STATE SENATE DISTRICT 21: Michaelson Jenet vs Alfred

AURORA | Democrat Dafna Michaelson Jenet is seeking to defend her Senate District 21 seat against Republican challenger Frederick Alfred Jr. in a race that underscores the differences in how both candidates view the role of state government.

About 150,000 people live in the mixed urban and rural district spanning from parts of Westminster and Federal Heights on the west to Bennett, Strasburg, Byers and Shamrock on the east.

Michaelson Jenet is 51 and from Commerce City, where she runs a nonprofit publishing house with her husband. She has written two books — one about her experiences traveling to all 50 states in one year in search, she says, “of ordinary people doing extraordinary things to solve problems in their communities,” and the other detailing the loss of a pregnancy how she worked through her grief.

She says services for youth and access to healthcare and mental health treatment will be her top priorities if elected to the seat she was appointed to in August 2023 when Sen. Dominick Moreno resigned for a position in Denver Mayor Mike Johnston’s administration. She at that time was in her final session representing House District 32 (she had represented House District 30 before redistricting), and served as chairperson of the House Public Health and Human Services Committee, and on that chamber’s Education and Legislative Audit committees.

Michaelson Jenet’s interest in mental health is personal. She has major depressive disorder and credits “a nice mix of medications that help me function every day.” 

“I am very, very grateful for my insurance, and I don’t take that for granted at all,” she says. 

Her son, now 22, also has mental health challenges including Attentional-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) and dysthymia, a type of persistent, low-level depression that led him to attempt suicide at age 9. Even with insurance and a host of private treatment and education programs for which their family has paid out of pocket, she says that he has never — as a child and later as an adult — received the full breadth and quality of care and services that he has needed.

“That’s part of why I first ran for office,” she says.  

A bill Michaelson Jenet introduced in 2021 led to the creation of I Matter, a program that provides up to six free therapy sessions and substance use disorder services for Coloradans 18 years old or younger, or 21 years or younger to those qualifying for special education. The program was temporary, but drew such high demand that the legislature made it permanent this year.

She also worked on bills lowering the age of consent for talk therapy to 12 years old and allowing for in-school mental health assessments similar to those for scoliosis or vision problems. 

Though she partly credits those laws for a recent drop in youth suicide in Colorado, she said she aims, if elected, to work toward further destigmatizing mental health challenges and making mental health care more available statewide.

Michaelson Jenet also has drawn from her own medical experiences to champion public policy on physical health. Her diagnoses with breast cancer in 2010 and uterine cancer in 2017 led her to push several pieces of legislation forcing insurance companies to pay for early detection, including biomarker tests. And her diagnosis with pre-diabetes inspired her bill to require access to obesity and prediabetes treatments both for privately insured and Medicaid patients. It did not pass into law last session, and she aims to reintroduce it next session if she wins in November.

Michaelson Jenet is a staunch believer in public school choice and the need for more public charter schools in rural parts of her district and the state. 

She helped pass a state program in which people with invisible disabilities such as autism or deafness may have those conditions identified on their drivers’ license and plates as a way of notifying police officers and others about their conditions. 

She also worked on legislation lifting the statute of limitations to prosecute people who sexually abuse children. 

“One of my goals is to make Colorado the worst place to be a sexual predator,” she says. 

Michaelson Jenet was born in Israel, but she was raised and has lived her adult life in the U.S. Although she strongly supports Israel’s right to exist and defend itself, she notes that she disagrees with many of Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu’s policies and strategies, especially since waging war in Gaza after Hamas’ Oct. 7 terror attack.

“If I were in Israel these days, I’d probably be among the people protesting,” she said.

As of Sept. 27, she said she had raised $85,000 in campaign contributions. 

Alfred, for his part, said he had raised only a small fraction of that, $4,500, by that same date.

The 36-year-old underdog, who goes by Fred, moved to Colorado in 2014 to attend the Colorado School of Mines, where he studied chemical engineering. He now works as a data scientist specializing in cybersecurity for a healthcare company he declined to name. 

“They have nothing to do with my campaign,” he said, noting that the company nevertheless would accommodate his need to focus on state business full time during the four-month legislative session.

Alfred cites energy policy as his main priority. 

He dismisses concerns about the nexus between fossil fuels and climate change. 

“I think it is overblown. I think it’s way overblown,” he said. He did not cite sources nor details leading him to that conclusion. 

