Colorado Republican Congressman Ken Buck warned Monday that a Democratic administration with California Sen. Kamala Harris at the top is a “dangerous” prospect for the American economy with some far-reaching consequences that would stretch through Colorado.
“She is the personification of the radical left,” Buck told The Federalist in an exclusive interview, arguing her addition to the ticket makes for a prime opportunity for Republicans to reclaim Colorado after having lost the state in every presidential election since 2008. “It’s not a choice that’s going to play well when her voting record of public service is exposed,” Buck said, but added, “[Biden] didn’t have a whole lot to choose from when you think about how far to the left the Democratic Party has gone.”
The recent 25-plus candidate primary indeed pushed the Democratic Party to an almost unrecognizable extreme where two of the party’s self-proclaimed socialist senators gave Biden his most fiercest competition in the crowded contest, while party moderates consistently failed to break into the top ten running. Framing himself as a pragmatic moderate throughout the race, Biden’s campaign almost collapsed under the weight of the growing movement dragging the party left at breakneck speed, despite Biden already operating on a platform of one of the most progressive candidates in the modern American history.
“Biden’s current set of policy prescriptions would likely be considered radical if they had been proposed in any previous Democratic presidential primary,” legacy news outlet McClatchy reported last September in a rare occurrence of honest analysis from the mainstream media.
When discussing Harris on the ticket, Buck emphasized the new vice presidential candidate’s pledge to pursue a nationwide ban on fracking and suffocate any energy innovation not in compliance with the Green New Deal, which proposed by the party’s socialists with Harris’s endorsement.
“Energy development in Colorado is crucial to our economy and our school districts,” Buck said, explaining that Harris’s plan on fracking combined with her support for open borders and animosity towards sworn defenders of public safety will alienate Colorado voters come November. “It’s clear she is far too liberal.”
A federal fracking ban would cost more than 230,000 jobs in Colorado and upwards of 1.7 million nationwide.
Buck also said an administration led by Harris and Biden would enhance a federal land grab where the U.S. government, which already controls more than a third of Colorado, expands its power over public lands. Buck warned the pair would seek further restrictions through rules and regulations from unelected bureaucrats, if not through legislative action that can pass through Congress.
The Colorado congressman’s concerns come as Biden’s old age at 77 raises the stakes over his vice presidential running mate. While Biden appears to illustrate an accelerated cognitive decline with each new public interview, many believe Biden will serve as a merely a figurehead in a Harris administration if he makes it through the entire first term. Harris has already signed onto a litany of other progressive reforms not yet supported by Biden including “Medicare for All,” and she maintains a voting record in the upper chamber to the left of Bernie Sanders.
Buck, who also serves as the chairman of the Colorado Republican Party said Harris’s extremism would only serve to alienate Colorado voters.
Recent polling however, suggests Republicans are failing in the increasingly blue state where Democrats swept statewide offices just two years earlier by comfortable margins and Biden holds a double-digit lead over Trump. In 2016, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton carried the state by 9 points, and incumbent Republican Sen. Cory Gardner is down by 6 to former Gov. John Hickenlooper as Democrats set their sites on who is seen as their most vulnerable target this cycle.
But Buck dismissed the polls and told The Federalist he’s optimistic the radical ticket will swing Colorado for Republicans this fall pinning his hopes on a silent majority upended over the violence sweeping the major cities and undue schools closings led by Democrats.
When asked what messaging Republicans needed to hold onto the state’s coveted Senate seat and capture its nine electoral votes in less than 80 days, Buck said the “key” is on the economy.
“Who do you trust to bring our economy back after this pandemic?” Buck asked voters, where one option is the Democrats pledging to raise taxes and the other is the incumbent president who has presided over “the best three years of economic growth of all time.”
Watch Ken Buck on The Federalist Radio Hour:
