Contact CU Independent Staff Writer Ryan Ellis at ryan.ellis@colorado.edu.
As the University of Colorado campus prepared for the Republican presidential candidates to arrive, the debate was hardly the only event of the day. With major media outlets focusing their cameras on Boulder for the day, it seemed that everyone was trying to get their message into the shot.
Outside the UMC earlier this morning, a crowd of about a hundred people formed around a group of Christian activists. While the activists shouted their religious messages, students responded, mostly with dissent. “Not all Republicans are like this!” one woman shouted from the crowd. At the same time, a man in a blue shirt and a Bernie Sanders badge stood with a group of his friends, watching the drama unfold. With presidential elections being the topic of the day, daily campus issues signified a partisan divide.
Inside the UMC, the Glenn Miller Ballroom is prepared for the watch party, while across the hallway stands a Boulder County election polling station. On the fifth floor of the same building, Democratic presidential candidate Martin O’Malley spoke about gun control.
Above the campus, an airplane circled all morning, towing a banner that read “Jeb and Rubio #KochPuppets.”
Outside the Coors Events Center stood the cameras themselves. Large media trucks and RVs from Utah, New York and California sat surrounded by teams of reporters. As they conducted their pre-debate stories and interviews, the focus remained strictly on the debate.
Surrounding all this was a very noticeable police presence on campus. Temporary fencing was erected where crowds were likely to gather, and the Jefferson County sheriff parked cars and trucks in various locations on campus.
