SCOTT BOTTOMS
MAKES HIS CASE
FOR COLORADO
GOVERNOR.

Scott Bottoms is the lead pastor of The Church at Powergate in Colorado Springs and a doctor of ministry who has pastored since the age of 20 — roughly 35 years. He has been married to the same wife for 35 years, has three children — two still in Colorado — and three grandchildren.

Bottoms represents House District 15 on the east side of Colorado Springs and told Pyrost he has just finished his second full term, a total of four years in the Colorado House. Because a legislator cannot run for two offices at once, this race marks the end of his time as a representative. He says he was the first candidate to declare for the 2026 governor's race, announcing in December 2024, and has been campaigning for roughly a year and a half — doing Lincoln Day dinners, town halls, and about twenty debates, including televised forums with Channel 7 and at Colorado Christian University.

He also described the personal toll of the campaign, saying he and his family have received threats and "iffy" packages since his first days in office, and that his wife is the one most affected by the more specific ones. Bottoms said he does not dwell on them.

Bottoms says parental authority and the protection of children have been his biggest issues since entering office, shaped both by constituents and by decades of pastoral counseling. He told Pyrost he co-sponsored or supported bills — run three years in a row — to impose minimum prison terms on those convicted of crimes against children, and to elevate certain sexual exposure offenses from misdemeanors to felonies. He claims these efforts were repeatedly voted down by Democrats in the legislature, and characterizes that opposition in stark terms.

He also recounted a widely disputed episode in which, he says, a Colorado Springs school placed a litter box in a bathroom to accommodate a student who identified as a cat — an account he says local media disputed at the time, but which he maintains he can substantiate through a family in his church. Pyrost has not independently verified these claims, which reflect Bottoms's own characterization of events and of his colleagues' motives.

Bottoms argues that Colorado's approach to gender transition for minors amounts to enabling mental illness rather than treating it, and he points to a recent U.S. Supreme Court decision that struck down a Colorado restriction on counselors discussing detransition. He contends the legislature responded by allowing lawsuits against counselors with no statute of limitations, and says he spoke against the measure on the House floor.

He frames what he calls "transgender ideology" as a collapsing trend, citing restrictions adopted in several European countries and a wave of high-profile detransition lawsuits in the United States. He also alleges Colorado functions as a "destination state" — paying for procedures for out-of-state residents through taxpayer funds and NGO recruitment. These are Bottoms's assertions as stated in the interview and have not been independently verified by Pyrost.

On parental rights specifically, Bottoms says he ran legislation to require parental consent and notification for medical procedures involving minors, and that it was voted down — leaving Colorado, in his account, a state where parents need not be notified of a minor's abortion or transition-related care.

Bottoms calls SB 25-003 one of the most aggressive firearms restrictions in the country. As he describes it, the law creates a new category — a "specified semi-automatic firearm" — and requires buyers to move through a multi-step permitting process: hunter education through Colorado Parks & Wildlife, a third-party background check, sheriff approval, and a certified training class before a purchase can be completed. He estimates the total cost to a buyer at roughly $300 or more, and notes the covered-firearms list remains in draft form.

He predicts the law will collapse under its own funding mechanism. Because enforcement would draw on Colorado Parks & Wildlife dollars, Bottoms argues that spending federal-linked CPW funds on firearm enforcement could jeopardize roughly $37 million in annual federal funding — and that unfunded sheriffs may simply decline to enforce it. This is Bottoms's analysis of the law's likely effect, not an established outcome.

More broadly, Bottoms describes himself as opposed to most firearm restrictions on constitutional grounds, including, in principle, concealed-carry permitting — framing the Second Amendment primarily as a check against government tyranny.

Bottoms walked through a series of rankings he keeps on his campaign website, citing Colorado as among the worst states for car theft, bank robberies, and overall crime, and as one of the most expensive states to live in and retire. He ties high crime to a 2023 competency-to-stand-trial bill he says he voted against, and to Denver's status as a destination for migration across the southern border.

On cost of living, he points to housing — citing an average home price around $620,000 — and to property taxes he says can run two to three times an older homeowner's former mortgage. He argues Colorado saw, in his telling, its first year of net out-migration and a long-run decline in both business activity and public-school enrollment. The figures cited are Bottoms's own and reflect his statements in the interview.

One of Bottoms's central pitches is an aggressive audit of state government. He says he has been working with contacts tied to federal small-business and fraud teams, that he ran a resolution seeking an outside special auditor for the judicial system and the attorney general's office, and that a single case under review could represent $30–33 billion in fraud — a figure he says would eclipse other states' known cases.

He also pointed to the long-delayed Front Range passenger-rail effort, saying roughly $5 billion has been spent without track laid — what a colleague calls "the train to nowhere." Bottoms says he intends to "DOGE this state," investigate agencies, and build out an investigative team if elected. These claims and dollar figures are Bottoms's own and have not been independently verified by Pyrost.

• PASTOR SINCE AGE 20

  Lead pastor of The Church at Powergate in Colorado Springs; roughly 35 years in ministry and a doctor of ministry.

• HOUSE DISTRICT 15

  Elected to the Colorado House representing the east side of Colorado Springs; completed two full two-year terms — four years total.

• DECEMBER 2024

  Becomes the first candidate to announce a run for governor; roughly a year and a half on the trail since.

• ~8-MONTH POLICY SCHOOL

  Says he studied the state constitution and statute line-by-line with a federal-level policy instructor to prepare for the office.

• TRANSITION PLANNING

  Mapping the roughly 3,200 gubernatorial appointments; says executive orders are being drafted and ready to sign on day one.

• JUNE 30, 2026

  Colorado's Republican primary, with the general election to follow in November.

Bottoms closed the Pyrost interview where he began — framing the 2026 race as a fight he expects to be contested from the first minute. He says a win by a Christian conservative pastor would "send shockwaves," that opponents will challenge him in court immediately, and that his team has spent more than a year preparing for exactly that. Whether his message lands with Colorado's primary electorate, and then the broader general-election base, remains to be seen.