to do.
William Wei: So they were a very reliable workforce. The point is is that others, you know, thought that they were unfair competition. And they experienced economic dislocation and were looking for someone to blame and hence scapegoated the Chinese for this. All that is contributing to the Anti-Chinese Riot that occurred, essentially destroying Chinatown. But the Chinese—some left, but most remained. And the reason they remained is because it was home, right? It takes a lot to drive you out of your home.
They faced racism and physical altercations with other communities culminating in the Anti-Chinese Riot on October 31, 1880, when the Denver Chinatown was essentially destroyed. With perseverance, they rebuilt, and because Chinese people were driven out from smaller communities across the West due to ethnic cleansing and fled to the nearest largest community, Denver’s Chinese population actually went through subsequent growth spurts.
William Wei: But by the eve of World War II, the community actually declined in part because of urban renewal, a phenomenon that occurs to the present. But also because of the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, which, in effect, kept Chinese workers from entering the country.
Nationally, the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 stopped new immigrants from entering the country and prevented Chinese men from reuniting with their families unable to bring their wives and children. Coupled with anti-miscegenation laws, these limitations prevented the Chinese community in Colorado from expanding, and it eventually dispersed. As a result, there isn’t a centralized Chinese district in Denver anymore, and besides a mural and a few historical markers that William actually helped install, you can barely tell that there was once a Chinatown.
William Wei: As a result of the Hart-Cellar law in 1965, Chinese as well as other Asians, Asian Pacific Americans were allowed to come to the state, and they have come in large numbers back into the United States—well, in numbers equal to others.
From 1882 through the first half of the 20th century, there was some immigration from Asia, including Japan, but there was a significant change after World War II. The Hart-Cellar Act of 1965 allowed people from regions previously discriminated against to enter, and immigrants from across Asia came to the US. As a result, the number racial minorities in Colorado, including a multitude of Southeast Asian ethnic groups, increased. William was born in China and immigrated to the US with his family as a child, and he feels a deep connection with Asians who moved here long before him. Through organizations like Colorado Asian Pacific United and his work as the Colorado State Historian, William has been involved in educating the public on the adversities and accomplishments of Asian communities.
Toshiki Nakashige: This was a really wonderful opportunity. Thank you so much for giving me time.
William Wei: The pleasure is all mine. Thank you for including me in your podcast. You know, it’s been fun.
Before I move forward, I want to acknowledge that I’m only really discussing Chinese and Japanese Americans in this episode. According to the Colorado Lotus Project, there are at least 25 Asian American Native Hawaiian Pacific Islander identities represented. So I understand that what I’ve been calling the Asian community includes many other ethnic groups, histories, and experiences. At the risk of flattening this diverse group of people even more, let me share one more statistic. According to a 2023 Pew Research Center survey, about 60% of Asian Americans identify with or lean toward the Democratic Party. Generally speaking, Asian Americans tend to be more liberal. If it wasn’t clear already, you could label me as liberal. I’m a registered Democrat. My first time voting was for Barack Obama in his first term as president, and I spent my twenties in Berkeley, Boston, and Manhattan—perhaps the most progressive cities in the country. But I’m also from Texas, from a solidly Republican county. And I now live in a rural, mountainous region of Japan that’s culturally traditional and, by global standards, politically conservative. Even though I generally hold liberal and—I would even say—progressive views, I value morality and practicality more than anything else. My politics have always been contextual, and I think that’s what intrigues me about Alyssa’s political journey. Alyssa is running for the Colorado House of Representatives as the Democratic Party candidate. But I’m not supporting someone like Alyssa just because she’s a Democrat. It’s more nuanced than that. The Alyssa4Colorado campaign slogan is “People Before Politics,” and she’s running on a platform based on kindness. She doesn’t believe in sacrificing empathy for allegiance to a political party. This “kindness” worldview was inspired by her grandfather—a second-generation Japanese American who came to Colorado at the age of 13. She shares how he got to Colorado, after this break.
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Alyssa sees that a lot of Americans feel disaffected with politics, frustrated because there’s no reasoning with the other side. But instead of dismissing people you disagree with, she wants you to lean in and try to have a conversation with them. Show kindness. So why does Alyssa care so much about kindness in politics? Based on my interactions with people in her community, I see a lot of influences—the Denver Buddhist Temple, women role models like her mom, and professional mentors. But I think the root of her goodwill is actually tied to an important period of Colorado history that I haven’t talked about. Following Alyssa for a few weeks, I’ve now heard her stump speech about ten times in different venues to different audiences, and there’s one part that always elicits an emotional response from the crowd. I asked her to retell that part of her stump speech for me.
