George Brauchler, once lost in a primary pack running for governor, is walking on sunshine now that he’s the lone Republican in the attorney general’s race – an office Republicans usually win.

Colorado Politics on Tuesday laid out the way the Brauchler found himself in this position, as four Democrats slug in out in what’s likely to be an expensive campaign on the left. The race includes state Rep. Joe Salazar, Denver attorney Brad Levin, former University of Colorado law school dean Phil Weiser, Jefferson County deputy DA Michael Dougherty and former federal prosecutor Amy Padden.

Without having to court a specific constituency to muster enough votes to get out of a primary, we get a clearer picture of who he might be as an officeholder instead of candidate. If Brauchler wins, the next Republican state prosecutor will be a bit different than the last.

Take abortion, still a potent issue with the conservative base fueled by an effective activist corps. The current attorney general, Cynthia Coffman is currently fluid on the issue as she runs for governor. Her campaign said she’s never publicly stated her position and she’ll announce one at some point on the campaign. In reality, abortion rights are a matter for the U.S. Supreme Court, not the state.

Brauchler is pretty clear on his personal view, election, Supreme Court or come what may.

“I’m pro-life; look, I’ve been Roman Catholic my whole life,” he said. “But, I’ll say this, I’m not looking to re-do the current status of the law on any of these (federal) issues. That’s not why I’m running for AG. That’s not why I was running for governor.”

He said if the courts or Congress sent the abortion rights back to Colorado as a states rights issue, a long-shot concept, “there would be a robust debate on what that would mean,” Brauchler said. “Do I for a moment think Colorado would become an anti-abortion state across the board? I do not. I don’t think so. I spent my whole life growing up here.”

Braucher, like Coffman and Gov. John Hickenlooper, said he would defend Colorado’s regulated marijuana industry against federal intervention from U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions. He is more focused on the black market that prospers in the shadows of legal weed.

“I’m a firm believer that Coloradans out to in almost every circumstance be in charge of regulating Coloradans,” he said. “And that’s true whether the outcome of some election on a ballot issue is one I supported. Fifty-five percent of Colorado voters chose to put it in the state constitution. It is a legal business.”

He noted that Hickenlooper has a proposed task force to flush out the illegal pot producers and sellers, but it lacks enough help for local prosecutors to take those those cases to trial. As attorney general, his office would find the money and manpower to help without taking over the cases from local prosecutors.

He said the regulated industry is not the enemy.

“I’m sold on the idea that these guys have spent millions of dollars to comply with a pretty onerous regulatory framework and they are keenly aware that they take a black eye in the public anytime anything bad happens with marijuana,” Brauchler said. “They understand that people connect any of the ills of marijuana with their industry.”

On the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, which protects about 17,000 immigrants from deportation, Brauchler said it’s a constitutional matter not a political matter: whether the president can override the law. President Obama declared the Dream Act to shield those brought to the U.S. as children as long as they’re contributors to society. Brauchler said federal immigration law is a matter for Congress to settle, a position similar to Coffman’s. Coffman refused to join a multi-state lawsuit to override President Trump’s plan to end the program.

“What I thought his fiat did was act as an end run around existing federal law,” Brauchler said of Obama. “Whether you agree with the federal law or not, I don’t believe it’s a power the executive has to say we’re going to stop enforcing the law.”

In 2015, as Hickenlooper was championing state efforts to surpass Obama’s Clean Power Plan, Coffman was joining a multi-state lawsuit to block it.

“I don’t want to be an activist attorney general,” Brauchler said. “I don’t want to legislate through litigation. But at the same time I’ve very sensitive to protecting Colorado from an overreaching federal government, especially when it comes to regulatory things like that.”

To him, when the EPA, not Congress, hands down costly regulations, he’s more likely to oppose them, too. That’s what happened with the Obama administration’s plan to curb greenhouse emissions primarily by going after coal-fired power plants.

Moreover, Brauchler would appeal to the legislature to address such matters, and not bow to the federal government

Last month, Coffman defended the state’s anti-discrimination law in a brief to the U.S. Supreme Court in a case involving a Lakewood baker who refused to make a wedding cake for a same-sex couple.

Brauchler said there should be nuance in the law to provide an exception for a product of art, while not torpedoing state laws that protect equal rights.

“I think the Supreme Court is going to come down with a ruling and carve out an exception for this one limited, fact-specific situation where it’s not just religious freedom but artistic expression,” he said.

The Arapahoe County district attorney said he never got far enough along in the governor’s race, against a half dozen viable candidates, to work up a short list of who his lieutenant governor might be.

But he did pick a candidate to endorse.

“Yeah, it’ll be the primary winner,” he said of the field of Republicans.