Colorado state Sen. Barbara Kirkmeyer has the most political and governmental experience of the many candidates running for the 2026 Republican nomination for governor of Colorado.

If she wins the Republican primary, she will have a decent chance of winning the governorship in the general election in November, even though Colorado is a decidedly blue state.

Kirkmeyer represents District 23 in the state Senate, which is composed of parts of Larimer and Weld counties.

She is a member of two of the most important committees in the state legislature: the Appropriations Committee and the Joint Budget Committee.

Membership on the JBC is particularly important. That committee spends considerable extra time meeting in Denver, studying every aspect of state government and recommending the specific budget figures for each department and bureau.

JBC members have the best opportunity of anyone in the legislature to understand Colorado’s government and its problems “from the inside out.”

Barbara Jean Kirkmeyer is a fourth-generation Coloradan who was born in 1958 and grew up on a dairy farm in Jefferson County. She has made her home in Weld County, near Fort Lupton, for the past 35 years.

Kirkmeyer is a 1980 graduate of the University of Colorado Boulder. She is a mother and grandmother.

She began her political and governmental career as a Weld County commissioner. She served eight years, from 1993 to 2001.

She then became the acting executive director of the Department of Local Affairs under Republican Gov. Bill Owens. The Department of Local Affairs is located next door to the state Capitol.

After that, she returned to Weld County and served 12 more years as a Weld County commissioner. From there, she moved on to her current position as a state senator from Weld and Larimer counties.

Kirkmeyer became a candidate for the Republican nomination for governor in 2026 by petitioning on to the ballot. She collected more than 21,000 voter signatures that were certified by the secretary of state.

Her campaign for governor has been endorsed by The Denver Gazette.

She also has been endorsed by former Colorado Springs Mayor John Suthers, Aurora Mayor Mike Coffman, former U.S. Rep. Scott McInnis from the Western Slope and by Owens.

In other words, she is the candidate favored by the Republican establishment in Colorado.

When she announced her gubernatorial campaign, Kirkmeyer said it was time to end “eight years of single party (and often far-left) control of our legislature and Governor’s Office.”

Kirkmeyer also says she is a person who “works across the aisle,” which would be necessary in Colorado. She added that was a characteristic “needed for governors.”

Two other members of the legislature are running for the Republican nomination: state Rep. Scott Bottoms of Colorado Springs and Sen. Mark Baisley of Woodland Park.

In the Democratic Party, there is a highly competitive struggle for the nomination for governor between longtime U.S. Sen. Michael Bennet and Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser.

Bennet, an attorney, was a former superintendent of schools for Denver. Weiser, also an attorney, was a former dean of the University of Colorado Boulder Law School.

The Democrats are running vigorous campaigns with strong financing. There is the prospect of negative campaigning in the Democratic Primary that could tarnish the reputations of both candidates.

And therein lies Kirkmeyer’s best chance of winning the governorship, assuming she gets the Republican nomination.

If Bennet and Weiser are politically weakened by a rough primary, disgruntled voters might give up on the Democrats and vote for a Republican.

Two added factors are at work in this election cycle: Independent voters are now the major force in general elections and Gov. Jared Polis has been more of a polarizing than unifying force in the past couple of years.

So an upset could happen despite Kirkmeyer’s challenge of being associated with President Donald Trump’s “party.” Stay tuned.

News columnists Tom Cronin and Bob Loevy write about national and Colorado politics.