Teller County sheriff announces run for Colorado governor in 2026
A view of the Teller County Sheriff's Office. (Google Maps)
Teller County Sheriff Jason Mikesell will run for Colorado governor as a Republican candidate in 2026.
Mikesell filed his affidavit declaring his candidacy Wednesday. His campaign website says Colorado is in crisis, highlighting issues including the state budget, water, housing, mental health and immigration.
'Our policies will bring Coloradoans together not divide them,' Mikesell's candidacy announcement says. 'I will sign laws brought to my desk that fix problems and will veto laws that impact on our freedoms or seek to take away local control and our rights.'
SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX
Mikesell was the last county sheriff in Colorado to have a so-called 287(g) agreement with federal authorities allowing his office to detain people on civil immigration violations after the Colorado Legislature passed a law banning the practice.
The agreement allowed deputies in the sheriff's department to make immigration-related arrests for U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement after undergoing a four-week immigration law training.
The American Civil Liberties Union of Colorado sued Mikesell in 2019 challenging his office's continued engagement with ICE, and the two parties entered a joint agreement concluding the years-long case at the end of January. It allowed Mikesell to continue to operate under the 287(g) agreement, but with specific directions on what deputies working with ICE could and could not do.
The Republican primary for governor will be a crowded race, with candidates including state Sen. Mark Baisley, state Rep. Scott Bottoms, Brighton Fire Chief Brycen Garrison, third-time candidate Jason Clark, former 5th Congressional District candidate Joshua Griffin, Stevan Gess, Jon Gray-Ginsberg, Alexander Mugatu and Jim Rundberg.
Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser is the only Democrat to have announced his candidacy for governor so far. Other potential Democratic candidates include Secretary of State Jena Griswold, U.S. Rep. Joe Neguse, U.S. Rep. Jason Crow and former U.S. Sen. Ken Salazar.
A Republican has not been elected governor in Colorado since 2002.
Mikesell did not respond to a Newsline request for comment ahead of publication.
SUPPORT: YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
USA Today
32 minutes ago
- USA Today
Former Biden press secretary is ready to tell Americans the truth? Give me a break.
Former Biden press secretary is ready to tell Americans the truth? Give me a break. | Opinion The knives are now out inside the Democratic Party. And the party is bleeding, not only Americans' support and trust but also its last remaining drops of honesty and truth. Show Caption Hide Caption Karine Jean-Pierre talks exit from Democratic party in new book Former White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre talks about leaving the Democratic party in her upcoming book slated for release in October. The Democratic Party continues to self-destruct, and I am here for it. Former White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre has teased a tell-all memoir about former President Joe Biden and the administration she served for nearly three years. 'Independent: A Look Inside a Broken White House, Outside the Party Lines' is stoking claims that Jean-Pierre is a grifter, profiting off her time in the administration by trashing the former president and the political party that gave her prominence. Knives are out among Democrats for one of their own who has now betrayed them. Like other books that have recently exposed details about Biden's poor health, Jean-Pierre's book raises questions about the White House cover-up that attempted to hide the president's mental and physical decline from voters. It also calls into question Jean-Pierre's honesty: Why did she wait until now, when she can profit from it, to tell the truth about the former commander in chief? Former White House colleagues turn on former Biden press secretary Democrats are now a minority party in America. The GOP controls the White House, the Senate and the U.S. House along with a majority of governor's offices and state legislatures. The Democratic Party has lost Americans' trust because of its leaders' penchant for gaslighting, not just about Biden's health but also on issues like immigration, border security and the economy. Jean-Pierre, who now claims to be an independent, certainly isn't helping her former colleagues rebuild that lost trust. Details from the book are still sketchy, but Jean-Pierre should provide readers with an inside look at what happened after Biden's disastrous debate with Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump a year ago this month. Jean-Pierre's coworkers have already reacted to the book with contempt. "Former colleagues expressed confusion at how Jean-Pierre seemingly intends to paint Biden as a victim while pinning her own decision to leave the party on his 'broken' White House," Politico reported, citing multiple former Biden administration officials who spoke on condition of anonymity. Opinion: Biden's cancer diagnosis raises the question: Was he ever in good enough health? Caitlin Legacki, a Democratic strategist who worked on the Commerce Department's communications team during Biden's presidency, took umbrage with Jean-Pierre's assertion that the Democratic Party betrayed Biden. 'Kamala Harris and the entire Biden/Harris campaign did hero's work to avoid losing 400 electoral votes and giving Republicans a supermajority in Congress, which is what would have happened if he stayed on the ticket,' Legacki told Politico. 'It's more productive to focus on that, and thank Biden for doing the responsible thing by stepping aside, than it is to pretend this was an unwarranted act of betrayal.' But party insiders continuing to squabble over whether a now former president was or was not betrayed by fellow Democrats entirely misses the larger point. Opinion: Guess who Americans want to run the economy? Hint − it's not Democrats. Far too many Democrats, Jean-Pierre included, worked hard to deceive Americans. Their willful lack of self-awareness about their gaslighting and dishonesty is why the party has shown no signs of recovering from the last disastrous election cycle. Karine Jean-Pierre's book about Biden isn't the first Jean-Pierre's book will be far from the first to address the deception at the heart of the Biden White House. On May 20, journalists Jake Tapper and Alex Thompson released "Original Sin," which describes in detail Biden's cognitive decline and the mind-boggling efforts with which his inner circle and the Democratic Party tried to hide the truth from Americans. Opinion: Texas woman's death would have been prevented if Biden had secured the border Conservatives had long been suspicious about Biden's health, but journalists with White House access failed to ask tough questions then. Now that it's too late to make a real difference, those who were silent when it mattered most are more than ready to profit from belated exposés about the former president's failing health. The knives are now out inside the Democratic Party. And the party is bleeding, not only Americans' support and trust but also its last remaining drops of honesty and truth. Nicole Russell is an opinion columnist with USA TODAY. She lives in Texas with her four kids. Sign up for her newsletter, The Right Track, and get it delivered to your inbox.
