• Atlanta has almost as many strip clubs as Waffle Houses, so it was only a matter of time before the Atlanta Hawks got around to having a promotional night honoring one of them. That strip club turned out to be Magic City, which the Hawks lovingly described as an “iconic cultural institution” and an “Atlanta landmark.” Alas, when the NBA found out, it stepped in and made them cancel it. The Hawks, defiant to the end, responded, “We remain committed to celebrating the best of Atlanta.”
• Nothing says “exclusive dining experience” like a $1,500 meal served with a side of an abuse scandal. After The New York Times detailed years of alleged physical and psychological mistreatment by Noma chef René Redzepi, the restaurant’s pop-up experience in L.A. lost prestigious sponsors American Express and Blackbird. And following that, it lost Redzepi, who resigned via an Instagram post and a tearful video.
• Finally, a non-University of Michigan scandal in the Big 10. Walter Carter Jr., the president of The Ohio State University, is out of a job after admitting that he had an improper relationship with a woman and that he gave her “access to Ohio State leadership to support her personal business.”
• It’s been quite a week for the Department of Defense War:
  • The Pentagon has banned press photographers from the briefing room after U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth found photographs from his recent press briefing unflattering.
  • Officials at the Pentagon threatened The Washington Post that a link on its website asking people to report Pentagon-related news tips “crossed the line into the sort of ‘solicitation’ that is not protected by the First Amendment and that could prompt punishment under the new restrictions.”
  • Secretary Hegseth blasted CNN for its Iran coverage, and announced that the “sooner” that Paramount Skydance CEO and friendly Republican David Ellison “takes over that network, the better.” Paramount Skydance has an agreement to acquire CNN’s owner, Warner Bros. Discovery.
  • CNN wasn’t the only media target in the Trump administration‘s crosshairs. White House officials expressed outrage that CBS News hired Jeremy Adler, a communications executive who formerly worked with Rep. Liz Cheney. They apparently only want people at news divisions that they can count on to be friendly to them.
  • Former NFL players expressed outrage at a propaganda video that juxtaposed their big hits on the football field with images of the U.S. bombing Iran. The Pentagon has declined to remove the video, which is accompanied by the AC/DC song “Thunderstruck.” Former NFL player Kenny Bell said, ““For (my) play to be associated with bombing human beings makes me sick. I don’t want anything to do with images like that.”
• Meanwhile, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio became a meme when President Donald Trump gifted him a pair of shoes that were clearly too big for him, but he apparently was afraid of offending the president and wore them anyway.
• Two Adams City High School students are facing felony charges after they phoned in a false bomb threat and active shooter situation at their school. The students were found at the school with the same type of fake blood that had been smeared in the school’s hallways. Approximately 200 first responders, including police officers with K-9s and bomb-detection equipment, spent several hours responding to the scene.
• The Colorado Republican Party continues its dysfunction. After failing in her attempt to unite the party, state chair Brita Horn announced she will step down next month. She is the sixth consecutive Republican state chair who will have served just one full term or less.
• Meanwhile, Colorado Attorney General candidate and current Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold is trying to dig herself out of the hole she created when she falsely claimed she argued a case before the U.S. Supreme Court.
• Players are blaming a data breach at the Women’s Tennis Association for releasing their private cell phone numbers. You might think they would be receiving calls from lonely, desperate men, but in reality they are receiving calls from organized gambling rings threatening them if they don’t throw matches.
• It’s common for new members of pro sports teams to buy their preferred number from another playing who is using it, but L.A. Kings player Artemi Panarin sank to a new low when he had to buy No. 72 from … the team mascot. He gave “Bailey the Lion” a Rolex for the number.

Who won the week?

• Former JohnstonWells CEO GG Johnston is celebrating the 16th anniversary of Downstream Partners, her consulting firm that helps businesses better align and be more successful.
• Katie Trexler McLean‘s book “What Do I Tell My Daughter” will be published this fall.
• The Denver Post profiled Denver Summit FC’s majority owner Rob Cohen. He also is chairman and CEO of Denver-based IMA Financial Group.