If elected, he said he would support adding nuclear power to Colorado’s energy portfolio, or at least fostering “more awareness and heightened conversation” about nuclear options at the state Capitol. He also hopes to pass legislation encouraging oil and gas development in Colorado, and he opposes the state government’s efforts promoting green energy. 

“I feel that’s not realistic and would just increase energy costs for everyone here in the state,” he said of most renewable energy sources. 

Alfred cites education as another top priority, saying he would work to provide “more academically challenging” school programs in the eastern, more rural part of the Senate district. He takes objection to what he sees as public schools usurping parental rights, pointing in particular to the case of an Adams County family that sued School District 27J after their daughter’s high school allegedly aided her transition to a male identity without their knowledge or consent.

“That’s really bad. Like, not having the parents involved is really hurting the family structure.” 

He said both his small children attend private schools.

Alfred grew up in South Florida, the son of a Haitian mother and father from St. Lucia, both of whom he said immigrated illegally to the Miami area in the 1970s. His wife — born to a Haitian mother, but raised in the Bahamas — also immigrated to the U.S. illegally. 

“They’ve all been naturalized,” he noted. 

He finds it “unfortunate” that Haitians in Springfield, Ohio and Venezuelans in Aurora have been singled out and vilified by his fellow Republicans this election season. Still, he said he is unfazed by former President Donald Trump, among others, claiming that Haitians eat house pets.

“Having grown up in South Florida, I’ve heard it my whole life and… got used to those kinds of jokes,” he said.

He added that, “When it comes down to the core principles and the core things that we are trying to push,” he agrees with most of the Republican Party’s platform.

On immigration in particular, Alfred embraces Trump’s stances on tightening the southern border. He also wants to curtail efforts in so-called “sanctuary cities,” including Denver, that welcome and provide services to undocumented immigrants.

“That just disrupts the services that help the citizens here in the state,” he said.

Alfred knows that as a Black Republican, he’s somewhat of an anomaly both in his district and throughout Colorado, but says he is used to that role after having attended “a predominantly white institution” — the University of Florida — for college and studied chemical engineering, a field without many Black students. 

The political newcomer says he is accustomed to “being the underdog” and “wasn’t entirely surprised” that, although state and local GOP groups have in theory supported his campaign, they have provided no volunteers or staff members and “they made me do everything on my own from the ground up.” 

“Just because they supported me doesn’t mean that I’m welcomed by them,” he said. 

As he sees it, it plays to his advantage that “our senate district is really not politically active and most people have no idea who their state senator”  — Michaelson Jenet — “even is.” 

“I feel like that’s the only advantage that I have,” he said. “So, if I can keep getting my name to just resonate in people’s ears, maybe I can pull it off.” 

Alfred and Michaelson Jenet have not debated, nor even met in person. There are no debates or joint public forums scheduled in their race.

Meet Dafna Michaelson Jenet

Dafna Michaelson Jenet, 51, spent six years representing Colorado’s House District 30 until redistricting when she represented House District 32. In those seats, she served as chair of the House Public Health & Human Services Committee, and on that chamber’s Education and Legislative Audit committees. She would have been term-limited out of the House this year and planned to run in Senate District 21 anyway, but was appointed to the seat in August 2023 when Sen. Moreno resigned for a position in Denver Mayor Mike Johnston’s administration.  The Commerce City resident is a native of Israel who grew up in Cincinnati and moved to Colorado in 1995. She has a bachelor’s degree in music from Yeshiva University’s Stern College for Women and a master’s in Business Administration from the University of Denver’s Daniels College of Business. She and her husband  Michael Jenet have three children: Eytan and Gavriella Michaelson and Ryan Jenet, an active-duty U.S. Marine.

Meet Frederick Alfred Jr.

Frederick Alfred Jr. is a political newcomer who was born in South Florida to a Haitian mother and father from St. Lucia, both of whom immigrated to the U.S. illegally in the 1970s. His wife also came as an undocumented immigrant from the Bahamas, then naturalized. 

The couple lives in Commerce City and has a son and daughter ages 4 and 3, respectively.

Alfred has a bachelor’s degree in chemical engineering from University of Florida and a master’s degree from the Colorado School of Mines. He has held jobs working with nuclear energy and internet technology, and currently works as a data scientist specializing in cybersecurity for a healthcare company he declines to name.