Fox News
34 minutes ago
- Fox News
Trump's ICE launches bold courthouse migrant arrest strategy to fast-track deportations Biden avoided
Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials are beginning a nationwide initiative to arrest illegal immigrants after asylum hearings as they leave courtrooms, multiple sources familiar with the matter confirmed to Fox News. The effort will target those who have been living in the United States for less than two years, sources said. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) strategy aims to get illegal immigration cases dropped. Federal officials plan to arrest migrants and place them in expedited removal proceedings, fast-tracking them to deportation out of the country, allowing for almost-immediate removal without a hearing before an immigration judge, according to ICE sources. If a migrant has an active, pending court case, expedited removal cannot happen, which is why DHS officials are planning to get them dropped. Immigration judges, however, have to agree to drop cases, and so far, they are cooperating with the effort, sources said. The initiative will likely cause controversy because migrants will be disincentivized from attending asylum hearings, and it will involve arrests of migrants with no criminal histories aside from entering the United States illegally. Videos posted to social media and captured by local news across the country show the ICE arrests already happening in various courthouses. "Secretary Noem is reversing Biden's catch-and-release policy that allowed millions of unvetted illegal aliens to be let loose on American streets," a DHS spokesperson told Fox News. "This Administration is once again implementing the rule of law." The spokesperson added that "most aliens who illegally entered the United States within the past two years are subject to expedited removals." "ICE is now following the law and placing these illegal aliens in expedited removal, as they always should have been." "Biden ignored this legal fact and chose to release millions of illegal aliens, including violent criminals, into the country with a notice to appear before an immigration judge," the spokesperson said. "ICE is now following the law and placing these illegal aliens in expedited removal, as they always should have been. If they have a valid credible fear claim, they will continue in immigration proceedings, but if no valid claim is found, aliens will be subject to a swift deportation." Gregg Jarrett, Fox News legal analyst and commentator, noted the Supreme Court's recent ruling "that President Trump had the authority to end Biden's Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for certain specified migrants who have been in the U.S. for less than two years." "That means they are eligible for expedited deportation," he said. "There is no law that prevents ICE from carrying out the initiative by making arrests at immigration/asylum hearings. From a safety standpoint, it makes sense. Indeed, it has been a longstanding practice." Kate Lincoln-Goldfinch, immigration attorney and CEO and owner of Lincoln-Goldfinch Law, told Fox News Digital that while "ICE can go in and conduct apprehensions in courthouses," such arrests "can be restricted" if immigration judges refuse to dismiss cases. WATCH: Attorney explains effort to detain illegal immigrants in courthouses "Because the playbook is this: the immigrant goes into their court hearing. The DHS attorney, which is essentially the prosecutor, tells the judge, 'Judge, we actually want to dismiss this case. We don't want to pursue it.' And in many instances, the judge will just dismiss over objection of the immigrant or [if] the immigrant doesn't know any better, and they say, 'Sure, that sounds great.' And then they walk out of the courtroom, and they're apprehended," Lincoln-Goldfinch explained. If judges refuse to dismiss cases, they can "maintain their own jurisdiction over what happens with [an immigrant] because this person is in immigration court proceedings and the judge gets to decide what happens to them so long as they don't dismiss the case." Jarrett believes "the likelihood of interference is minimal" when asked whether judges might try to stop the arrests. "Most asylum and deportation hearings are in front of an immigration judge who is an employee of the Justice Department," he said. "Those hearings occur in federal courthouses or detention facilities, so the likelihood of interference is minimal. You would not have, for example, a state court judge trying to interfere, as we saw in [Milwaukee, Wisconsin]." Milwaukee Judge Hannah Dugan, 65, was indicted last month on federal charges of obstruction of proceedings before a U.S. agency and unlawful concealment of an individual subject to arrest after she allegedly directed an illegal immigrant defendant to leave through a private exit at the Milwaukee County Courthouse while ICE officials were serving a warrant for his arrest. WATCH: WISCONSIN JUDGE SEEN TALKING TO ICE AGENTS Lincoln-Goldfinch, meanwhile, believes the new DHS effort is a scheme for the Trump administration to easily and quickly boost illegal immigrant apprehension numbers, and that "they are not targeting the population of immigrants that Trump and Kristi Noem purport to want to go after, and that is law-breaking, dangerous, criminal history type of immigrants." This initiative, she said, targets illegal immigrants trying to go through a legal citizenship process. "Why are we not sending ICE after the people that they're claiming are here to harm us? It doesn't make sense from a resource expenditure perspective," she said. "And I think that is the main objection. So do I think this will be challenged in court? But on top of that, I think that people should really take issue with the fact ICE is going after people who are following the rules and they're playing dirty tricks and games in order to get them to dismiss their cases and then they arrest them walking out of the courtroom." WATCH: INSIDE THE THREATS AND DANGERS ICE AGENTS FACE In an April 29 press release marking 100 days in office, DHS announced that border apprehensions were down 95% since President Donald Trump took office, and more migrants are returning to their home countries to avoid deportation. The administration also noted that it had arrested more than 158,000 illegal aliens in 2025 alone, including more than 600 members of Tren de Aragua, saying federal officials are "targeting the worst of the worst" with 75% of illegal immigrant arrests involving those with convictions or pending charges.
