Graham outraising Gradisar so far and more takeaways from Pueblo campaign finance reports

Election season is now over for all but two candidates in Pueblo.

Pueblo’s incumbent Mayor Nick Gradisar and city council President Heather Graham are gearing up for the mayoral runoff election scheduled for Jan. 23, 2024.

Candidates filed the latest round of campaign finance reports earlier this month, in which they are required to list their donors, how they’re spending money and other financial details about their campaign.

The Chieftain obtained campaign finance records from the city clerk’s office through an open records request. Here are some of the biggest takeaways.

Graham has been outraising Gradisar recently

Gradisar reported bringing in nearly $100,000 over the course of the first year of his campaign, dwarfing the $42,000 that Graham brought in from November 2022 through mid-October 2023.

While Gradisar has still raised $31,368 more than Graham since November 2022, Graham has brought in more monetary contributions than Gradisar in the latest two rounds of financial disclosures.

Since mid-October, Graham has reported bringing in nearly $34,000 and Gradisar has received $11,395.

Graham garnered nearly 500 more votes than Gradisar to finish first in the initial mayoral election.

The incumbent also still has over $20,000 available to spend, while Graham’s remaining balance as of the latest campaign finance reports is around $1,750. Graham has consistently ended each reporting cycle with just a few thousand dollars available, while Gradisar has had more than $20,000 in his campaign account.

Gradisar has spent a total of $93,806 and Graham has reported $74,162 in expenses.

The next campaign finance reports for the runoff candidates are due on Jan. 8, 2024, City Clerk Marisa Stoller confirmed with the Chieftain.

Colorado governor donated to Gradisar’s campaign

Gradisar’s campaign has announced a slew of endorsements from high-profile Democrats in Pueblo and the rest of the state, including from some of Colorado’s top elected officials.

Gov. Jared Polis is helping Gradisar’s campaign not only with his public endorsement but also a financial contribution. Campaign finance records show that Polis made a $250 online donation to Gradisar’s campaign on Nov. 25.

Gradisar also received endorsements from both of Colorado’s Democratic U.S. senators, John Hickenlooper and Michael Bennet. Neither are listed as contributors on Gradisar’s forms.

Polis does not appear to have made many endorsements over the past four years since he’s served as Colorado’s governor, but he did endorse Aaron Brockett in the November 2023 Boulder mayoral election.

However, Polis does not appear to have personally made a donation to Brockett’s campaign, according to a review of Boulder city campaign finance records.

Gradisar does not appear to have personally donated directly to either of Polis’ gubernatorial campaigns in 2018 and 2022, according to the state campaign finance database.

Fewer donations coming from businesses

The Chieftain previously reported that several candidates in this year's elections — most notably Gradisar — received ample donations from non-person entities, such as labor union small donor funds and limited liability companies.

The first round of campaign finance reports, filed in mid-October, showed that approximately 40% of Gradisar’s contributions came from non-person donors. Those contributions totaled $38,000.

However, all of the donations in the most recent batch reported by the Gradisar campaign appear to be directly from people, as was true for Graham’s campaign.

Mayoral candidate Randy Thurston finished in fourth place in November. Thurston appears to be the only candidate to accept a donation from a business in the latest round of reports: he accepted $250 from Alpha Protection Services, bringing the total amount of donations from that business to $400.

The address listed for Alpha Protection Services on Thurston’s campaign finance reporting form is a post office box located within the 81005 zip code in Pueblo.

Forging the Future, the political committee that’s an offshoot of the local conservative Christian group Forging Pueblo, reported a single donation from the group’s parent organization.

Forging Pueblo, Inc. made a $600 donation — the only one reported in the latest round of campaign finance reports — to Forging the Future on Nov. 6, the day before Election Day. The political committee reported spending $451.50 on a mass text, also on Nov. 6, and has a remaining fund balance of $59.

Political committees are allowed to accept donations from corporations, but donations are capped at $725 every two years, according to state campaign finance regulations.

How much the average donor gave

While most Colorado political jurisdictions have some form of cap on campaign contributions to politicos — for example, individuals can only donate up to $450 to Colorado legislative candidates — there are no contribution limits in place for most elements of Pueblo municipal elections.

Gradisar still has the record for the largest single contribution made in this election, which was a $25,000 check from Ji Hyun Bae, the director of corporate affairs for CS Wind. However, his average donation size in this latest round of reports was $231 from 46 different donations.

That’s a little more than half the size of the average donation to Gradisar’s campaign he reported in the earlier rounds of campaign finance disclosures, which was $543.

Graham’s average donation size was $599 from 31 donors. Aside from a $12,000 check she wrote herself in late October, Graham reported her campaign’s largest individual donation so far, an $8,500 donation from her husband, Danny Beaudry, who owns the Pueblo Athletic Club.

The overall donation size reported in the latest round of campaign finance reports among all of the candidates and committees was $431.

How some candidates closed out their campaigns

All of the candidates who lost in the November election filed termination reports with the city clerk’s office, formally ending their campaigns. If they had any remaining balance, candidates were allowed to return contributions to donors as well as make a donation to a nonprofit.

For example, mayoral candidate Chris Nicoll, who placed third overall, returned $100 each to two donors because the donation was “not needed,” according to his paperwork.

Nicoll also gave $677.25 to A Caring Pregnancy Center as a “donation to close account” on Dec. 7.

Nicoll was endorsed by Forging the Future, an offshoot of Forging Pueblo. The address for Forging Pueblo in the Colorado Secretary of State’s database of business organizations is the same as A Caring Pregnancy Center.

At-large city council candidate Elvis Martinez had a remaining balance of $14.87, which he refunded to himself. Previous campaign finance records show that Martinez gave his campaign a total of $260 from his own pocket.

Some of the candidates had to make a contribution to their campaign to make sure they had enough to cover expenses, such as mayoral candidate Larry Atencio and District 2 city council candidate Joe Latino.

Anna Lynn Winfrey covers politics for the Pueblo Chieftain. She can be reached at awinfrey@gannett.com. Please support local news at subscribe.chieftain.com.

This article originally appeared on The Pueblo Chieftain: Heather Graham outraising Nick Gradisar in Pueblo mayoral runoff race