President Donald Trump reversed course Friday, once again backing Rep. Jeff Hurd in Colorado’s 3rd Congressional District and telling supporters he would offer Hurd’s primary challenger, Hope Scheppelman, a job in his administration if she steps aside. The reversal comes less than a month after Trump publicly yanked his support when Hurd voted against the president’s tariffs, suddenly jolting a Republican primary that was already shaky heading into the June contest.
As reported by The Denver Post, Trump posted on Truth Social that he was back in Hurd’s corner and that he had offered to hire Scheppelman and her husband into his administration if she dropped out of the GOP primary. The Post notes that Trump cast the move as an effort to stitch together pro-tariff and MAGA factions in the sprawling Western Slope district. Hurd's campaign followed up with a brief acknowledgement on social media after the president’s message.
Hurd, a first-term congressman from Grand Junction who won the seat in 2024, has defended his tariff vote as a constitutional obligation. In a Feb. 19 statement, his office said the repeal vote was "grounded first and foremost in the Constitution" and argued that Congress, not the White House, should set sweeping trade policy, according to his press release. Trump pulled his endorsement in February after that vote, a move covered by Newsweek.
What It Means For The June Primary
Colorado's primary is scheduled for June 30, which means any withdrawal by Scheppelman would have immediate consequences for ballots and turnout, according to VOTE411. The Denver Post notes that if Scheppelman steps aside, Hurd would likely have an uncontested path to the Republican nomination, effectively ending a short but heated intra-party fight. That kind of reset would change how both campaigns deploy staff and court donors across the district’s wide geography.
Local Reaction And What’s Next
Local Republicans and national allies will be watching to see whether the president's about-face actually moves Scheppelman off the ballot or simply reshuffles the race’s dynamics yet again. Colorado Politics reported Trump's original endorsement of Hurd in October 2025 and has tracked the back and forth since. Scheppelman's campaign highlighted Trump's February backing on her campaign site, according to Hope for Colorado, but the campaign had not confirmed whether she would accept the administration job mentioned by the president.
With ballots set to be mailed in late May and a June 30 primary looming, both campaigns have little runway to adjust. We'll update this story as campaigns or the White House provide more details.
