Darryl who?

U.S. Rep. Doug Lamborn didn’t have time until late Wednesday to comment on news he’ll be facing a second challenger in next year’s Republican primary for his seat representing Colorado’s 5th Congressional District.

At the end of last week, El Paso County Commissioner Darryl Glenn, the GOP’s 2016 U.S. Senate nominee, was telling key Republicans he planned to join state Sen. Owen Hill in next year’s primary for Lamborn’s seat, Colorado Politics was first to report. A few days earlier, Hill said he planned to report raising $225,000 in the fundraising quarter just ended, a record sum since Lamborn has been in office. Things were heating up in the heavily Republican district.

But Lamborn, a six-term incumbent who sits on the House Armed Services Committee, was on the other side of the world, traveling with the panel’s Strategic Forces Subcommittee on a fact-finding trip in Asia and elsewhere in the Pacific until late Sunday. He would be nearly impossible to reach, an aide said, because of time-zone differences and the classified nature of some of the trip’s proceedings.

Come Monday, Lamborn still hadn’t arrived stateside – the congressional delegation encountered unexpected delays on its return trip – and had yet to weigh in on the growing Republican field hoping to unseat him.

A couple more days passed before Lamborn campaign spokesman Jarred Rego was able to get back to Colorado Politics with his boss’s take on Glenn’s entrance in the race, and it could be a dismissive comeback for the ages.

“The congressman is working on numerous policy amendments to the National Defense Authorization Act ahead of its expected passage this week,” Rego said. “His focus is on polices that strengthen our national security needs and protect and grow our local military missions, not on the ambitions of local politicians.”

Ouch. That might leave a mark.