Overview:
Melat Kiros, a 28-year-old immigration lawyer, is running an upstart grassroots campaign against 30-year incumbent Rep. Diana DeGette.
In the midst of New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s campaign last year, Denver resident Caroline Belmont came across a TikTok video of a group of volunteers standing in the rain, crying and celebrating after winning round one of the Democratic Primary.
“I saw that and thought, ‘Oh my god, I would die to have that much hope and happiness about something going right politically,’” Belmont said.
Now, Belmont says she has found that same energy in Denver. The clean energy professional, who moved to Colorado from California a decade ago, is one of hundreds of volunteers fueling the grassroots congressional campaign of Melat Kiros, the 28-year-old immigration attorney and PhD student challenging longtime incumbent Diana DeGette in Colorado’s 1st Congressional District Democratic primary on June 30.
“There’s a lot of energy and momentum,” Belmont said. “The energy this year during primary season in Denver is different. There’s a lot more passion.”
Kiros, a democratic socialist who was born in Ethiopia and immigrated to Denver as an infant, is running on a platform centered on Medicare for All, housing affordability, universal childcare and removing corporate money from politics. She is also calling for an arms embargo on Israel and the abolition of ICE, positions that place her firmly to the left of much of the Democratic establishment.
She is the only candidate in the race not accepting corporate PAC money and says her campaign has raised more from small-dollar individual donors than any other candidate in the field. According to the campaign, she has received contributions from more than 5,000 donors.
“[Democrats] are beholden to the same billionaires and corporations that got Trump into office in the first place and created the conditions for someone like Trump to rise to power in the first place,” Kiros said.
The race has emerged as an unusually competitive Democratic primary in one of the safest blue districts in the country. DeGette, first elected to Congress in 1996, is the second-longest-serving member of Colorado’s congressional delegation and has framed her campaign around experience and seniority in Washington.
“Diana DeGette has worked hard for Denver for over 30 years and is grateful she is on track to make the ballot through the assembly process, despite the major technical issues with the party’s software platform and serious questions about the process,” campaign spokesperson Jennie Peek-Dunstone told Colorado Politics. “She enjoyed connecting with Democrats about the issues that matter to them.”
Kiros, who was born the same year DeGette was sworn into office, believes DeGette should have retired long ago.
“By the time I turned 18 and got the right to vote,” Kiros said, “there should have been a new batch of people to choose from.”
Kiros and DeGette both qualified for the ballot through the Democratic assembly process, where Kiros won 67% of delegate support compared to DeGette’s 33%. Business owner and University of Colorado Regent Wanda James is also running in the primary. James qualified through petition signatures.
Kiros decided to get into politics after working as a corporate litigator in New York in 2023. While working at Sidley Austin LLP, Kiros wrote an article defending law students whose job offers were being revoked over protests against the war in Gaza. She said her employer demanded she remove the piece.
“The next day, I got fired,” Kiros said. “And I moved back home immediately.”
Belmont said Kiros’ willingness to accept professional consequences for her beliefs drew her to the campaign.
“Her strength in writing the letter that got her fired, and her conviction and willingness to act on it, is really, really deeply admirable,” she said.
Back in Denver, Kiros volunteered for former congressional candidate John Feder, who at the time was the only candidate in Colorado’s 4th Congressional District publicly calling for a ceasefire in Gaza. She later became his communications director while also enrolling in a PhD program at the University of Colorado Denver, where her research focuses on money in politics.
After Donald Trump’s 2024 election victory, Kiros said she became convinced Democrats needed a new generation of leadership.
“We cannot expect the same people who were at the helm of the ship when we saw Trump get elected the first time and then lose again a second time to be the ones who get us out of this mess,” Kiros said.
Much of her campaign is focused on economic issues affecting working-class voters. Her housing platform calls for federally subsidizing 30% of all new housing developments and treating homelessness as a public health issue rather than a criminal one. She supports Medicare for All, universal childcare and term limits for members of Congress, while also backing a ban on congressional stock trading and a five-year lobbying ban for former lawmakers.
She points to Denver’s publicly financed elections and campaign contribution limits as evidence that local voters are already more progressive than many of the politicians representing them in Washington.
“This is where all my family are, my friends,” she said. “Regardless of what happens, I’m not leaving Colorado.”
Kiros’ campaign has leaned heavily into volunteer organizing, drawing inspiration from progressive campaigns like former New York Congressman Jamaal Bowman’s. Belmont helped organize a campaign kickoff event at BurnDown that attracted more than 200 volunteers.
“No one wants to do that on their weekends, typically,” Belmont said with a laugh. “But we had an incredible turnout.”
While canvassing neighborhoods across Denver, Belmont said she has encountered both frustration and optimism from voters.
“There have been some people who are very apathetic and have kind of lost hope,” she said. “And it’s been really cool to see some spark return to their eyes. It feels so powerful. It’s incredible.”
Kiros argues Democrats have a narrowing window to deliver meaningful change for working-class voters before risking deeper political disillusionment.
“We need someone who’s bold and imaginative and is going to be unbought and unafraid,” she said. “Who puts you into office is who you’re going to hold yourself accountable to.”
