The House Democrats’ largest super PAC on Tuesday launched an ad attacking Republican congressional candidate Gabe Evans over the state lawmaker’s opposition to abortion.

Airing on broadcast and cable stations in the Denver TV market, the House Majority PAC’s 30-second spot is narrated by a local OB-GYN, who calls the GOP nominee’s record of support for a sweeping abortion ban “too extreme for Colorado.”

Evans, a first-term legislator and former police officer, is challenging Democratic U.S. Rep. Yadira Caraveo, a pediatrician and former state lawmaker, in the closely divided 8th Congressional District. Covering parts of Adams, Larimer and Weld counties north of the Denver metro area, the district is one of a dozen or so seats nationwide both parties agree could determine who will win the House majority after the November election.

Evans blasted the ad in a statement as a “desperate” attempt to distract voters from issues he wants to focus on, including crime and immigration.

The ad is the first salvo in the Democratic group’s previously announced $4 million in fall TV reservations for the race. In all, both parties’ national House campaign committees and super PACs associated with the chamber’s leadership have booked about $13 million worth of ads in the district.

“My patients deserve to be treated with compassion, but extreme politicians would rather treat them like criminals,” says Dr. Emily Schneider, a board-certified obstetrician gynecologist who practices in the Denver area, in the ad.

Pointing to Evans’ answers to a candidate survey when he ran for the legislature two years ago, Schneider says the Republican “supports banning abortion, even here in Colorado, and even in cases of rape or incest, forcing a woman to carry and deliver her abuser’s child.”

Adds Schneider: “Gabe Evans is just too extreme for Colorado. He should never have the power over our lives. He should never represent us in Congress.”

Evans called the attack a misleading characterization of his record, maintaining that he has “always” supported banning abortion with exceptions for rape, incest and to save the mother’s life.

“Yadira Caraveo and her allies are clearly desperate,” Evans said in an emailed statement. “Instead of explaining Yadira Caraveo’s deadly open-border, pro-criminal, and go-easy-on-fentanyl-dealer policies, they make up an abortion attack ad against me that has no basis in reality. The voters will not fall for this. My position is clear: I oppose a federal abortion ban — it’s an issue for the states — and I’ve always supported exceptions for rape, incest, and the life of the mother.”

Evans’ political opponents contend that he hasn’t always espoused that particular position.

The ad cites Evans’ response during the 2022 campaign to the Freedom Voter Guide, a survey that asked candidates to state their positions on a number of questions. Evans checked the column indicated he supported “Prohibiting abortion except when necessary to save the mother’s life.”

Also last cycle, iVoter Guide, a division of American Family Association Action, asked candidates, “Under what circumstances should abortion be allowed?”

According to a copy of the survey obtained by Colorado Politics, Evans responded: “Life begins at conception. If the circumstances wouldn’t warrant killing a born person, the unborn also should not be killed.”

Two years ago, Democratic groups supporting Caraveo spent heavily to attack her Republican opponent, state Sen. Barb Kirkmeyer, over her record opposing abortion. In the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court decision overturning Roe v. Wade just months before the 2022 election, the issue was considered decisive in numerous races, including Caraveo’s narrow win by less than 1 percentage point.

Last month, analysts at Sabato’s Crystal Ball moved the 8th CD from “leans Democratic” into the toss-up column. 

Mail ballots start going out to most Colorado voters on Oct. 11 and are due back to county clerks by 7 p.m. Nov. 5.