Coloradans applauded thunderously in Aurora on Thursday night when Democratic presidential candidate Amy Klobuchar told them how she would address student loans.

“In my first 100 seconds, the solution: fire Betsy Devos,” Klobuchar said to the estimated 1,100 people at a campaign rally in The Hangar at the Stanley Marketplace.

The three-term Democratic U.S. senator from Minnesota is campaigning in Colorado and other Super Tuesday states ahead of their March 3 primaries and caucuses in an effort to elbow her way to the front of the presidential candidate pack. 

Klobuchar proposed connecting the country’s education system to its economy, not through “bumper sticker solutions” like free college for all, but by investing in pre-K-12 education, offering free 1- and 2-year degrees, doubling Pell Grant dollars for 4-year degrees, and extending the student loan payback program to other in-demand occupations. 

“If millionaires can refinance their yachts, students should be able to refinance their loans,” Klobuchar said, to the approval of the audience.

The crowd also cheered when Klobuchar said she’d “bring down the pharmaceutical companies,” as part of her plan to lower health care costs. They cheered again when she brought up gun safety. 

Klobuchar said that she comes from a state like Colorado with a proud hunting tradition and noted that a Fox News Poll last summer that showed most hunters support gun restrictions. She blamed politicians’ fear of the National Rifle Association for the lack of sensible gun laws and contrasted it with the courageous acts of ordinary citizens during some of the country’s deadliest mass shootings, including the Aurora Theater shooting.

“I promise you,” Klobuchar said in reference to gun legislation, “I will have the courage to get it done.” 

Klobuchar’s rally was attended by moderate Republicans and many undecided Democrats and Independents as well as her supporters.

Mike Casey, a retired postal worker from Denver and registered Republican, was impressed with Klobuchar’s last two debate performances and came out to hear her speak in person. Casey, who said he will not be voting for President Donald Trump in November, calls Klobuchar “solid” and believes she’s the best candidate to beat him.  

“She doesn’t lean toward the give-away programs,” Casey said. “She’s more what I would call moderate.” 

Casey thinks U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders’ socialist label will make it impossible for him to win the presidency.

Sanders, the Democratic frontrunner, spoke to over 11,000 supporters at the Colorado Convention Center on Sunday.

Chloe Walsh, 10, who attended Sanders’ rally, observed a difference between that crowd and Klobuchar’s.

“There’s a lot of older people here compared to the Bernie rally,” Chloe Walsh told her mother, Jennifer Walsh.

The mother-daughter pair from Westminster, who had whittled the potential candidates down to Sanders and Klobuchar, attended both events in order to make an educated decision about whom to support.

Mail-in ballots began arriving to Coloradans last week and, as a result, visits from presidential candidates abound. 

While Klobuchar was speaking in Aurora, Trump was holding a rally with U.S. Sen. Cory Gardner and other Republican leaders in Colorado Springs, drawing an estimated 20,000 attendees both inside and outside the Broadmoor World Arena. 

On Monday, a day after Sanders’ visit, former Vice President Joe Biden attended a private fundraiser in Denver. 

Two more candidates will be holding town halls in the state later this week. Mayor Pete Buttigieg, who currently leads in delegates, will hold one in Aurora on Saturday, and Sen. Elizabeth Warren has one planned in Denver on Sunday.

Former New York mayor and presidential candidate Mike Bloomberg came to Colorado Feb. 1 to open a field office. Since November, when the latecomer entered the race, Bloomberg has used millions of his own dollars to flood the state with advertising and establish a comprehensive ground campaign. The billionaire’s debut on the presidential debate stage Wednesday night in Nevada, however, did not go well. 

It wasn’t Klobuchar’s best night either. 

After a stand-out debate performance in New Hampshire earlier this month, Klobuchar’s was notably less effective in the most combative Democratic debate yet, spending much of the night on the defensive. Sen. Elizabeth Warren derided Klobuchar’s health care plan, saying it was more “like a Post-it note” than a plan. Fellow centrist candidate Buttigieg attacked her voting record in the Senate and cast her experience as irrelevant for the job they both are seeking.

Klobuchar, however, told her audience on Thursday that she is the only Democratic presidential candidate that can win rural red districts, suburban areas like Aurora, and the independent and moderate Republican votes needed to beat Trump.

“I’m the only one up there [on the debate stage] that has won in districts like this one, who has won big time,” Klobuchar said. “Not once, not twice, but three times.”

In the last moments of her speech, Klobuchar urged the crowd to tell their friends who she is and what she’s about, stating that is how you build a movement.

“I’m asking you to do that for me and then: We will win, and we will beat Donald Trump.”