One-on-one interview with Colorado Republican gubernatorial candidate Victor Marx

Colorado Republican gubernatorial candidate Victor Marx recently sat down with CBS Colorado to discuss his experiences, his campaign and the issues facing Coloradans ahead of the Nov. 3 election.

Marx's campaign for governor is his first foray into politics, and it's been a bumpy one.

He first teased his campaign at a memorial last year for Republican activist Charlie Kirk, telling the crowd, "Come October 1st, I'll tell you if God is calling me to run for governor."

Marx says he was a close friend and spiritual mentor to Kirk but, while Kirk's organization, Turning Point U.S.A., has endorsed hundreds of candidates this year, Marx isn't one of them. He says he told the organization not to endorse him to protect Kirk's widow, Erika, from attacks.

"I'm probably the most attacked gubernatorial candidate in the country," Marx explained.

Yet, he posted a picture of himself with Erika Kirk online right after her husband died.

Marx is, in many ways, a study in contrasts, a victor and a victim.

"To me, it's do people like yourself actually want to believe it or not," Marx said in a wide-ranging interview. 

He founded a Colorado Springs organization called All Things Possible Ministries in 2003. He says he's "led more than 150 high-stakes humanitarian missions" to help victims of terrorism, trafficking and violence.

Marx says people who question his stories of going into combat zones to save women and children are just biased: "On our campaign website, under endorsements, there are people that were there serving with us who still hold credentials in the U.S. government at the highest level."

His website lists 5 people under military endorsements. Only one of them confirms any of Marx's claims, and he works for him.

The absence of independent backup is exacerbated by the extraordinary nature of the claims, like how he called in the coordinates for a strike on ISIS as a civilian.

"Since I started this organization, we've been under high threat and high stress where people are trying to kill us," Marx said.

He says he's not sure if he's killed anyone during one of his missions, " I cannot say, while I've been engaged in defending myself, that I've killed anyone."

But he's hinted at it, telling NRATV, "I don't believe every ISIS fighter is beyond redemption. You know, now a lot of them just got to be killed. There is, I mean, I've had them shooting me, and I've had to shoot back." 

The only person he's sure he killed is a man he says his dad forced him to kill as a kid.

Marx has wavered on how many people he's saved.

He initially said he has "rescued more than 45,000 women and children from sex trafficking."

His ministry's website now says, "Our teams have served more than 45,000 women and children, some of whom needed to be rescued from captivity."

He says most of his ministry's work is helping women and children recover from abuse: "The main thing is trauma care and relief." 

Much of that relief comes in the form of stuffed animals that he calls "trauma tools." The ministry's website also mentions helping a shelter in Southeast Asia.

Running a ministry is very different from running a state. But Marx has expressed concern about Colorado's governance and the state's budget deficit.

Marx says he was invited to the Capitol to view the state budget.

"We sat down with the transitionary briefing about a week and a half ago, and I was shocked at how bad it is," he said.

If elected, he says he will immediately order state agencies to cut their spending by 10%. That would mean $100,000,000 less for the Department of Corrections, which is already short on beds, and $1.6 billion for the Department of Health Care Policy and Financing, which administers Medicaid and is already preparing for federal cuts.

"So, what I think has to happen, what we will see is, we'll do a full audit first," he said.

Marx is also trying to sort out his campaign finances. A court found that he accepted $83,000 in donations above the legal limit.

"We actually haven't done anything illegal," Marx says.

Yet, he received one of the biggest fines in state history for illegal contributions that his campaign says it's returned.

Marx has also come under fire for remarks he's made about women.

In 2020, he said, "Men, wives, you've got to have that hierarchy. Someone's got to lead when decisions have to be made. You can make them jointly, but ultimately one person -- I'm always going to say the man -- But there are areas in my life I submit to my wife in the sense that I go, 'Hey, what do you think is the best course of action for this?' I listen. I still know the decision; I still have to make the final decision. Because I believe it's: God, husband, the wife, kids."

"That's what we call the biblical family unit," Marx told CBS Colorado. "But men are not superior to women. I never said that."

He says decisions are a shared responsibility and credited his wife, Eileen Marx, with the idea to go to Iraq, stating, "I listened. I took her advice, and that started our whole ministry inside of Iraq and the Middle East."

But he has previously said men are better at leading and making decisions. Last year, he said, "Men lead, and women - they're not going to lead perfectly."

And in 2020, he said, "Women are emotional, and they want right. Sometimes, they make the bad decision."

When his wife decided to stop martial arts training after they were married, he says he slammed her into a door.

He told CBS Colorado he wasn't mad at her, but he told a podcaster in 2021 that he was furious: "And of course, that infuriated me, right. You know, I'm not gonna be [there] the whole time. And it was funny because she goes, I can handle myself. I said, 'You can?' And I remember grabbing her, slamming her into our front door. I mean, pretty, it was a decent push. It'd be a bouncing push, right? Yes. She hit that, bent over and started crying, facing the opposite way."

Eileen Marx says she pretended to be hurt to lure her husband in and then kicked him to show him she could handle herself.

Marx says he would not be the kind of Governor who yells when he's upset, explaining, "I typically get quieter."

That isn't always the case. Marx didn't like a woman's question at a campaign event and said, "Ma'am, did you just not hear what I said? I gave you details. How are you gonna help me win? Okay then, vote for Phil! Vote for Phil!"

Marx was apparently referring to his Democratic opponent Phil Weiser.  

Marx says God called him to run for governor because he knew he had a good shot. If he loses, he says it will be because people, not God, chose someone else.

"That's where God's providence comes in," said Marx. "He'll give people an opportunity to choose a leader, and it's up to them to choose."

Several high-profile Republicans have refused to endorse Marx. Some have even endorsed Democrat Phil Weiser. CBS Colorado also offered to interview Weiser, but his Communications Director, Nate Jackson, stopped responding to messages from Your Political Reporter after she ran a story during the primary about campaign finance that he didn't like. CBS Colorado has now reached out to Weiser's campaign manager. She said she'll get back to us.

Find the full interview with the Marxes here.