• No Denver hotel may have more history than the Brown Palace, but that history is also working against it. The hotel has undergone multiple renovations to try to make it as modern as competitors such as the Four Seasons and the Ritz-Carlton, but it also finds itself located in the wrong part of downtown – far away from Union Station and the Arts District. The Brown Palace is now for sale for the third time since 2014.
• U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. may get away with banning vaccines, but Massachusetts residents rebelled when he threatened to take away their sugary Dunkin‘ coffee drinks. That’s a bridge too faah.
  • RFK Jr. still had a better week than Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem. President Donald Trump fired her after two brutal days testifying before Congress in which she alleged that President Trump authorized a $200 million advertising campaign featuring her and deflected questions about whether she was sleeping with one of her top aides.
• Data indicate that the arrest rate for rapes in our state sits at just 10%.
• A report commissioned by Visit Denver and restaurant financing company InKind finds that Denver‘s restaurant scene is in “crisis.” The Cliffs Notes version: Denver lost thousands of restaurant jobs between 2020 and 2025, our costs and prices are on par with New York and L.A.’s, and city bureaucracy continues to be a challenge.
• What did a $110,000 investigation into one of the Denver Police Department‘s division chiefs find? We don’t know. DPD refuses to release the report.
• The Atlanta Track Club agreed to award nearly $40,000 to three participants of its USATF Half Marathon Championships  when they were led off course by an official race motorcycle. Complicating the situation is that the race was qualifying event for the world championships in Denmark, and the three individuals who should have finished on the podium for the race now have not qualified for the world championships.
• There’s a reason CEOs usually don’t appear in advertisements, and McDonald’s reminded us why when CEO Chris Kempczinski awkwardly promoted the chain’s new Big Arch burger, which he referred to lovingly as “this product.” Among the competing brands who immediately jumped online to roast him were Burger King, Buffalo Wild Wings, Wendy’s and even Ryanair.
• If you are waiting for an overnight package from someone in Vail, cross your fingers. A FedEx semi-truck traveling to Denver crashed and tumbled into Clear Creek.
• The battle between AI company Anthropic and the Trump administration continues. Anthropic is holding its moral line while the Trump administration tries to declare Anthropic a supply-chain risk and sever its government contracts. The courts will decide.
• Troubled singer Britney Spears‘ challenges continue. She was arrested this week for DUI.
• The Hollywood Reporter dug through recently released Department of Justice files to uncover how a small cadre of public relations professionals enabled Jeffrey Epstein.

Who won the week?

• Linhart PR‘s CFO Carri Clemens is celebrating her 30th anniversary with the agency.
• 9News morning anchor and reporter Lauren Scafidi is leaving the station for a new undisclosed career opportunity.
• DIA awarded a 10-year advertising contract to JCDecaux North America, a subsidiary of the world’s largest outdoor advertising company. The contract still has to be approved by the Denver City Council and, if approved, will become effective in May 2026.
• Aurora Chef Michael Diaz de Leon of the taqueria Molino Chido is one of 16 participants on the CBS television show “America’s Culinary Cup.”
• Denver is on the shortlist to host the 2028 Democratic National Convention.
• Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg and his wife, Priscilla Chan, paid $170 million for a still-under-construction mansion on Miami’s Indian Creek island. 
• We’ve seen versions of this story before – a college accidentally notifies students they were accepted when they weren’t, and humiliated kids have to backtrack on public announcements of their college plans. This time, BYU flipped the script. After nine prospective students were mistakenly sent acceptance letters despite not being admitted, the school has decided to enroll them.

