Mitch McConnell thinks Joe O’Dea is perfect

There’s really only one thing Coloradans need to know about Joe O’Dea, the Republican nominee for U.S. Senate: Mitch McConnell called him the “perfect candidate.”

Yes, this is the same Mitch McConnell who is responsible for stealing seats on the Supreme Court to overturn abortion access. The same Mitch McConnnell who cut taxes for the rich, while keeping prescription drug costs high for the rest of the country. And the same Mitch McConnell who responded year after year to mass shootings, including the one at King Soopers in Boulder, by blocking common sense gun regulations.

So when Mitch McConnell calls O’Dea the “perfect candidate,” it’s because he knows he can count on O’Dea to be a vote for his right-wing agenda.

But right now O’Dea is trying to come up with a new brand for himself. In the Colorado primary, he took far-right positions and aligned himself with Trump. Now he’s trying to call himself a “moderate” and a “Republican Joe Manchin” (even though O’Dea opposed the Inflation Reduction Act that Manchin himself negotiated).

Let’s be very clear: McConnell is bad for Coloradans. And O’Dea will be, too.

We’ve got to start by nipping in the bud any idea that O’Dea is pro-choice: O’Dea clearly stated he would have confirmed the Trump Supreme Court justices, who overturned Roe v. Wade and our fundamental right to abortion access.

O’Dea opposes the Reproductive Health Equity Act in Colorado, signed into law by Gov. Jared Polis to enshrine abortion access in our state. He called it “reckless.”

And he’s made it clear he’d vote against the Women’s Health Protection Act in the Senate, sticking with Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell over Colorado women.

He’s anti-choice. He does not stand with pregnant Coloradans who have a right to make their own health care decisions.

O’Dea also doesn’t stand with Coloradans who want to do something about the extreme heat and wildfires increasingly taking over our state, opposing climate change legislation currently in the Senate that would create good-paying clean energy jobs while lowering household energy costs. On top of that, his PAC accepted a $50,000 donation from a gas company that was just fined $3 million for releasing toxic pollution into the air.

So what does O’Dea stand for? It’s simple: a far-right agenda that benefits big corporations and harms working people.

O’Dea opposes making billion-dollar corporations pay their fair share, even though many of these corporations currently pay $0. Having big businesses pay their fair share would be huge for Coloradans — in return, we could have lower prescription drug costs, lower health care costs, and the assurance that any families making less than $400,000 wouldn’t see their taxes go up. But he’d rather put big businesses who need a break the least over hardworking Coloradans who are struggling.

Coloradans clearly know O’Dea is not in this for them — less than 4% of his campaign contributions are from small dollar donors. That’s why he has to support the unpopular McConnell agenda — he needs the money.

So what does McConnell get in return? A seat that is essential for Republicans to flip in order to retake control of Congress and pass his extreme agenda. McConnell knows that, together with O’Dea, his Republican-led Senate could try to enact a nationwide abortion ban, pass more tax cuts for the rich, dismantle Social Security, and reject any last shot we have at saving the climate. That’s what O’Dea in the Senate means for Coloradans — more Mitch McConnell.

How do we know this? Because we’ve already seen how this story plays out. McConnell and his donor network spent lavishly to elect former Sen. Cory Gardner in 2014. Gardner pledged at the time to be an independent leader for Colorado but instead spent his time in office siding with McConnell on over 90% of his votes. Time and time again, we saw that Gardner was just a puppet, and McConnell pulled all the strings. Where McConnell led, Gardner followed — holding up the Colorado Outdoor Recreation and Economy, CORE, Act, covering up former President Donald Trump’s high crimes, and voting to jam through the confirmation of Justice Brett Kavanaugh despite credible claims of sexual assault.

Ever been to the theater to check out a movie only to learn all the good stuff was in the trailer? We’ve all been there. But we’re smart enough not to check out the sequel.

O’Dea is following in the very same footsteps as Gardner. And Coloradans really don’t need to see the sequel.

If you don’t want to take my word for it, take McConnell’s. This might be the rare instance where he’s telling you the truth.