November 01, 2022 09:27 AM UTC

CO Senate Candidate Walsh Praised Trump in Private, Now Tells Voters He's 'Not a Fan'

• 2 Comments
• by: Erik Maulbetsch

(At least someone has been listening to Joe O’Dea — Promoted by Colorado Pols)

A candidate who says one thing to one audience and the opposite to another is the most common political cliche. It’s rarer to catch one doing so in front of a reporter, but that’s what has happened to Tim Walsh, a Republican running for state senate in Jefferson County.

Back in May, Walsh made an appearance at the venerable Jefferson County Republican Men’s Club (JRMC), a local GOP institution. The Colorado Times Recorder previously reported his statements from that speech which cast doubt on the legitimacy of the 2020 election.

Following his biographical stump speech, Walsh spoke in detail about a poll his campaign conducted. He explained that while is he is a Trump supporter “who loves what he did,” he can’t share his love for Trump with voters because of their dislike of the former president.

In an almost apologetic tone, Walsh explains that Trump is hugely unpopular in his district, especially with younger voters. He tells them specifically,

“I am the first to be a Trump supporter. Loved what he did, but I can’t campaign on being a Trump person. And so just letting you know that. When we’re out knocking on doors, we don’t even bring up Trump.” 

If Walsh simply did that — avoided talking about Trump while campaigning, this story would just be about that typical politician cliché — telling folks what they want to hear. He told his far-right base supporters that he loves Trump but won’t reveal his pro-MAGA position when knocking doors of swing voters in his district.

Except we know he isn’t just avoiding the subject on the campaign trail — he’s telling them he doesn’t like Trump.

According to an article published last week by the Colorado Sun’s Elliott Wenzler, who accompanied Walsh on the campaign trail, he is now saying he’s “not a fan” of Trump and “never has been.”

So which is it? Was Walsh making a false statement to the JRMC back in May, or is he doing so to voters’ faces now? The Walsh campaign once again didn’t answer a request for comment, but of course this article will be updated with any response received.

In the absence of his comment, we can look to another political cliché for evidence of Walsh’s true position on Trump: “follow the money.”

According to FEC records, in 2020 Walsh donated $2,660 to Trump’s campaign and another $2,800 to Trump’s MAGA PAC. He also gave $1,000 to U.S. Rep. Lauren Boebert’s (R-CO) campaign.

In another twist, Walsh told the Colorado Sun that the recording of the May JRMC speech had been “doctored.”

“Walsh says the video was doctored, pointing to how the images and audio in the recording are out of sync. He doesn’t overtly deny, however, what he said in the recording.”

You can listen to the recording of the event as posted online by the JeffCo Republican Men’s Club here. The portion of Walsh’s discussion of his campaign’s poll which is transcribed below begins at approximately 35 minutes.

Here is the transcription:

“We’ve got to be targeting the middle — so that 48%. So as much as I would want to go out there and beat on with an election integrity — we already — we’ve got to assume that Republicans are going to vote for Republicans. But what we need to do is win over the middle of Colorado. Another interesting question was we asked, so how favorable or unfavorable is Joe Biden?

Again, 52% of Coloradans believe that Joe Biden is favorable. And yeah, and they voted. Right? You know? But I tell you, that’s it’s doesn’t always make sense. But then you ask the question of how favorable is Trump and 67% of people- and several say that he -Trump- is unfavorable. So, you know, when we’re in these Republican groups talking to each other, we all love what Trump did and what he stood for. But a lot of the younger Coloradans, you know, they’re directed by what they hear on social media. They’re directed by what they see on CNN.

So, you know, you can’t go out saying ‘Rah Rah Trump’ and think you’re going to be elected as a Republican with our base of voters here being mostly unaffiliated. I can tell you, I mean, it’s I have only hit 300 doors or so in the last three weeks, but I can tell you that in my mind, I would say that 35 to 45 year old voter Trump is not popular, even if they’re Republicans or unaffiliated.

And so it is a- it’s- again, it’s a Colorado thing. We are more like Virginia. Same thing in Virginia. You know, Youngkin was not endorsed by Trump, but he won in a landslide and brought a Republican red wave there because he learned he understood how to communicate just like Colorado with unaffiliated voters.

I’m telling you this because there’s poll data, we’ve seen it. So, you know, it’s- I am the first to be a Trump supporter. Loved what he did, but I can’t campaign on being a Trump person. And so just letting you know that when we’re out knocking on doors, we don’t even bring up Trump if if they bring up- nobody- The other interesting nobody has brought up election integrity. Only two people that I met yesterday, one was a Republican. He left, he’s now an unaffiliated voter because of January 6 and because of Trump. So there are people that are leaving our party and go and become becoming independent or unaffiliated and so on.

So anyways, but I think, you know, we got to have a winning message. The polls sort of reinforce that. Everything I hear, I see Denise back there. And wouldn’t you agree, Denise? I mean, you can’t campaign on Trump and you can’t campaign on election integrity and win.

What we got to do is win first and then we can go ahead and make changes because we all know something was fishy with the 2020 election.”