It pales of course in comparison to this year’s downright gaudy presidential contest, but the race to represent state Senate District 27 is one of the biggest political stories in Colorado.

Because Democrats fairly comfortably control the state House and the governor’s office, and Republicans control the Senate by only one seat, the District 27 contest is one of about six races that could deliver full control of the Legislature to Democrats – and either put an end to frustrating gridlock or wipe away crucial partisan checks and balances, depending on whom you ask.

Hoopla and hard work

“Sure, there was hoopla the first couple of weeks, but all that’s over now,” Sullivan told me last week. “It’s nothing but work now – and I like that. I feel like I’ve been preparing for this the last four years. I’ve been putting myself out there on the issues. I’ve been gathering the information, meeting people, showing up at the press conferences, attending committee hearings. I’ve been going to town halls – all those kinds of things. I’ve shown up.”

Sullivan is a retired postman. He delivered mail for three decades, joined the union and saved his money. He got married to his high school sweetheart, Terry. They had kids and then they bought a small house in an eastern Centennial bedroom community with a top-rated school district.

“At the Capitol, if I win, I think I’ll see things differently, more from the perspective of how policy affects everyday people,” he said. “I mean, me and Terry, we thought we were doing the right things and that we were part of the American dream, but you need to be aware of how small and how interconnected we all are.

“I feel we need to get some regular guys down there,” Sullivan said. “We got enough businessmen and lawyers and career politicians. I think I should be down there to keep the other lawmakers on task, keep them honest and let them know: ‘This is who this or that policy affects and this is how it affects them.’ It’s not a theory. It’s not a study. It’s real life.”

We’re talking in Sullivan’s living room at a well-loved wooden table. There’s another small table set along the wall behind him. On top are three boxes full of letters, cards and photos stacked in rows. The stuff is crammed into the boxes, piled up, but there’s an order to the arrangement. Sullivan is retired but he’s still doing the job.

Two years ago his life changed dramatically in a tragedy that riveted the country. Sullivan’s son Alex was one of the people murdered in the Aurora Theater shooting. It all happened in a flash, and Sullivan has been a public figure ever since, struggling in public settings with the meaning of the event, speaking on behalf of the victims, weighing in on gun rights, mental health policy, the justice system, capital punishment. Sullivan makes headlines wherever he goes. He appears with national figures when they come to town. But he’s not like other public figures. He doesn’t speak like other public figures. He’s sincere and intense and vulnerable.

In short, Sullivan is the kind of person Americans talk about when they poke holes in the air and talk about the need to shake up political business-as-usual by electing a non-politician to show the politicians how things should be done.

A break and a sweet spot

Before I talked to Sullivan, I met Tate on a street corner in Centennial about 15 miles west. Rain pattered on the leaves of the wide tree above us and dotted the fabric around the initials embroidered on the pocket of his blue button-down shirt.

“I’ll take the rain over the heat. It’s a nice break,” he said, folding and unfolding a fistful of pages covered with the names, addresses and party affiliations of voters that will guide his door-knocking for the next few hours. Tate tilts his head toward the sky. “I’m out here working every day. I’m not sitting by the pool – although that could be nice,” he joked.

Tate surely expected to escape the heat this summer – at least the political heat of an election likely to be much closer than anyone expected and a campaign that will grow more intense as the last weeks of the summer slip by and opportunities to connect with voters disappear as typical, last-push presidential-election-year madness – the usual flurry of campaign events, nonstop cheesy broadcast ads and nasty mailers – leads voters in September and October to step back and tune out.

Indeed, Sullivan and his campaign manager, Marguerita ten Houten, told me that right now is the “sweet spot,” that over the next weeks they’ll be hitting as many doors in the district as they can – before “all the noise blows in.”

“People at this point can still talk,” Sullivan said. “People will give you five minutes – or at least 30 seconds.” He bursts out laughing. “In September, I know all hell will break loose.”

Sullivan’s eyes are wide. He looks out the window. The sun is out. The sky is blue. He seems about to jump up from the table and rush out into the neighborhood to start knocking on doors.

On the rainy side of Centennial, Tate was a contrast of calm. He seemed only mildly concerned about the speed at which the campaign season seemed to be winding down.

Tripping off the tongue

Tate is a big guy with an easy manner and a quick wit. He is well liked at the Capitol and well respected. He is from Nashville, Tennessee. He attended Duke and Vanderbilt, the University of Missouri and the University of Colorado. Tate has degrees in engineering, finance and marketing. He has worked for major companies and headed up large projects. He smiles and speaks at once in whole paragraphs peppered with phrases that any job applicant at a glass-tower consultancy would kill to feel so casually tripping off of their tongue.

“My role is to provide folks with a coherent choice,” Tate said. “To the degree that I can simply present what I’m about and what I bring to the table, well, if people don’t want that, that’s fine. I’m not there at the doorstep to persuade someone to buy something that doesn’t make sense for this district, for this constituency. This is about getting to know people. Meeting them and talking to them and, for me, doing community research.

