Gabe Evans (R-inc.) vs. Manny Rutinel (D)
I. The Race
Gabe Evans (Republican) is seeking a second term in the U.S. House after upsetting Yadira Caraveo in 2024. That outcome was one of the biggest GOP surprises and instrumental in winning a very narrow majority. Evans had been a police officer and member of the Colorado House of Representatives prior to becoming a Congressman.
Manny Rutinel (Democrat) is also a former member of the Colorado House of Representatives; he was appointed in 2023 to fill the vacancy in District 32, and won his only full term in 2024 by running unopposed in an overwhelmingly Democrat district.
They are joined on the ticket by Libertarian candidate David Wood, who looks to play spoiler for Evans or Rutinel.
II. District Geography
Colorado’s 8th Congressional District (CO-8) is north of Denver proper, and includes the most populated portion of Adams and Weld Counties, as well as a tiny sliver of Larimer County. The district is highly urbanized/suburbanized and has a median household income of over $100,000.
The district has a surprisingly high concentration of Hispanics (38.5% of the population), and GOP gains in 2024 were key to flipping the seat with Trump and Evans, whose grandfather was a Mexican immigrant, on the ticket. Trump had carried the district in 2016 thanks to a better suburban white share and a high third-party vote share sandbagging Clinton, then lost it in 2020 thanks to suburban drift (and mail-in balloting on steroids). He won it back thanks to the Hispanic gains throughout mostly Adams County.
Presidential Margins
Key Statistics
51.7% White, 38.5% Hispanic
III. Market Assessment
Polymarket bettors give Evans very little shot at holding onto the seat, and are overvaluing Rutinel based on polling, Colorado’s overall drift, and the view that CO-8 is one of the most vulnerable Republican-held seats.
IV. History
We lose the trail on the turf that has become CO-8 beginning with the 2022 election. Colorado gained a seat thanks to population growth, and with it, split up the old CO-6 to be even more favorable to Democrats, and divided Weld County (with the remainder in Lauren Boebert’s CO-4).
When Jason Crow knocked out Mike Coffman in 2018, the warning signs had been there. While Coffman held the seat in 2016, Trump lost it by 9 points. In 2018, the House margin caught up with the previous presidential margin, and the impact was felt all throughout suburban Denver – particularly in Arapahoe and Adams Counties.
CO-6 has since been recut for Crow, and the new CO-8 eliminates Arapahoe County and readjusts for the slices of Adams, Larimer, and Weld Counties now making it up. In its first live test (2022), Democrats secured CO-8, but not by much:
Richard Ward, the Libertarian on the ballot, may have denied Barbara Kirkmeyer the win in 2022, thereby giving Evans the pathway to flip the seat with Trump on the ballot making major gains with Hispanics:
Here is a real-life example from a precinct in Adams County near Thornton with a 57% Hispanic population showing these minority gains:
Trump lost it by 16.8%, improved from the 35.0% margin of defeat in 2016. That is a 228-vote improvement at the top of the ticket for overall margin, and similar gains are seen all throughout the district (especially in Adams County).
The biggest area of concern with the seat is the year (GOP president midterm) and the type of electorate (suburban, with a big swing in 2018 documented).
V. Analysis of 2026 Primary Results
Evans ran unopposed in the GOP primary, and has no work to do for consolidating the party.
Rutinel, propped up by activist groups, shredded Shannon Bird. Bird presents as a typical suburban moderate who would have easily pulled away the middle of the electorate in a Democrat-favorable year. Bird, in the Colorado House, voted against restrictions on local cooperation with ICE and maintained a bipartisan reputation. Rutinel is a climate extremist who has scrubbed his campaign materials of most of his radical past, which includes a desire to reform agriculture and energy in ways that would relinquish local control. in a big way. Weld County produces 83% of Colorado’s crude oil and 56% of its natural gas, and has a bustling cattle industry, and Evans has made Rutinel’s extreme positions widely known.
The primaries, despite the hostile electoral terrain of the Denver suburbs, gave Evans a huge break and a window to steal victory from the jaws of defeat.
VI. Polls
Poll pulled from The New York Times:
The only poll out there worth commenting on is from one of the few reputable pollsters left – McLaughlin & Associates. It has Evans up two, but short of a majority.
VII. Media Ratings
Everyone but Decision Desk has this race marked “toss-up.” Decision Desk is bullish most likely because of Colorado vibes, rather than considering candidate quality and the type of electorate these candidates are performing for.
VIII. Party Registration
In yet another sign that Hispanics aren’t running back to rejoin Democrats, CO-8 has eased further toward even in party registration. Both Republicans and Democrats have lost membership since November 2024, but the Democrats have lost more. While party registration is highly predictive for presidential elections, it is not for midterms because of the serious turnout differentials and various reactions to the administration. Still, this is an encouraging indicator for Evans.
IX. Election Considerations
Despite the rantings of Secretary of State Jena Griswold and her insistence that Colorado’s elections represent the “gold standard” in America, nothing could be further from the truth. Colorado practices the three cardinal sins of elections:
• Automatic Voter Registration
• Universal Mail-In Voting (everyone gets a ballot in the mail)
• Ballot harvesting (with legal limits that cannot be enforced)
Just like they say no lead is safe in Coors Field (a baseball idiom), there is no tight race, such as the one CO-8 is shaping up to be, that is outside the margin of mail-in ballot stuffing. You can read all about Colorado’s election laws in my 2024 review, Lower Rockies – 2024 Election Compendium (January 4, 2025).
The nature of Colorado’s elections gives Rutinel a potentially decisive edge.
X. Summary and Election Estimate
This race reminds me a bit of MI-7. While the ethnic demographics of the voters are quite different, this is a seat that would have been a nearly-automatic pickup for Democrats (even easier than MI-7) had they nominated a vanilla moderate, such as Bird; unfortunately for them, their rabid grassroots voters who care little about the energy production of Weld County nominated someone who checked more diversity boxes, but is extremely unqualified.
Evans hit him hard last night over his radical positions, including weakness on drug culture and law and order:
.@GabeforColorado RIPS Manny Rutinel for putting Coloradans at risk: "He voted for a bill in the state legislature to legalize hard drug usage locations…he’s a defund the police, open borders radical."
RNC Research (@RNCResearch), Oct 7, 2026
Here is how the key factors in this race stack up:
Forecast for CO-8 House
Remember, when I have any race at 55/45, I consider it a coin toss. Rutinel gets the hunch edge because of the trend of Colorado over the past decade, the nature of mail-in voting states, and the suburban/rural divide featured in CO-8. It will be hard for Republicans to hold all of Trump’s gains with Hispanics in a midterm cycle, and the suburban white electorate ran hard left in 2018; still, Rutinel’s radical nature and positions may completely prevent any leftward shift, and if that happens, Evans will be reelected.
This forecast is no knock on Evans, who is vastly underpriced in the markets and positioned perhaps better than any candidate looking to hold down a seat that appears to be in the first tier of Democrat flips in a normal year with sane candidates on the ballot.
Seth Keshel, MBA is a Senior Fellow at the Gold Institute for International Strategy and a retired Army Captain. He publishes Captain K’s Corner on Substack.
