This story was first published at Colorado Newsline.
DENVER | With concerns about the economy and the cost of living on the rise, Colorado voters have a sharply negative view of President Donald Trump — but they’ve also soured somewhat on top Colorado Democrats over the last year, a new poll found.
By a 48% to 44% margin, more Coloradans have an unfavorable opinion of Gov. Jared Polis than a favorable one, according to the Colorado Polling Institute’s latest statewide poll, conducted in March and released Wednesday. A Democrat in his final year in office, Polis’ favorability rating represents a 15-point shift since March 2025, when 51% of voters said they had a favorable opinion of him, compared to 40% unfavorable.
Voters have similarly swung against Democratic U.S. Sens. Michael Bennet and John Hickenlooper since last year, though their favorable-unfavorable ratings are more evenly divided — 40%-39% for Bennet and 43%-43% for Hickenlooper, the poll found.
In all three cases, the swings reflect more negative attitudes from Democratic and unaffiliated voters, said Kevin Ingham of Aspect Strategic, one of the polling firms that conducted the survey of 613 likely 2026 Colorado voters.
“For both senators, Democrats’ attitudes have shifted a net 20-ish points in a negative direction towards both (Bennet and Hickenlooper) over the past year,” Ingham said. “We’ve seen similar sized shifts among unaffiliated towards both.”
Bennet is running to succeed Polis as governor in 2026, and faces Attorney General Phil Weiser in the Democratic primary. Hickenlooper, running for a second Senate term, faces a primary challenge from state Sen. Julie Gonzales. Three months ahead of the June 30 primary, more than half of likely Colorado voters still haven’t heard of or have no opinion of Weiser, according to the survey, which didn’t poll either primary contest directly.
The Colorado Polling Institute’s results echo other recent surveys of voter attitudes towards the state’s top Democrats, including a 2025 poll by Magellan Strategies. Ingham said that the trend he’s observed among left-leaning voters is “less about Democrats wanting their party to be more progressive, and more (about) being more aggressive.”
“They’re looking for fighters,” he said. “They’re looking for people who are going to take a sharper edge and a more non-traditional approach to governance and standing up to the Trump administration.”
On the other side of the aisle, Trump — who lost the contest for Colorado’s electoral votes by 11 percentage points in 2024 — remains deeply unpopular in the Centennial State, with just 37% of voters holding a favorable opinion, compared to 61% unfavorable. That’s a more negative view than the figures of 40% favorable and 58% unfavorable that Trump scored in Colorado a year ago.
“Notably, while Democrats and unaffiliateds have always been deeply skeptical of the president, in our polling, this is the first time that we’ve seen his numbers softening among Republicans,” Ingham said.
One thing that Colorado’s Democratic, Republican and unaffiliated voters overwhelmingly agree on is that the cost of essential goods — housing, health care, food, utilities and insurance — is too high.
The cost of housing still tops the list of concerns, with 59% identifying it as a “very big problem” — though that’s down from the 68% who said the same last year. Rents and home values in the formerly red-hot Denver-area real estate market have cooled since 2024.
At the same time, other cost increases are beginning to strain Coloradans’ budgets. According to AAA, average gasoline prices in Colorado spiked to over $3.82 a gallon as of April 8, a 32% increase since Feb. 27, the day before Trump started a war with Iran that has snarled the global oil market.
A 55% majority of Coloradans expect the state’s economy to get worse over the next year, the Colorado Polling Institute found.
“Coloradans are increasingly frustrated with the price of everything — gas prices were the one area of respite in our survey last November and now that’s gone,” Lori Weigel of New Bridge Strategies, the survey’s other pollster, said in a press release. “Fewer than 1 in 5 voters (18%) characterize their family as comfortable and increasing savings. Everyone else is either treading water or in fear of sinking.”
The difference is the reason top level Democrats have a poor rating is because they aren’t doing enough to resist authoritarianism, so they will vote for a Democrat who will by huge margins. Decent Republicans are sickened by their choices and aren’t too sure they want to continue down this horrid path
Opinion polls of politician’s popularity during periods between elections lack the palpable comparative analysis that comes at election time. For instance, I have an unfavorable view of Polis for several reasons – his intrusion into the sentencing of the I-70 crash that killed way too many people, even a thought about pardoning an unrepentant and visibly emboldenend Tina Peters, his lack of support of unionization, and much more. However, juxtaposed with a choice between Polis and anyone from the currently dysfunctional Colorado GOP and I would hold my nose and choose Polis! I just thank goodness that I don’t have to make that choice. Also, I and most Democrats, understand that while we want pushback against the overreach of the Trump GOP, the comparative power position of Democrats is severely muted at this time. Frustration comes from the lack of an emergent and strong leader!
The moves toward minimizing Peters’ crimes was a red flag for many, many Democrats.
Polis is a mush. He really has to go.