Newsweek
an hour ago
- Newsweek
US States Seek To Ban Chinese Citizens From Buying Land, Property
Based on facts, either observed and verified firsthand by the reporter, or reported and verified from knowledgeable sources. Newsweek AI is in beta. Translations may contain inaccuracies—please refer to the original content. Some U.S. states are attempting to ban Chinese citizens from buying land and property, amid souring diplomatic relations between the countries. By 2024, more than two thirds of states had enacted or considered laws limiting or barring foreign land ownership including states that specifically mention China by name, according to POLITICO. According to the non-profit membership organization the Committee of 100, in total 27 states have considered this kind of legislation. However, the group has not shared a list of those states. Newsweek has rounded up a non-exhaustive list of states that have been involved in this kind of legislation, based on publicly available information. Some states do not name China explicitly, but name foreign nations that would likely include China. A number of US stakes have advanced legislation to ban some land sales by foreign nationals and so-called "foreign adversaries." A number of US stakes have advanced legislation to ban some land sales by foreign nationals and so-called "foreign adversaries." Flourish Why It Matters There has been a wave of concern over Chinese land purchases in the United States, some of which have taken place close to military bases. This comes amid soaring tensions between the U.S. and China including trade clashes between the two giants and national security concerns. However, as of USDA data accurate to 2023, Chinese investors own land in the U.S. equivalent to roughly twice the size of the footprint of New York City. What To Know A number of states have considered legislation on the issue. In May, the Texas legislature passed a bill to ban people tied to the governments of China, North Korea, Russia and Iran from purchasing land in the state. In January, Republican senators in Arkansas introduced the Not One More Inch or Acre Act which would prohibit any Chinese citizen, entity or foreign person acting on behalf of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) from purchasing public or private real estate in the U.S. On Tuesday, Arizona's Democratic Governor Katie Hobbs vetoed a bill to prevent the People's Republic of China from buying a 30 percent stake or more in land near military bases and other strategic assets. Meanwhile, Florida passed a bill to prohibit citizens from China, Russia, Iran, North Korea, Cuba, Venezuela, and Syria from owning agricultural land or property near military sites in 2023. Similar legislation has been passed in South Dakota, North Dakota, Indiana, Nebraska, Virginia, Utah, Iowa, West Virginia and Montana. Other states are considering legislation or bills regarding foreign nations' ability to purchase land including Ohio, Michigan and Georgia. What People Are Saying Speaking to Newsweek, Michael McFaul, who served as the U.S. ambassador to Russia from 2012 to 2014, said: "Not every Chinese citizen is an agent of the Communist Party of China. Many of China's most successful entrepreneurs, engineers, and academics—especially those living and working in the United States—loathe the Chinese Communist Party. U.S. government officials must develop more sophisticated policies for decreasing the influence of the Chinese Communist Party in the United States that do not treat all Chinese citizens as enemies of America." Cole Hefner, a Texas Republican state representative, said of Texas' bill: "Senate Bill 17 will counter this threat and make Texas a leader in state security. We cannot, we will not, allow oppressive regimes who actively seek to do harm to cease control and dictate their terms over our economy, our supply chains, our daily lives, our critical infrastructure for our food supply." Advocacy group Asian Texans for Justice opposed the Texas bill, saying it revives "a shameful chapter in American history—when Asian immigrants were banned from owning land." What Happens Next Texas' bill will now go to the state's governor, who has indicated he will support it. The success of other bills as well as whether other states will advance legislation pertaining to the issue remains to be seen.
