Republican congressional candidate Dave Williams, the chairman of the Colorado GOP, this week landed an endorsement from the House Freedom Fund, the political arm of the conservative House Freedom Caucus.

Williams is running against podcaster and Americans for Prosperity executive Jeff Crank in the June 25 primary for the heavily Republican 5th Congressional District seat held by retiring U.S. Rep. Doug Lamborn.

In its endorsement statement, the House Freedom Fund noted that Williams is one of only a few candidates for open seats this cycle who has been endorsed by former President Donald Trump. Williams, the organization added, “stands in stark contrast to many party chairs in that he doesn’t cower to pressure. He is an unapologetic conservative.”

Williams previously won endorsements from prominent members of the House Freedom Caucus, including Matt Gaetz of Florida, Bob Good of Virginia, Paul Gosar of Arizona and Mary Miller of Illinois. The group of about three dozen House Republicans has frequently been at odds with the chamber’s GOP leadership this session.

“I’m honored and humbled that America’s best congressional leaders are all in for our campaign to take power away from DC and return it back to ‘We the People,’ where it belongs,” Williams told Colorado Politics.

“Like Donald Trump, they trust and endorsed me because just like them, we know the last thing our broken Congress needs is another crony insider lobbyist like Jeff Crank who sells us out to appease his billionaire puppet masters.”

Williams said that if he’s elected in November, he plans to join the House Freedom Caucus.

Crank counts endorsements from Lamborn, House Speaker Mike Johnson and a slew of past Republican officeholders, including former Gov. Bill Owens, former U.S. Sen. Hank Brown and former Colorado Secretary of State Wayne Williams.

Americans for Prosperity Action, the political arm of Crank’s employer and a part of the fundraising network founded by industrialist Charles Koch, has also endorsed Crank and vowed to spend heavily in the primary. According to Federal Election Commission reports, the group has so far spent a little over $90,000 on digital advertising and canvassing to support Crank.

A spokesman for Crank’s campaign called it “incredibly interesting” that Williams was touting an endorsement by an  organization led by “one of the leading anti-Trump voices in Congress,” referring to Virginia Republican Rep. Bob Good, the chairman of the Freedom Caucus. “We’ll be happy to let him try to square that fact with his previous actions and rhetoric for the voters.”

Good, who is locked in a primary of his own with a Trump-endorsed challenger, drew the former president’s ire when he supported Nikki Haley in the Republican presidential primary earlier this year.

Earlier this cycle, the fund endorsed U.S. Rep. Lauren Boebert, a longstanding member of the House Freedom Caucus running in a six-way primary for the 4th Congressional District seat formerly held by Republican Ken Buck, who resigned in March. A founding member of the caucus in 2015, Buck was expelled from its ranks just days before he departed from Congress, The Hill reported.

In 2022, the House Freedom Fund spent just over $500,000 to support Boebert’s reelection bid in the Western Sloped-based 3rd Congressional District, where she won a second term by fewer than 600 votes in the closest House contest in the country. In late 2023, Boebert announced she was moving across the state to run in the more reliably Republican 4th CD, which covers the Eastern Plains.

Roughly coinciding with the boundaries of El Paso County, the 5th CD isn’t as solid red as Buck’s former district, but in the 50 years since its creation, its voters have never elected a Democrat.

Democrats River Gassen, a scientist and astronomy teacher, and Joe Reagan, an Army veteran and veterans’ advocate, are running in their party’s primary for the seat.

Primary ballots go in the mail to voters at the beginning of June and are due back to the county clerk by June 25.

Editor’s note: This story has been updated to include a comment from Crank’s campaign.