Don Quick

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Don Quick

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Prior offices

Colorado 17th Judicial District

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Education

Bachelor's

University of Colorado, 1982

Law

University of Colorado School of Law, 1986

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Don Quick was a judge of the Colorado 17th Judicial District. He left office in 2024.

Quick ran for re-election for judge of the Colorado 17th Judicial District. He won in the retention election on November 6, 2018.

Quick was appointed by Colorado Supreme Court Chief Justice Nathan Coats to replace Emily Anderson as chief judge of the 17th District Court, effective January 23, 2022.

Education

Quick received his undergraduate degree from the University of Colorado in 1982 and his J.D. degree from the University of Colorado School of Law in 1986.

Career

Before his appointment to the Seventeenth Judicial District Court, Quick was a senior counsel at the law firm of Beatty & Wozniak, P.C. He previously served as a district attorney for the 17th Judicial District from 2005 to 2013, as chief deputy attorney general from 2002 to 2005, and as deputy attorney general for the Criminal Justice Section from 1999 to 2004.

Quick was a Democratic candidate for Attorney General of Colorado in the 2014 elections, but did not win.

Elections

2018

See also: Municipal elections in Adams County, Colorado (2018)

Colorado 17th Judicial District, Don Quick's seat

Don Quick was retained to the Colorado 17th Judicial District on November 6, 2018 with 69.1% of the vote.

			Retention  Vote	%	Votes
		✔	Yes	69.1	114,331
			No	30.9	51,104
			Total Votes		165,435

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It has been certified. Source

2014

See also: Colorado attorney general election, 2014

Quick ran for election as Attorney General of Colorado. Quick was seeking to replace John Suthers (R), who was ineligible to run for re-election due to term limits. He ran unopposed for the Democratic nomination in the primary election on June 24, 2014, and lost to Cynthia Coffman (R) in the general election on November 4, 2014.

Results

Attorney General of Colorado, 2014
Party		Candidate	Vote %	Votes
	Republican	Cynthia Coffman	51.4%	1,002,626
	Democratic	Don Quick	42.4%	826,182
	Libertarian	David K. Williams	6.2%	120,745
Total Votes				1,949,553
Election results via Colorado Secretary of State

Race background

Originally appointed in 2005 to fill a vacancy in the office, outgoing Republican Colorado Attorney General John Suthers went on to win two full terms in 2006 and 2010. He was barred by term limits from running for a third consecutive term, leaving the attorney general seat open in the 2014 elections.

The seat was first marked as "vulnerable" to partisan switch in a March 2013 report Governing put together about the 2014 attorney general elections. In December, the same publication rated the race a "tossup." Out of a total of 31 attorney general seats up for election nationwide in 2014, only four received this rating, including Colorado. The others were Arizona, Arkansas and Wisconsin. Against the backdrop of Colorado's "purple" partisan landscape, statewide races are flagged as competitive early on because major party organizations and other interests get involved in order to exert influence over state government.

In this case, Democratic Party forces placed their faith and money in the campaign of Don Quick, a career prosecutor whom Governing called "a strong contender to flip the seat." Quick previously served as District Attorney for the 17th Judicial District, which includes Adams County, and spent six years as deputy attorney general under Suthers' predecessor, Democrat Ken Salazar.

Also vying to succeed Suthers as Colorado's chief legal officer was Republican contender Cynthia Coffman. Coffman served as chief deputy under Suthers. Coffman's husband, Mike Coffman (R), is a three-term U.S. Representative from Colorado's 6th Congressional District and a former Colorado Secretary of State. Like Quick, she had the connections and access to deep pockets necessary for running a legitimate statewide campaign.

Quick and Coffman were uncontested for their respective party nominations in the June 24 primary and advanced automatically to the general election. Libertarian attorney and party activist David K. Williams was the only third party candidate on the November ballot. Coffman won the general election on November 4, 2014.ref name=win>Colorado Secretary of State, "Colorado Election Results," accessed September 24, 2015</ref>

Money in the race

The Republican Attorney Generals Association spent $2.6 million on Coffman's campaign as of September. Quick was operating on less than one-quarter of that amount, and he tried to compensate for the relative funding shortage by "walking 2.6 miles a day in campaigning."

