Republican U.S. Rep.-elect Greg Lopez is scheduled to be sworn into office on Monday, July 8, after winning last month’s vacancy election in Colorado’s 4th Congressional District, a Lopez spokeswoman and House Speaker Mike Johnson’s office told Colorado Politics on Friday.
The 60-year-old Lopez is expected to serve the roughly six months remaining in former U.S. Rep. Ken Buck’s term, following the five-term Republican’s resignation from Congress in March.
Once Lopez is sworn in, Republicans will expand their slim majority in the House of Representatives to 220 members, compared to 213 Democrats, with two vacant seats remaining.
Lopez easily defeated Democratic nominee Trisha Calvarese for the solid GOP seat, which covers Douglas County, portions of Larimer and Weld counties and the state’s Eastern Plains.
In only the second U.S. House vacancy election in Colorado history, Lopez won with just over 58% of the vote on June 25, ahead of Calvarese’s roughly 34% and Libertarian Hannah Goodman’s 5%, with another third-party candidate receiving just under 2%.
While the Colorado Secretary of State’s Office doesn’t plan to certify the results until July 22 — following a required audit and meetings of the district’s 21 county canvass boards — Johnson’s office is able to make Lopez a congressman based on unofficial results, according to sources familiar with the process.
“Neither of my parents had the opportunity to graduate from high school, and yet, this evening I was elected to serve in the United States House of Representatives,” Lopez said in a statement after winning election.
“I truly feel I am a living testament that regardless of who you are or where you come from, we can all be a part of the American Dream. That said, the real work starts now.”
Lopez added that he was “ready to serve all the residents of the district with honor and integrity regardless of whether or not they voted for me.”
An Air Force veteran who grew up in Texas, Lopez served two terms as mayor of Parker from 1992-1994 and was the Colorado director of the U.S. Small Business Administration for six years during the Obama administration. Lopez made two unsuccessful runs for governor, finishing in third place in 2018 in a four-way primary and trailing Republican nominee Heidi Ganahl by about 8 percentage points in 2022.
Lopez narrowly won the GOP nod for the special election in late March after pledging to run as a “placeholder” candidate, arguing that his nomination would let Republican primary voters pick the nominee for a full term in the district without giving any of the GOP candidates a leg up.
U.S. Rep. Lauren Boebert, who moved into the district from the Western Slope at the beginning of the year, handily won a six-way primary, which was held at the same time and on the same ballot as the special election. Seeking a third term in Congress, Boebert faces Calvarese in November.
Lopez and his wife, Lisa, live in Elizabeth. They have two adult children.
