Colorado Native Son (and State’s First Hispanic U.S. Senator) Takes Charge of Public Lands

DENVER – Ken Salazar, who worked his way from a remote family ranch in the San Luis Valley to become Colorado's first Hispanic U.S. senator, with a stint as state attorney general along the way, will join President-elect Barack Obama’s cabinet as Secretary of the Interior, it was announced this week.

He takes the helm of a department that is “critical to the integrity of the nation’s parks, its open spaces and its animal species,” opined the New York Times Wednesday, a department currently “riddled with incompetence and corruption, captive to industries it is supposed to regulate and far more interested in exploiting public resources than conserving them.” Salazar’s “most urgent task will be to remove the influence of politics and ideology from decisions that are best left to science.”

In the 2004 campaign that sent him to the Senate, Salazar vowed to fight for Colorado's land, water and people, narrowly defeating beer baron Pete Coors.

Salazar has a reputation among Democrats as a maverick, once joining 13 moderate senators to block his party from a filibuster of appellate court nominees by President George W. Bush. He joined another bipartisan group to prevent renewal of parts of the Patriot Act because of concerns about civil liberties in the measure intended to combat terrorism, and he upset Democrats when he backed Alberto Gonzales, Bush's nominee for attorney general.

Western Democrats, he has said, made their gains by focusing on issues dear to a cross-section of voters – energy, the environment, water, agriculture, veterans' affairs – and not on special interest groups.

Of the party's national leaders, Salazar once said: “I hope they heed the fact that we in the West have been able to get the Democratic Party back in the saddle, and that's by being moderate pragmatists that don't see Republicans as devils.”

Salazar's family settled in Colorado's San Luis Valley about 150 years ago and built a 220-acre ranch in an area called Los Rincones (the corners) because of the right angle formed by two snowcapped mountain ridges.

“I got my political values from my mother and father. They struggled mightily in one of the most rural and poorest counties in America,” Salazar said. “Their vision for their children was that they would have a better life.”

Growing up, Salazar occasionally stayed at the ranch alone, a rifle by his side because they lived five miles from the nearest town. “It was rough. We struggled,” said his mother, Emma. Her husband, Henry, valued education and made sure all eight children went to college before he died in 2001.

Salazar obtained a law degree from the University of Michigan in 1981 and joined a prominent Denver law firm. Six years later, Democratic Gov. Roy Romer made him his legal adviser, then head of the Department of Natural Resources.

In 1998, Salazar was elected attorney general.

His older brother, John, was elected to the House of Representatives in 2004.

DeGette, Hickenlooper, Romanoff and Rep. Salazar Possible Replacements

Democratic Gov. Bill Ritter, acknowledging “bittersweet” feelings at the prospect of choosing Salazar’s replacement, praised Salazar's experience as head of the state Department of Natural Resources under former Gov. Roy Romer, and his Western roots.

“Ken Salazar has been an extremely effective United States senator for Colorado these past four years, particularly as a moderate and as a centrist,” Ritter said, adding that “Sen. Salazar [will] make an equally outstanding Interior secretary for the country, for the West and for Colorado.

Political consultant Floyd Ciruli said it would be difficult, but not impossible, for Ritter to appoint Salazar's brother John to fill a vacant Senate seat. The appointee would serve until the next general election in 2010 and would be required to run then if he or she still wants the job.

Ciruli said John Salazar doesn't have the statewide support his brother garnered during his term as state attorney general and could have a tough time against a Republican challenger. John Salazar was elected in the 3rd Congressional District largely because of name recognition and the millions of dollars Democrats spent to get Ken Salazar elected, Ciruli said.

John Hickenlooper, Denver's quirky mayor who won office with a campaign promising to chop down parking meters, may have a better chance, Ciruli speculated.

He said Hickenlooper continually out-polls other prominent Colorado Democrats, including Ritter and Ken Salazar.

Another possible replacement on Ciruli's list: House Speaker Andrew Romanoff, who is term-limited and is leaving office in January. Romanoff is currently a finalist for Colorado Secretary of State. The incumbent, Republican Mike Coffman, was elected to replace retiring U.S. Rep. Tom Tancredo in the 6th Congressional District.

Ciruli said that in Ken Salazar, Senate Democrats would lose a valuable lawmaker known for seeking bipartisan support, but that he could be even more valuable to Colorado and the region as interior secretary.

Democratic U.S. Rep. Diana DeGette has received several calls encouraging her to seek an appointment to fill Salazar's seat, said her spokesman, Kristofer Eisenla.

“It's definitely something she is going to have to consider,” he said.