• Big agency Burson just reported that its 2025 earnings fell 6% year over year.
• Fox31 parent company Nexstar is cutting journalists in newsrooms across the country to reduce costs in advance of its expected acquisition of 9News parent company Tegna. The math is curious: more stations, and fewer people to staff them.
• AI company Anthropic has found itself at an impasse with the Pentagon over a philosophical line it won’t cross: Claude cannot be used for fully autonomous weapons or mass domestic surveillance. The Pentagon assures Anthropic it has never considered such applications. I’m guessing Anthropic asked Claude if the Pentagon can be trusted, and, well, you can guess the answer.
• Colorado‘s own U.S. Rep. Lauren Boebert temporarily derailed the deposition of former U.S. Senator and First Lady Hillary Clinton by secretly photographing Clinton and sharing it with a conservative podcaster – a violation of the agreed-upon ground rules for the Jeffrey Epstein-related proceedings. Democrats objected to the breach of protocol; Republicans lamented that the photo became the story. Asked why she did it, Boebert offered a two-word philosophy: “Why not.”
• If the BAFTA awards were looking for attention after being routinely overshadowed by numerous other film awards, they certainly picked a curious strategy. Tourette Syndrome advocate John Davidson, the inspiration for the BAFTA-nominated movie “I Swear,” was invited to the ceremony, and his condition caused him to shout, among other things, the N-word at presenters Michael B. Jordan and Delroy Lindo. The host of the awards show offered two statements – one thanking the crowd for its “understanding” of Davidson’s disability and a second generically apologizing if “anyone was offended.” It took another two days for BAFTA to realize that it probably should extend an apology specifically to Jordan and Lindo, and for putting presenters and audience members in that position to begin with.
• NBC‘s Savannah Guthrie and her family increased the reward for information about her kidnapped 84-year-old mother to $1 million. Nancy Guthrie, 84, has now been missing for four weeks.
• Juan Padro, the co-founder of Culinary Creative Group that runs Denver-area restaurants such as Tap & Burger, Kumoya, Señor Bear, A5 Steakhouse and Bar Dough, is stepping down amid a lawsuit accusing the group of “keeping employee tips under the guise of a ‘service charge’ and paying a manager with the money.”
• University of Virginia QB Chandler Morris has filed a lawsuit against the NCAA demanding he be allowed to return for a seventh college season. One of his arguments: He was injured early in the 2022 season, but returned to play three games at the end of that season. He says those three games weren’t normal games but rather “three appearances (that) were part of a medically prescribed mental health treatment plan” and therefore shouldn’t counted as using up a year of his eligibility.
• Microsoft founder and billionaire philanthropist Bill Gates apologized to Gates Foundation staff members for his affairs and ties to Jeffrey Epstein that have cast a cloud over the foundation and its work.
• Meanwhile, CBS News contributor Peter Attia has resigned after the extent of his relationship with Jeffrey Epstein was disclosed in files released by the DOJ.
• What started as a feel-good, unifying moment – the U.S. Men’s Hockey Team winning the gold medal for the first time since the 1980 Miracle on Ice – quickly turned partisan when FBI Director Kash Patel celebrated in the locker room like he won a medal and President Donald Trump took a swipe at the gold-medal-winning U.S. Women’s Hockey Team during a congratulatory post-game call.
• The Westernaires, the Golden-based youth horseback-riding organization, will no longer perform “cowboys-and-Indians tropes — including a reenactment of the 1876 Battle of Little Bighorn and white children dressed in Native-inspired regalia performing sacred Indigenous dances.” That decision wasn’t made willingly, though. A threat from the National Western Stock Show to ban them forced their hands.
• Italian golfer Andrea Pavan was hospitalized after suffering serious injuries when he fell down an elevator shaft. Pavan “called for the elevator but failed to notice, when the doors opened, that there was no elevator car waiting to collect him.”
• The Colorado Rockies are Rockie-ing again. They traded for pitcher Pierson Ohl in the offseason, and a week into spring training announced he would need to undergo Tommy John surgery that will cause him to miss the entire upcoming season. Rockies Fever! Catch It!
• The Met Gala could use some public relations help after it announced that Jeff Bezos and Lauren Sánchez Bezos will serve as honorary chairs for the 2026 event. Jeff Bezos has most recently been in the new for gutting The Washington Post with extensive layoffs, and even causing some foreign correspondents to find themselves out of work and stranded in war zones.

Who won the week?

• The Denver Press Club has reached the half-way point in its 2026 membership drive. You can join here.
• Good news for local bars and brewpubs: drinking at bars is on the rise even as alcohol consumption is on the decline.
• Former Colorado state Sen. Sonya Jaquez Lewis avoided jail time after being convicted of four felony charges of forgery and attempting to influence a public servant. She was sentenced to two years of probation and 150 hours of community service.
• Warner Bros. Discovery may have jilted Netflix to accept a better acquisition offer from Paramount, but it did receive a $2.8 billion break-up fee in the process.

• Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor – formerly Prince Andrew – appears to be getting his reckoning, albeit Al Capone-style. Caught up deeply in the Jeffrey Epstein human trafficking and rape scandal, British authorities have finally arrested Mountbatten-Windsor … for sharing confidential trade paperwork with Epstein.
• If you have a lunch scheduled with your prospect at Palantir next week, you might want to reconfirm it. The company slinked out of town this week like they were the Baltimore Colts.
• Colorado is the modern-day equivalent of the Wild West. You want drugs? We were the first state in the country to legalize recreational marijuana. Psychedelic mushrooms, you say? Legalized those, too. Gambling? Feel free to head to Black Hawk or Central City. Guns? We’re an open carry state – no permit needed unless you are one of those dandies who wants to conceal it. So what’s left? Why, prostitution, of course. Fear not – the Colorado legislature is on it.
• It is not uncommon for accidents to occur in rural areas of I-25 and I-70 during blowing snow whiteouts in the winter. But brownouts? Extraordinarily dry conditions, dirt-covered fields and high winds combined to cause a February brownout south of Pueblo that resulted in a 30-car pileup. Five people were killed and nearly 30 more were injured.
• Washington, D.C., is at risk of becoming a cesspool. Literally.
• Anderson Cooper is the latest journalist to leave “60 Minutes” following Bari Weiss‘ appointment as editor in chief of CBS News. Pretty soon, there will only be enough journalists on staff to create “30 Minutes.”
• Eight people died in an avalanche in the Lake Tahoe backcountry. Six of the eight were mothers who bonded over their love of the outdoors and two were sisters.
• Actor Eric Dane, best known for roles in “Grey’s Anatomy” and “Euphoria,” passed away at the age of 53. He had been diagnosed with ALS a year ago.
• The high price of cocoa has caused Reese’s to shift from milk chocolate to a chocolate-flavored coating that can’t legally be referred to as milk chocolate. Reese’s is now the Cheez Whiz of chocolate.
• A pickleball dispute over the legality of a winning shot escalated into an argument, then a fistfight, then a 20-person brawl and finally felony charges. Yes, the incident took place in Florida.
• A Wisconsin man who may have just earned honorary Florida citizenship faces multiple charges after he allegedly stole an ambulance that had a patient inside and then led police on a high-speed chase.
• A judge ruled in favor of Buffalo Wild Wings in a $10 million lawsuit that accused the restaurant of fraud because the boneless chicken wings it serves don’t actually come from the wings of chickens.

Who won the week?

• Colorado ski resorts are celebrating the massive snow storm that delivered as much as 44 inches over the past week.
• Mumford & Sons announced it will perform a June show at Folsom Field in Boulder.
• Mikaela Shiffrin is unquestionably the greatest ski racer in the world, but she hasn’t always shown that in the Olympics. This week, she broke an eight-year Olympic medal drought with gold in the slalom event.
• Every Olympics has its breakout stars: snowboarder Shaun White in 2006, swimmer Michael Phelps and sprinter Usain Bolt in 2008, swimmer Katie Ledecky in 2012, gymnast Simone Biles in 2016 and snowboarder Chloe Kim in 2022, for example. So who is the breakout star of the 2026 Winter Olympics? The drones.

