FORT COLLINS — For the second election in a row, a Fort Collins man is hoping to bring his community closer to the middle in ideology by unseating controversial House District 52 incumbent Yara Zokaie, who has close ties to the Democrat Socialists of America group and an antisemitic social media streamer.
Steve Yurash, state chairman and founder of the Colorado Center party, now has two full years as a qualified minor party in Colorado to prop up his goal of being the voice for the “majority in the middle.”
“We need new political leaders grounded in the reality of our difficult and complex lives willing to make the difficult choices,” he said on his website. “We need a balance between strong businesses for good paying jobs and a vigilant government to protect citizens from corporate abuses like pollution, anti-trust violations, and consumer protection.”
Democrats divided
With more and more division among Colorado Democrats –led by Gov. Jared Polis – over the growing number of Democrat Socialists in the party, and no Republican on the HD-52 ballot, Yurash believes he has a chance.
“Governor Jared Polis and my opponent, avowed socialist Yara Zokaie, have engaged in a tit-for-tat on social media where Governor Polis described socialism as “dangerous” and said ‘I just care deeply about our state and don’t want the socialists to destroy it,’ ” Yurash said in a statement on his website. “When you vote for socialists like Ms. Zokaie, you get the whole package, you don’t get to choose some issues and reject others.”
While Yurash lost the historically Democrat stronghold by a landslide in 2024, with Zokaie getting 63 percent of the vote, the timing could be right this time around. Adding to the party’s division, the district sits alone among a conservative stretch of plains and small towns running north to the Wyoming line, with unaffiliated voters making up the largest block.
House District 52, which covers south-central Fort Collins, is surrounded by more the conservative House District 51 (Loveland), House District 64 (Johnstown/Berthoud), and House District 65 (northeast Fort Collins, Windsor and Eaton).
Zokaie’s socialist baggage
Yurash will need those unaffiliated voters, as well as registered Republicans–void of their own candidate–to be successful, and Zokaie’s track record could be the difference.
Zokaie has not been shy about her socialist ideology. Her website features an endorsement from the Democrat Socialists of America, and she endorsed Melat Kiros in her successful primary run against Diana DeGette for the right to represent Democrats on the ballot in the 1st Congressional District.
She is an ally of New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani, and has also openly aligned herself with antisemitic social media streamer Hasan Piker.
Piker’s polarizing commentary has said America deserved 9/11, has referred to Israelis as “inbreds,” and has expressed support for designated terrorist organizations such as Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis, prompting groups such as the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) and the American Jewish Committee (AJC) to condemn his commentary as “sanitizing violence and amplifying dangerous tropes.”
Challenge from the center
The Colorado Center Party Yurash founded launched in January 2022 and won minor-party status in September 2023. Yurash describes the party as “more left-leaning on the social issues and more right-leaning on the fiscal issues and crime.”
Yurash call himself a common-sense candidate who loves America. His platform mixes some of both major parties’ positions. He supports preserving Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights (TABOR) refunds, local control over land use, cash bail, school choice, and reproductive rights. He opposes the idea of “Medicare for All,” which he says his opponent supports.
“Politics today is far too divisive with too much acrimony,” Yurash says on his website. “Families can’t even talk to each other anymore. I can bring the voice of commonsense and civility back to our state government to get to work on real solutions that our citizens deserve.”
Neither candidate returned requests for interviews from Complete Colorado.
