No single individual has greater influence over public safety and criminal justice than district attorneys, and they are all on the ballot this year. Several of Colorado’s most important DAs races will offer an opportunity to either embrace the offender-friendly approach that has fueled our crime tsunami, or turn to a system that insists on accountability and prioritizes victims.

Because Colorado is the only state in the U.S. that term-limits its district attorneys, Colorado saw more than half its DAs replaced four years ago. Nationwide, in the aftermath of George Floyd’s murder, numerous inexperienced prosecutor candidates were elected on platforms of experimental and sweeping criminal justice reform. Communities throughout America and Colorado are reconsidering those decisions.

One lesson learned is undeniable: elected DAs with scant state prosecution experience are the most susceptible to adopting the politically appealing and demonstrably ineffective policy de jour of their extremist base. The examples are everywhere.

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San Francisco: Democrat Chesa Boudin — who had no prosecution experience and only five years as a deputy public defender — ran for DA on a platform of “decarceration” (emptying jails and prisons). He garnered the endorsement of Bernie Sanders and narrowly defeated three prosecution-experienced candidates through ranked-choice voting. After progressive Boudin’s election, crime in San Francisco exploded. Fewer than 30 months after he took office, voters removed Boudin through an unprecedented recall election.

Chicago: In 2016, Kim Foxx — supported by a PAC with $300,000 of George Soros money — became Cook County state attorney on a platform that included reduced prosecutions and ending cash bail. In her first year in office, the incarceration rate in Cook County dropped nearly 20%. Crime got worse. A Soros PAC put $2 million into her 2020 re-election. Plagued by growing criticism of her policies, charging decisions, growing lawlessness in the city, and mishandling of high-profile cases involving Jussie Smollett and R. Kelly, Foxx chose not to seek re-election this year.

Portland: In 2020, after only five years of prosecution experience that had ended seven years earlier, Mike Schmidt was elected DA for Multnomah County (Portland) running on a platform that opposed mandatory prison sentences and against treating violent juvenile offenders as adults. Schmidt — a proud “progressive prosecutor” — refused to prosecute criminal offenders who participated in the George Floyd protests and implemented measures to decriminalize the possession of drugs. Google “crime in Portland” to see how that approach worked out. Despite an infusion of $213,000 in Soros-linked support, Schmidt was defeated by nearly 10 points by a career-prosecutor candidate from within his own office.

Colorado has its own examples. In July 2022, 12th Judicial District DA Alonzo Payne was run out of his southern Colorado office 18 months after running uncontested in the 2020 post-George Floyd general election. The Bernie Sanders-endorsed Democrat defeated the incumbent DA — a former police officer — pledging to eliminate cash bail throughout his jurisdiction. He had zero prosecution experience. Payne prioritized soft-on-crime policies over complying with Colorado’s victim’s-rights laws. The community revolted. Payne resigned after constituents gathered sufficient signatures to place his recall on the ballot. He has since been disbarred from the practice of law.

What about this year in Colorado?

The 2020 Democrat nominee for the 18th Judicial District (Arapahoe, Douglas, Elbert and Lincoln counties), Amy Padden, received Bernie Sanders’ endorsement and ran on a platform of broad reform, claiming “racism and systemic inequities continue in our criminal justice system.” She pledged not to ever prosecute juvenile offenders as adults. With light experience as a part-time rural prosecutor of low-level state criminal offenses, Padden narrowly lost to uber-experienced Republican John Kellner in Colorado’s most populous jurisdiction. Four years later, it may be different.

As of January 2025, there will be a new, heavily Democrat 18th Judicial District (Arapahoe County only). It will be the third-largest district in Colorado. Kellner is entering the private sector. Padden, a self-proclaimed “true progressive” who was supported by Soros family contributions in her earlier campaigns for DA and attorney general, is the presumptive Democrat nominee. Recently, the Colorado Court of Appeals overturned a conviction for gun-related crimes Padden obtained due to prosecutorial misconduct. She will face Republican and former DA Carol Chambers (2005-2013), a career prosecutor.

In Denver, the second largest district, DA Beth McCann’s decision not to seek re-election has resulted in a de facto two-way race between Democrats Leora Joseph and John Walsh. Walsh was a successful federal white-collar prosecutor in California 30 years ago who later served as President Obama’s U.S. Attorney in Colorado from 2010-2016 (longest in state history), where he oversaw the federal criminal and civil litigation of the office. Walsh unsuccessfully ran for DA in 2004 and U.S. Senate in 2020. He appears never to have been a state prosecutor or personally prosecuted violent crime. Joseph’s career in state prosecution spans multiple decades and includes leadership roles in several metro area prosecutors’ offices. She has personally prosecuted countless violent offenders and victimizers of women and children. She has never run for public office before.

This year, Arapahoe and Denver have clear choices to make. Will they follow the dramatic shift back to experienced state prosecutors by progressive counties across America, or will they roll the public safety dice and hope for a different outcome than we have seen everywhere?

George Brauchler is the former district attorney for the 18th Judicial District and is a candidate for district attorney in the newly created 23rd Judicial District. He has served as an Owens Early Criminal Justice Fellow at the Common Sense Institute. Follow him on Twitter(X): @GeorgeBrauchler.