• The Denver television news landscape continues to be a dumpster fire:
  • There was a bloodbath among the senior ranks at Denver7 (ABC) this week. GM Brian Joyce shared with employees that Senior Director of News Megan McRae, Assistant News Director Olivia Dickenson and Digital Director Landon Haaf have all left the station effective immediately.
  • And the uncertainty at Denver7 isn’t just in the newsroom. The station is owned by E.W. Scripps Company, which continues to be aggressively pursued by right-wing news holding group Sinclair.
  • Meanwhile, President Donald Trump reversed his position and has now endorsed Nexstar‘s proposed takeover of Tegna, a deal which would have the owner of Fox31/CW2 absorb 9News, potentially dismantling the highest-functioning television newsroom in the state.
• Speaking of President Donald Trump, his ongoing war against the media is working. A Pew Research Center survey finds that a majority of Americans – 57% – lack confidence that journalists act in “the best interests of the public.” That confidence level split significantly along party lines, with just 25% of Republicans expressing confidence in journalists while 61% of Democrats saying they had confidence.
• Omnicom is consolidating PR agencies Porter Novelli with FleishmanHillard and Ketchum with Golin following the completion of its merger with IPG. It is the latest big-agency restructuring and it underscores the economic pressures larger agencies are under with more-demanding clients and AI disruption.
  • PRWeek, which broke the story, noted, “…This is a new era for marketing services holding companies where tough decisions have to be made, and we have already seen the death of similarly famous brand names in the creative and media agency sectors, both after the Omnicom acquisition of IPG and at competitor holdcos such as WPP. Nothing is sacred anymore.”
• The co-owner of the storied Manchester United soccer team is apologizing for his statement that the UK has been “colonized by immigrants.” On the one hand, who would know more about colonizing than an Englander? On the other, that’s probably not a statement you want to make when more than two-thirds of your players are foreign-born.
• Tennis players can be quick to complain about a lot of things – line calls, distracting fans, matches that end too late. But Daniil Medvedev dropped an entirely new one this week: the Head Tour XT tennis balls used in a tournament in Rotterdam are “not round.“ Medvedev added, “I think maybe we should consider not playing with Head (tennis) balls,” which no doubt sent the company’s public relations team into full crisis mode.
• A few Winter Olympics updates:
  • U.S. Olympic skier Lindsey Vonn‘s comeback tour after rupturing her ACL in her final tune-up race before the Winter Olympics came to a disastrous end. A horrific crash in the Women’s Downhill resulted in what doctors described as a “complex tibia fracture” – a term often used to describe when the shin bone shatters. She has had three surgeries since the accident to repair her leg, and doctors caution that her recovery will take at least another six months.
  • The U.S.O.C. disqualified Ukrainian skeleton athlete Vladyslav Heraskevych after he refused to stop wearing a helmet that includes photos of Ukrainian athletes and coaches who have died defending Ukraine from Russian forces.
  • The Olympic medals from Milano Cortina keep breaking.
  • Norwegian biathlete Sturla Holm Laegreid used a perfunctory media interview that came with his bronze medal win as an opportunity to reveal that he had been unfaithful to his former girlfriend in an attempt to win her back. Not surprisingly, that move did not go over well with the ex-girlfriend.
• The HGTV show “Rehab Addict” has been cancelled after leaked footage showed host Nicole Curtis using the N-word on-camera.
• The Ontario Hockey League has apologized for sending an email to season-ticket holders asking them to “be mindful of personal cleanliness while sharing our space with fellow fans.” Before backtracking and apologizing, a team representative elaborated on the reason for the email, saying, “I got a lot of people complaining about the (person) next to them smelling like cat pee, bad breath, this, that and everything else.”
• James Van Der Beek, the actor who co-starred with Katie Holmes, Michelle Williams and Joshua Jackson in the late 1990s/early 2000s teen drama “Dawson’s Creek” has died from complications of colorectal cancer. He was 48. And Brad Arnold, the lead singer of 3 Doors Down, died from kidney cancer. He was 47.

Who won the week?

• Novitas Communications added Clare O’Halloran as an associate.
• The Children’s Hospital Colorado internal comms team was named a finalist for Employee Communications Team of the Year in the 2026 Ragan Employee Communications Awards.
• The Four Seasons was named the best hotel in Denver. It was followed by The Ritz-Carlton, the Crawford Hotel, the Limelight Hotel and The Maven Hotel at Dairy Block.
• Denver Nuggets star Jamal Murray will play in his first NBA All-Star game this weekend. He will be joined by superstar Nikola Jokic.
• Bad Bunny‘s halftime performance drew 128.2 million viewers, making it the fourth most-watched in Super Bowl history. Meanwhile, Kid Rock‘s competing streaming halftime show drew 6.1 million viewers, a not-insignificant number that could encourage others to continue counter-programming future Super Bowl halftime shows.
• Nearing the halfway point, Norway, Italy and the United States lead the medal count at the 2026 Winter Olympics.