“It’s also a matter of being known for who I am,” he continued. “I’m an engineer, a problem solver, a project manager. I’m used to getting things done. So (campaigning) is just about becoming more widely known as that person.”

Tate said that the people he meets with mostly want to talk about jobs and education.

“People last year, for instance, wanted to talk a lot about the pricing shocks of Obamacare. Of course, there are always winners and losers when you pass public policy, and the losers in this case were small business entities, which – you know I’m an S corp advocate,” he adds, talking about a limited-liability startup tax category for businesses. It’s just an aside, for now. He continues. “So, you have people who have invested in their education, taken on debt, people who are seeing marginal income tax rates in their businesses, and now they have their health care premiums going through the roof. That’s a big hit …

“So I tell them I understand capital investment. I understand how tax policy and regulatory issues affect capital investment,” Tate said. “It’s an easy discussion for me to have about how jobs are created and how jobs are destroyed. It’s just macro-economics, basic macro-economics at that point.”

“You talk like this at the doors?” I ask.

“Oh, yeah, I do,” he said, smiling. “This is a very well-educated community. I had someone yesterday who wanted talk about the pros and cons of supply-side economics. And, of course- like anything else – it’s an issue at certain tax rates and not at others.”

I nodded.

Tate was named University of Colorado Legislator of the Year for sponsoring a bill that is reportedly saving the system millions. Tate’s bill “lifted some statutory restrictions on how the university can underwrite its debt,” he said.

Tate talks fluidly about getting more money into the state’s schools by “making education a higher budget priority and by controlling costs.” He said the state is spending too much money on “socio-economic re-engineering efforts made by the opposition party,” by which I take it he means the state is spending too much on Obama-era expanded health care coverage programs. He added that schools could spend less on overhead, including student testing.

The money

It’s still at least semi-early, but neither Tate nor Sullivan say they’ve seen any sign that outside interests are spending money in the race. Both candidates are successful fundraisers.

In July, Tate reported raising $15,337 and spending $2,439, leaving him $77,040 cash on hand. He received his largest donation from a realtor donor committee in the amount of $4,850. Other top donors include business and engineer committees and the Colorado Health Care Association, an assisted living and longterm care trade group.

Tate’s donor lists reflect his areas of interest as a lawmaker – and the simple fact that he’s a sitting legislator who can influence the law. Individuals from the finance industry and lobbyists from Axiom Strategies, Bowditch Public Affairs, Brownstein Hyatt and the University of Colorado have all pitched in to support his reelection.

Sullivan for the same period reported raising $24,972 and spending $5,056, leaving him $44,866 cash on hand. He has received his largest donations from the state Democratic Party, totaling $7,500 as of August 1, as well as from Colorado firefighter, education and plumbers’ unions and a pro-choice health care group.

Sullivan’s individual donors reflect his personal history and his legislative interests. Postal workers have donated to his campaign, and so have Coloradans employed at national anti-gun violence group Everytown for Gun Safety.

Energized opponents and a different walk

Tate told me he was approaching this year’s race the way he approached the two races he won in 2014 to represent state House District 37. It was a Republican wave year but it was Tate’s first ever legislative race and he ended up shellacking Democratic opponent Nancy Cronk by 16 points.

“I had two tough election races that year – a tough primary campaign and a tough general election campaign,” he said. “I faced highly energized opponents, highly energized opposition. I won both races handily with a lot of work. I think this race is the same. It’s a larger district, but the geography is similar, the constituency is similar, the issues of concern are similar. You look at it, it’s a fairly consistent cross-section of suburbia. You don’t see the kind of heterogeneity that poses challenges in other districts,” he said.

Tate played down the Sullivan candidacy. In fact, he said he didn’t know much at all about Sullivan.

“I know very little about my opponent – about his resume, his educational background, nothing,” he said.

Tate is being shrewd. He surely knows that Sullivan’s resume and educational background are perhaps the least interesting things about him – a stint in the Air Force at the end of the Vietnam War, a degree from Metro State on the GI Bill, a middle class job – except in so far as they look a lot like the resumes and educational backgrounds compiled by a lot of Americans, particularly the kind who almost never run for seats in the Senate – no state Senate seats or U.S. Senate seats – no Senate seats of any kind.

Sullivan says that people often recognize him at the doors.

“Sometimes people blow you off initially, you know. But then they come back out of the home, carrying the literature I gave them, walk me down just to talk. It happens more often than you would think. ‘Tom,’ they say. They tell me they were on the phone, but that they know who I am and I can count on their support. You know, like that.”

“You can’t lead with the theater,” Sullivan says. “That’s not fair to anyone. But it comes up. They ask about my background. I tell them I’m retired. They say, ‘So why screw that up? Why do you want to do this?’ I tell them, ‘Look, this is what happened to me,’ you know? I tell them there are so many issues I see now that are related, about community and safety and justice, and that I should be down there.”

Sullivan says he tells campaign volunteers to be prepared.

“‘This may be a different walk than you have done for other candidates,’ I say. There’s that six-degrees of separation thing. We ran into one of the theater managers, into one of Alex’s teachers, people who went to school with him, all of these types of things.”

– john.tomasic@gmail.com