Alyssa Nilemo: Sure, so my grandfather was thirteen, and him and his family were living on the West Coast when World War II broke out. And during that time, the federal government decided that they were going to imprison Japanese Americans. It did not matter if they were citizens like my grandfather and his family were. Most people know the stories of families that were put into internment camps. A very small number of the population decided they were going to make a different journey. And that’s because, at the time, there was a rising star Republican governor by the name of Ralph Carr here in Colorado, who believed absolutely in the Constitution and felt that what the federal government was doing was beyond wrong. And so he sacrificed his political career to say, this is not okay. If you make it to the state of Colorado, you will not be imprisoned. And so my grandfather, other family members load up in this caravan and start to drive to Colorado. And as they’re making state crossings or major intersections with civilization, people have heard this caravan is coming and they’re throwing things at it, they’re threatening it, they’re waving guns at it. They’ve got terrible signs out. And it was just a very traumatic, long journey. And finally they make it to the border of Colorado, and the National Guard is there. And the family is sort of braced for what kind of interaction—maybe this was too good to be true. They’re about to be turned away. Maybe they’re going to be put into camps anyway. And instead, what they are received with is this warm welcome. And the way, in our family, in which we’ve kind of summarized that interaction is my grandfather remembers them just saying, “Welcome to the state of Colorado. Welcome to your home.” And so for my family, that became what Colorado was to us. It was a place that was above wartime politics. It was above fear and hate. It was people. And it was a place we belonged, and it was our home that we would fight and work for. And that’s the story that I talk to voters about because that is the Colorado I still see and believe in. And I know that’s the Colorado voters in my district want. They want that principled politician that is above party and is truly for what is right.
I think people who hear her tell this story about her grandfather are awestruck because they never actually learned about this part of Colorado history. During World War II, Japanese Americans were identified as national security threats because of fears of their allegiance to Japan. In 1942, US president Franklin D. Roosevelt, who was a Democrat, signed Executive Order 9066 that forced people of Japanese descent living on the West Coast to be incarcerated in ten concentration camps across seven states, including a camp known as Amache in Colorado. Governor Ralph Carr opposed the order, famously stating, “They are loyal Americans.” While the federal government ran Amache, Carr provided a place elsewhere in his state where Japanese Americans, including Alyssa’s grandfather, could live freely. Alyssa doesn’t put party allegiance above her morals. She’s the first to say that Governor Carr, who was a Republican, was a great politician. He showed kindness. Furthermore, Alyssa wasn’t even registered as a Democrat until last year. She was Unaffiliated. But she’s also pragmatic. To have a real shot at winning an election, to even get a foot in the door in our two-party system, she needed to register as a major political party. Maybe not perfectly, but because her views align more with the Democratic Party, she registered as a Democrat. Politically, I’m a Democrat, but as a podcaster, I’m independent. Meaning, I’m not employed by Alyssa’s campaign, and even though she’s my friend, I’m here to present an honest representation of who she is as a candidate and as a person. As a disclosure, I’ve donated $100 to her campaign, and to understand how her campaign works, I plan to volunteer. With that said, if you’re listening and want to do your own research on Alyssa, or perhaps make a contribution, her website is Alyssa4Colorado.com. The number 4. You’ve probably heard of the term Purple State to describe Colorado. In the last 30 years, Colorado has experienced a unique shift from a notoriously conservative state to a solidly liberal one. And feeling the expansion of the Denver Metro Area, Douglas County is in the midst of its own political transformation. I get the chance to talk with political experts and elected officials about these changes. That’s next time on Middleweight: District 44.
Rob Preuhs: Colorado had a reputation actually nationally as the “Hate State.”
Brad Geiger: We are a bellwether county, and because we’ve gone back and forth, there’s always this kind of fight for the soul of Douglas County.
Logan Davis: Parker is the redheaded stepchild of the Denver Metro Area.
Toshiki Nakashige: But for someone who’s looking at your race, understanding that there’s already a supermajority for the Democrats, why is it important that you’re even running?
Middleweight is produced by me, Toshiki Nakashige. The art for the podcast was created by Yoko Takahashi. Music was composed by Tim Greer and performed by Steve Denny and Gary Tsujimoto. Special thanks to Courtney Ozaki and Dustin Alarid. For more information about the podcast, please visit middleweightpodcast.com, and subscribe to the show wherever you listen to podcasts. My name is Toshiki Nakashige. Thanks for listening.