• Jeff Bezos took The Washington Post motto “Democracy Dies in Darkness” as an instruction rather than a caution this week when he laid off one-third of the paper – 300 employees. Bezos, who apropos of nothing is worth $249 billion, indicated the layoffs were part of a growth strategy (he may have been holding the revenue projections chart upside down). The layoffs at The Post overshadowed the Atlanta Journal-Constitution‘s announcement that it was laying off 50 employees, or about 15% of its workforce.
• Many recognizable names were included in the latest round of Jeffrey Epstein documents that the U.S. Department of Justice released. Among them: President Donald Trump, former President Bill Clinton, Tesla/X/SpaceX entrepreneur Elon Musk, Virgin founder Richard Branson, former British Prince Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor and his ex-wife Sarah Ferguson, New York Giants co-owner Steven Tisch, former Israel Prime Minister Ehud Barak, former Secretary of the Treasury and former president of Harvard University Larry Summers, current U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, Google co-founder Sergey Brin and former Trump advisor Steve Bannon.
  • There was also one notable local name: Boulder restaurateur Kimbal Musk, who is Elon Musk‘s younger brother. His name was mentioned in the new files more than 100 times.
• After attempting to shoe-horn his name onto the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts and finding that few big names were then willing to perform there, President Donald Trump announced that the center would shut down for two years for extensive renovations. President Trump claimed it would be a renovation rather than a demolition, but anyone who followed his East Wing “renovation” project won’t believe it for a second.
• How unexpected was a New England Patriots–Seattle Seahawks Super Bowl this year? Fanatics, the manufacturer of official NFL jerseys, can’t keep up with demand because it didn’t bother to make extras for those teams in case they made the Super Bowl.
• Nancy Guthrie, the 84-year-old mother of “Today” show host Savannah Guthrie, remains missing and feared kidnapped. Adding to the family’s nightmare, they received competing ransom notes demanding Bitcoin payments, one of which resulted in the arrest of an opportunist who was not involved in any kidnapping. Savannah was scheduled to host the NBC Winter Olympics opening ceremonies later today, but has taken leave to be in Arizona near her mother’s home. Mary Carillo will replace her.
• You will never guess what drives many youth coaches to quit. Okay, you will. The answer is abusive parents.
• The beer at Wonderland Brewing Co. in Broomfield is quite strong, and I know that because the owner must have been consuming a lot of it this week when in the span of a few hours, he 1) made a Vanilla Ice “Ice, Ice Baby” joke on Facebook about competitors who closed to support the ICE protests, 2) deleted that post, 3) replaced it with a heartfelt apology for his first post he described as “insensitive and ignorant,” 4) then deleted that apology post, and finally 5) posted a lengthy rant saying he wasn’t sorry and blaming “Broomfield moms” for the controversy.
• “The 2026 Edelman Trust Barometer reveals grievance has devolved into insularity. Seven in 10 respondents report unwillingness or hesitance to trust someone with different values, approaches to social issues, backgrounds or information sources.”
• What has two wheels, handlebars and a pretty decent chance of landing you in the hospital? According to the latest Denver data, it’s an electric scooter. Last year, 15 people in Denver died while riding standing e-scooters, and another 1,800 were admitted to Denver Health after accidents.
• Last week, I reported that former New England Patriots head coach Bill Belichick – the owner of eight Super Bowl rings as a head coach and assistant coach – inexplicably was not selected the the Pro Football Hall of Fame in his first year of eligibility. This week, we learned that New England Patriots owner Bob Kraft, who has won six Super Bowls so far, also was not selected in his first year. If I am Tom Brady, I might be getting nervous for my first year of eligibility in 2028.
• The diminutive singer ironically named Ariana Grande summed up the Vogue Japan cover photo that featured her with six fingers by saying, “Holy s–t.” It may be time for Vogue Japan to find a new AI tool.
• A Zamboni driver in Fort Collins died when he hit his head on a partially open overhead door while driving the machine. It is Colorado‘s worst sports-related accidental death since a hammer thrown by a high school track-and-field competitor cleared the protective barrier and flew into the crowd at a meet at the University of Colorado Colorado Springs last year, killing one.
• What do you do when a couple of dine-and-dashers take you for a little more than $100? Two Fraser restaurant employees chased them across town, threatened them with a gun and put one of them in a chokehold. Police who responded to the fight ended up giving the dine-and-dashers a ticket and then arrested the two restaurant employees for felony menacing and misdemeanor assault. No word on whether they’ll get their $100.
• Normally, having your boxing opponent literally knock the toupee off your head would be a sign that the fight is not going well, but boxer Jarrell “Big Baby” Miller somehow lost his hairpiece and won the fight.

