The owner of a Denver construction company and local event halls is jumping into Colorado’s increasingly crowded Republican U.S. Senate primary, giving a race featuring public officials, veterans and a former Olympian a bit more of a business flavor.
Joe O’Dea, owner of Concrete Express Inc. and co-owner of two event facilities in the Sun Valley neighborhood, has not run for office before. But his entry into the race to unseat Democratic Sen. Michael Bennet, announced in a speech Thursday at his business, comes as he said he’s increasingly frustrated with the direction of the country — both on financial issues and on public safety, which he plans to make major planks of his campaign.
O’Dea joins a seven-person field that includes the likes of state Sen. Ron Hanks of Penrose, former Olympian Eli Bremer, former Fort Collins City Councilman Gino Campana and veteran/oil-industry professional Erik Aadland. While several national political analysts consider Bennet’s seat to be relatively safe, Colorado has shown a tendency to blow with the political winds, which will be in the face of the party holding all the power in Washington, D.C., in the 2022 midterm election.
O’Dea said that he wants to “rebuild” the country by controlling spending and by getting Washington focused on several issues of concern to business leaders, including lowering taxes, reducing regulations and spurring “an economic recovery that benefits working people.” He also said in his speech Thursday that he wants to address the growing threats of crime and homelessness, which he said have turned Denver into a “disaster.”
“Both parties are guilty of reckless spending, and future generations will suffer because of the debtor’s mindset in D.C.,” O’Dea said during his announcement. “Government intervention in the midst of a pandemic was both legitimate and necessary. Nobody begrudges a safety net. But this attempt to turn the hardships of the last year into a hard-left fiscal policy is wrong.”
O’Dea dropped out of Colorado State University to launch Concrete Express, a heavy civil services contractor that builds roads, parks and waterway projects and now employs about 300 people. He and his wife, Celeste, also operate the Mile High Station and Ironworks event halls, which are popular spots for group events as well as for gatherings before Broncos games at nearby Empower Field at Mile High.
While most of the candidates in the race have some business background, O’Dea is arguably the most well-known businessperson with no political experience to jump into a U.S. Senate race in Colorado since beer baron Pete Coors won the Republican nomination but lost to Democrat Ken Salazar in the general election in 2004. Colorado’s other current U.S. Senator, Democrat John Hickenlooper co-founded the Wynkoop Brewery and a string of brewpubs across the country before diving into politics 18 years ago, first as Denver mayor then Colorado governor.
Business operators are more common in the state’s gubernatorial contests, which next year likely will feature Republican entrepreneur-turned-politician Heidi Ganahl seeking to knock off Democratic Gov. and entrepreneur-turned-politician Jared Polis.
Bennet’s business background includes time as managing director of the Anschutz Investment Company before serving as Hickenlooper’s chief of staff and then Denver Public Schools superintendent leading up to his appointment and subsequent reelections to the Senate. Bennet, the author of a child tax credit that was enacted during the coronavirus pandemic, touts his desires to raise the minimum wage, close the gender pay gap and invest in technical education and broadband as the primary economic planks of his reelection campaign.
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