Kiros, 29, is poised to become one of the youngest women in Congress. Her political work was sparked by the war in Gaza and caught fire in an antiestablishment year.
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Before she ran for Congress in Denver’s deeply Democratic district, Melat Kiros was a barista, doctoral student and left-wing activist who didn’t identify as one of the democratic socialists rocking her party’s establishment.
But in her insurgent campaign that toppled a liberal, three-decade incumbent, Kiros embraced the democratic socialist label — and the organizing prowess that helped power her stunning victory Tuesday night.
The war in Gaza sparked Kiros’s interest in politics, and her campaign caught fire among Denver’s progressive groups in a year with a strong antiestablishment mood.
Young Democrats and democratic socialists have begun prevailing in Democratic primaries, rattling party leaders.
In an interview Wednesday, Kiros, 29, described her decisive primary victory over Rep. Diana DeGette, 68, as evidence of “discontent with the failure of the party.”
She has pitched publicly financed elections and banning corporate campaign donations. She called for Medicare-for-all and universal child and elder care. She told supporters at her victory party that the win sent a message that “we will not wait” and “we believe that fundamental change can, and will, happen if we fight for it.”
Her evolution from a junior corporate lawyer in New York to democratic socialist started with an open letter to law firms in November 2023.
More than two dozen top law firms had sent letters urging law school deans to crack down on antisemitism that accompanied campus protests over Israel’s war on Gaza. Among the signatories was Sidley Austin, where Kiros was a junior associate fresh out of Notre Dame Law School, working on securities regulation.
In her “Dear US Law Firms” letter, Kiros accused the powerful legal community of equating criticism of the Israeli government with antisemitism. She said she was fired when she refused the firm’s request to take it down.
She said attorneys emailed her saying they wish they could have spoken up too but couldn’t afford to lose their livelihoods or health care.
Kiros said that people had been “held hostage” and censored by an employment-based health care system and inability to meet people’s basic needs.
“If we don’t have citizens who feel like they could actively participate, then we don’t have a functioning democracy,” she said.
After her firing, Kiros moved home to Colorado, where her family had settled from Ethiopia when she was an infant through the Diversity Visa Lottery program. She has described Israel’s war as a genocide and said she recently lost relatives in a genocide in Ethiopia.
She started working as a barista in Denver’s Whittier Cafe, volunteered on a congressional campaign in a neighboring district and got to know Denver’s progressive political crowd. She launched a PhD program studying public policy at the University of Colorado Denver.
The political action committee Justice Democrats offered Kiros backing and campaign expertise shortly after she launched her campaign against DeGette.
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“The local progressive community had been building for a moment like this for years,” said Alexandra Rojas, executive director of Justice Democrats, who described Kiros as ”a generational talent and rising star.“
That advocacy connected Kiros to the local chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America, and Kiros realized that her values matched the DSA. She said Denver voters also shared the values, citing how they approved ballot initiatives to enact universal preschool and public financing for elections.
The DSA also had organizing power that undercut DeGette’s institutional support, helping Kiros secure two-thirds of the March vote at the state’s nominating convention, nearly disqualifying DeGette from the primary race. Kiros’s strong showing among party activists helped unleash more donors and build the case that DeGette was vulnerable.
“A lot of things changed after our performance at the caucus,” Kiros said. “That was through a really massive operation of organizing, largely assisted by DSA.”
She also received a late endorsement from Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vermont), who she said called to congratulate her after her victory.
Kiros is the third democratic socialist all but assured to join Congress after winning Democratic House primaries in deep blue districts, following June victories by Claire Valdez and Darializa Avila Chevalier in New York City.
DeGette had liberal bona fides in policies and allies: She sponsored Medicare-for-all legislation, worked on abortion access and served as an impeachment manager against President Donald Trump alongside liberal Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Maryland), who endorsed her. So did a former chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Washington), who recorded a video arguing that DeGette’s seniority in Congress would grant a key leadership position to advance Medicare-for-all.
But supporters of Kiros faulted DeGette for taking money from corporate political action committees and not taking a harder line against Israel’s actions in Gaza.
Some progressive groups and Jewish leaders raised concern that Kiros’s attacks on the Israeli government went too far, particularly when she declined to call a deadly firebombing in Boulder antisemitic.
“To respond in a manner that says ‘well, I don’t know what was in the perpetrator’s heart’ I think missed a moment and an opportunity to talk about what it takes to heal in the midst of just exceptional pain and violence,” state Sen. Julie Gonzales, a Democrat who lost a primary bid against Sen. John Hickenlooper, told the Colorado Sun.
DeGette posted a concession video online Wednesday congratulating Kiros and saying “job No. 1 is standing up to Donald Trump and protecting our democracy.” But she added that she spent her career trying to work across the aisle to make a better society, and “sadly, in our toxic political environment, there seems to be little room for that type of politician anymore.”
In Congress, Kiros wants to abolish ICE, create a nationwide moratorium on data centers and pass an updated Green New Deal. But first she wants to overhaul campaign finance laws, and she refuses to support a House leader who takes any corporate donations.
“I sincerely believe that getting money out of our politics is going to be the issue that unlocks everything else,” she said.
Until she joins Congress next year, Kiros remains a barista and doctoral student — but she had put her coffee shop shifts on hold during the campaign.
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