Who won the week?

• GBSM‘s Andy Mountain has been named to the Downtown Denver Partnership‘s Board of Governors.
• Special Olympics Colorado promoted Johanna Erickson to Chief Communications Officer.
• Linhart PR added Olivia Venuta as an Account Executive.
• The Mountain West Conference named Stuart Buchanan the Associate Commissioner of Strategic Communications.
• Briana Fernandez has been promoted to morning traffic anchor at 9News. 
• Penny the Doberman Pinscher won Best in Show at this year’s Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show.
• Speedskater Erin Jackson and bobsledder Frank Del Duca have been named U.S. flag bearers for the Winter Olympics opening ceremonies.

Before I get into this week’s edition of “Who Had the Worst Week,” I wanted to share that a Celebration of Life for Dawn Doty is scheduled for Monday, February 23, at 4 p.m. at the Sustainability, Energy and Environment Community (SEEC) Auditorium. It is located at 4001 Discovery Drive on the University of Colorado Boulder’s East Campus. Members of the community are invited.

Now, on to the list.

• The documentary “Melania” about First Lady Melania Trump is projected to bring in about $3 million in its first week, a disappointing total for a movie that Amazon‘s MGM Studios paid more than $75 million to produce and promote. Meanwhile, approximately two-thirds of the crew has requested they not appear in the credits at the end of the movie.
• The decision to spend more than $75 million on “Melania” looks even worse given that Amazon announced this week that it will lay off more than 16,000 workers.
• Amazon wasn’t the only one announcing big layoffs. UPS said it will cut as many as 30,000 jobs this year as part of a continuing effort to reduce costs and shore up profits, in part because it is delivering fewer packages for … Amazon. UPS eliminated 62,000 positions last year.
• Staff members at the Denver Zoo killed two rare Malayan tapirs when they misdosed them with copper, a common dietary supplement for tapirs. The zoo did not say how the mistake happened or whether anyone had been disciplined for causing the deaths.
• Former New England Patriots head coach Bill Belichick won six Super Bowls as a head coach and another two as an assistant coach – more than anyone else in NFL history. So, naturally he was a lock for the Pro Football Hall of Fame in his first year of eligibility, right? Nope. The voters rejected him as part of this year’s class.
• Scientists are warning that an influenza virus informally called “Canine Coronavirus” could evolve to pose a similar threat as the recent COVID-19 virus.
• The Trump administration has made clear who it is making the scapegoat for the ICE killing of Alex Pretti in Minneapolis: Gregory Bovino, the U.S. Border Patrol commander who had been put in charge of the city’s immigration operation.
• The United States will host most of the 2026 World Cup matches this summer (Mexico and Canada will host the others), and calls are mounting globally for a boycott. Former FIFA president Sepp Blatter is the latest to join the chorus.
• The NCAA continues to pretend that college football players are not professionals, but bit by bit that veneer is disappearing. The latest example: University of Colorado head football coach Deion Sanders is now fining players as much as $2,500 for missing practices without approval. It’s only $500 if you are late.
• The latest batch of Jeffrey Epstein-related materials released by the U.S. Department of Justice includes a claim that Microsoft founder Bill Gates asked Epstein to help obtain prescription drugs to treat an STD he caught from “Russian girls.”
• Dom Testa is out at KOOL 105, apparently ending his more than 30-year reign as one of Denver‘s most recognizable radio personalities. Prior to joining KOOL 105, he spent three decades at KIMN Mix 100.
• The board of the Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association voted to pursue moving its headquarters from Colorado Springs to Cheyenne, Wyo., but there is still at least one obstacle: conservative Wyoming legislators who are balking at public funding for a private enterprise.
• An unexpected feud has erupted between Denver Broncos head coach Sean Payton and QB Bo Nix. Nix was unhappy that Payton spoke to media about the QB’s history of ankle injuries and described the latest injury as something Nix was “predisposed” to have. Said Nix, “I don’t think (Payton) really should share how many surgeries I’ve had in the past, to be honest with you, he doesn’t even really know that.”