Polls

Colorado Attorney General - 2014 General Election
Poll	Cynthia Coffman (R)	Don Quick (D)	David K. Williams (L)	Undecided	Margin of error	Sample size
Suffolk University September 9-16, 2014	40%	30%	4.8%	25.2%	+/-4.4	500
Public Policy Polling July 17-20, 2014	38%	29%	0%	32%	+/-3.8	653
Gravis Marketing July 8-10, 2014	42%	38%	9%	11%	+/-3.0	1,106
AVERAGES	40%	32.33%	4.6%	22.73%	+/-3.73	753
Note: The polls above may not reflect all polls that have been conducted in this race. Those displayed are a random sampling chosen by Ballotpedia staff. If you would like to nominate another poll for inclusion in the table, send an email to [email protected].

**Due to the nature of the comparison, a placeholder figure of 0% is assigned to candidates not included in any given match-up round

Campaign themes

2014

• Public Corruption:

“	If elected, I will develop a public corruption prosecution unit within the office that will assist local jurisdictions with their corruption prosecutions and help restore the public trust in our government.	”
—Don Quick

• Natural Resources:

“	While working for Attorney General Salazar, I established Colorado’s Environmental Crimes Prosecution Unit. As your next Attorney General, I will strengthen and expand our efforts to protect all of Colorado’s natural resources. I will make protection of our land, water and wildlife one of my top priorities.	”
—Don Quick

• Equality and Civil Rights:

“	I believe that “Equal Protection of the Laws” is not simply a phrase in the Constitution; it is the cornerstone of our justice system. As Attorney General, I will work tirelessly to ensure that the rights of every Coloradan are protected, regardless of race, ethnicity, religion, gender or sexual orientation.	”
—Don Quick

• Safer Schools:

“	Over the last 15 years, I have worked with schools and law enforcement agencies to create safer schools by keeping guns and gangs out of schools, implementing anti-bullying policies, facilitating early and appropriate intervention through information sharing, and establishing Safe 2 Tell, an anonymous call system allowing kids and their parents to report potential dangers. I will continue to focus on creating safe schools as your next Attorney General.	”
—Don Quick

Campaign finance summary

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Note: The finance data shown here comes from the disclosures required of candidates and parties. Depending on the election or state, this may represent only a portion of all the funds spent on their behalf. Satellite spending groups may or may not have expended funds related to the candidate or politician on whose page you are reading this disclaimer. Campaign finance data from elections may be incomplete. For elections to federal offices, complete data can be found at the FEC website. Click here for more on federal campaign finance law and here for more on state campaign finance law.

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Don Quick campaign contribution history

Year	Office	Status	Contributions	Expenditures
2014	Colorado Attorney General	Lost	$588,693	N/A**
Grand total			$588,693	N/A**
Sources: OpenSecrets,  Federal Elections Commission ***This product uses the openFEC API but is not endorsed or certified by the Federal Election Commission (FEC).
** Data on expenditures is not available for this election cycle
Note: Totals above reflect only available data.

See also

• Attorney General of Colorado
• Colorado attorney general election, 2014
• Current Colorado Attorney General John Suthers
• Colorado District Courts
• Colorado counties
• Judicial selection in Colorado

External links

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Footnotes

Colorado courts

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Federal courts:

Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals • U.S. District Court: District of Colorado • U.S. Bankruptcy Court: District of Colorado

State courts:

Colorado Supreme Court • Colorado Court of Appeals • Colorado District Courts • Colorado County Courts • Denver Probate Court • Denver Juvenile Court • Colorado Municipal Courts • Colorado Water Courts

State resources:

Courts in Colorado • Colorado judicial elections • Judicial selection in Colorado