Politics

Lauren Boebert loses re-election in Colorado as Democrat Eileen Laubacher flips a deep-red seat

Denver, Colorado • November 13, 2026 • By Press Pass USA

Eileen Laubacher, a retired Navy rear admiral, outdoors with an American flag behind her

Photo: McKenzie Lange / Colorado Public Radio

Democrat Eileen Laubacher defeated Rep. Lauren Boebert for a Colorado U.S. House seat on Friday, ousting a three-term Republican and staple of conservative media in one of the biggest upsets of the midterm elections.

The Associated Press called the race for Laubacher at 1 p.m. Friday, ten days after Election Day, with Laubacher leading 48.8 percent to 47.9 percent and nearly all ballots counted. A Libertarian candidate took just over 3 percent of the vote. Laubacher is a retired Navy rear admiral who declared victory on Monday and has already been attending new-member orientation at the Capitol in Washington.

The result stunned even seasoned observers of Colorado politics. The 4th Congressional District, which stretches from Denver's eastern suburbs to the Kansas border, is considered the state's reddest seat. President Donald Trump carried it by 18 points in 2024, and Republicans carried the district by more than 18 percentage points that same year. Laubacher becomes the first Democrat to win the seat since 2008, when Betsy Markey claimed her only term in the House.

Boebert, first elected in 2020, built a national profile as one of Trump's most outspoken allies in Congress. After barely surviving her first re-election campaign in western Colorado's 3rd District, she moved across the state in late 2023 to run in the far more conservative 4th District, winning in 2024 by more than 11 points. She was considered the heavy favorite to keep the seat this year.

Boebert has not conceded. She told Scripps News she will not run for the seat again in 2028 if she lost, and her campaign has raised the possibility of a recount. Her attorney, former Colorado Secretary of State Scott Gessler, said last week that he expects the race to head to a recount "one way or another" and cited "unusual voting patterns." Under Colorado law, an automatic recount is triggered if the margin is within half a percentage point of the top candidate's votes, and a campaign may also request one at its own expense between November 13 and November 25.

Laubacher is the third Republican member of Congress from Colorado to lose a re-election race this cycle, according to Colorado Public Radio. Her win is one of several surprising Republican losses in what the Associated Press described as shaping up to be the most lopsided election in half a century. CNN had called the race for Laubacher on November 9, but no other major organization followed until Friday, when NBC News was among those making the call.

Returning to the Capitol this week as the losses piled up, Boebert acknowledged the scale of the Republican defeat, saying, "We collectively failed."

Sources: The Associated Press, "Rep. Lauren Boebert of Colorado loses House seat to Democrat Eileen Laubacher" (Nov. 13, 2026, full text verified); Colorado Public Radio, "Eileen Laubacher wins 4th Congressional District seat, ousts Lauren Boebert" (Nov. 13, 2026, full text verified); The Coloradoan, "Lauren Boebert loses re-election bid in Colorado" (Nov. 13, 2026, full text verified).