MEEKER — It’s 6:20 p.m. and Democratic Senate candidate Mark Udall is working a campaign event in this Western Slope town, where the joke is that there aren’t enough Democrats in town to fill a small Volkswagen.

It is not the warmest of rooms. One questioner challenges Udall to explain why he got an “F” rating from the National Rifle Association.

When Udall tells the crowd that this election isn’t about turning Colorado “blue,” but “red, white and blue,” a man from the back shouts, “you mean red, white, blue and black” — visibly startling Udall with an apparent reference to the party’s presidential candidate.

But there are also openings for the Democrat, among them Cheri Robinson.

As Udall shakes her hand, the lifelong Republican complains about the thousands of gas-field vehicles that pass her ranch daily, damaging roads, tossing garbage and “making it almost impossible for my sheep ranch to continue.”

“We should tap these resources — but we need to do it smartly,” Udall reassured her, repeating a version of the message that he has been hammering on the Western Slope for months now.

In a marathon bus tour last week, the five-term congressman from Boulder County was furiously crisscrossing a landscape where he ought to be at a distinct disadvantage.

In the 22 counties west of the Continental Divide, Republicans have about 135,000 registered voters to the Democratic Party’s 95,000.

But in a sign of how much Colorado’s political landscape is changing, several polls show Udall now leading on the Western Slope by a slim margin.

As he goes from mountain resort towns full of fleece-wearing progressives to counties dominated by gun enthusiasts and oil and gas workers, the tour shows the highs and lows of a changing political landscape.

In Montrose, Democrats listening to Udall give a speech on a lawn were met with yells of “terrorism supporters” from passengers in a pickup that circled the block three times to ensure the message got through.

But then there is Jill Potter, an 82-year-old Republican and former treasurer in overwhelmingly Republican Jackson County, who had just cast her ballot for Barack Obama in early voting.

“It’s the economy,” said Potter, crediting the recent endorsement of Obama by Colin Powell with helping her to make up her mind. “People are really hurting.”

Region transforming

While Ken Salazar did well here in his Senate race four years ago, shrinking the vast margins that Republican candidates traditionally have garnered in western Colorado, he didn’t win the region outright.

If a congressman from one of the state’s most liberal districts captures an area that should be among the Republicans’ easiest to win, analysts say it will mark a sea change.

Democrats are practically giddy at the idea.

In places like Craig, Grand Junction, and Ouray, Udall spun out the well-worn themes of a campaign that has purposely been pitched to the kind of moderate conservative voters that have moved into this region over the last decade.

He talked of reining in spending, investing in renewable energy, and — in a riff on a theme by Western writer Wallace Stegner — “building communities to match our scenery.”

John Salazar, the Democrat who represents western Colorado in Congress and traveled with Udall most of the week, cheerily told crowds how when he first ran, Democrats would come up to him on the street and express their support in embarrassed whispers.

Four years later, that political environment has been transformed, Salazar said. “I have never in my entire life seen such energy in western Colorado,” he told a crowd in Ridgway.

But just as often, the crowds have been packed with conservative Democrats skeptical of trademark policies.

In Silverton, Steve Kral told Udall that he had voted for him already, then quickly launched into a critique of Obama’s progressive tax plan.

But there is also little doubt that Udall has managed to make inroads — partly by spending a significant chunk of campaign time here; partly by following a carefully crafted strategy that aims to peel off pieces of a Republican coalition fractured by the area’s rapid energy development.

“The Democrats said, ‘We are going to align ourselves with sportsmen, with hunters and anglers — and the business community out here,’ ” Udall said as he sat in the back of the bus as it wound along mountain roads between events.

“People out here know that one of the biggest business bumps comes in the summer with recreation, and in the fall with all these hunters that come to the area.”

“We want to look after those interests as well,” he said.



Michael Riley: 303-954-1614 or mriley@denverpost.com