Who won the week?

• SideCar PR and its founder/CEO Sarah Cullen are celebrating the agency’s 15th anniversary.
• Former University of Colorado Buffalo Shedeur Sanders, now the starting quarterback with the Cleveland Browns, was named to the NFL Pro Bowl. He replaces New England Patriots QB Drake Maye, who is playing in the Super Bowl.
• The Great American Beer Festival, the biggest beer festival in the U.S., will relocate from the Colorado Convention Center in downtown Denver to the outdoor Levitt Pavilion in south Denver. Remember when we used to worry about snow in October?

• Go big or go home, they say. Aurora City Councilman Rob Andrews embraced that philosophy when he tested at more than three times the legal limit for alcohol – a 0.252 – while being arrested for DUI this past weekend. Inexplicably, his sober son was in the car with him when he was arrested, and police turned Andrews’ car over to him while taking his dad to jail. Which begs the question, why was the drunk guy driving?
• Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu has agreed to join President Donald Trump’s “peace board,” but could not attend the signing ceremony because he’s wanted by the International Criminal Court for alleged war crimes.
• A tech glitch caused a shelter-in-place warning intended for a two-block radius in Denver to be sent city-wide.
• British troll broadcaster Piers Morgan tripped and fell so hard at a London restaurant that he suffered a broken femur and had to have his hip replaced.
• Denver native Lindsey Halligan was removed from her role as U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia after a judge ruled her appointment invalid and called her efforts to remain in the office “a charade.”
• Elon Musk’s Grok chatbot flooded Twitter/X with millions of sexualized images in a period of just nine days, according to a new analysis. Of the more than 4.4 million images, more than 40% were sexualized images of women, many without their consent.
• Two Denver executives – Thomas Sandgaard and Anna Lucsok – with now-bankrupt Zynex, Inc. have been indicted for conspiracy to commit health care fraud, securities fraud and mail fraud. The most illuminating paragraph in the DOJ press release: “When financial reporters raised questions about Zynex’s business practices, … Sandgaard hired an individual to attempt to disrupt the reporters’ personal lives. These efforts included signing reporters up for therapy sessions and (sending) used female underwear to a reporter’s spouse at the reporter’s home with a thank you card addressed to the spouse, detailing the reporter’s alleged ‘illicit behavior’ – all apparently with the intent to convince the spouse that her husband was being unfaithful.”
• Denver Broncos second-year QB Bo Nix helped carry the team to the AFC Championship this past weekend by beating the Buffalo Bills, but the jubilation was short-lived. Approximately 45 minutes after the game ended, head coach Sean Payton announced that Nix had fractured his ankle at the end of the game and would miss the rest of the playoffs.
• Speaking of the Buffalo Bills, if you thought their overtime loss to the Broncos in the playoffs would be their lowest point this year, team owner Terry Pegula managed to top that by firing adequately performing head coach Sean McDermott, promoting underperforming GM Brandon Beane, and holding a train-wreck of a press conference where he – unprovoked – attacked one of his own wide receivers. Anyone thinking about taking the head coach role is probably reconsidering.
• “60 Minutes” correspondents Scott Pelley and Sharyn Alfonsi are reportedly close to being fired for pushing back against CBS News Editor-in-Chief Bari Weiss‘ attempts to influence their coverage.
• Patagonia had negotiated a truce with drag queen Pattie Gonia that allowed the performer to use her stage name, but Pattie’s recent attempt to trademark and sell merchandise under the “Pattie Gonia” brand was a bridge too far. Patagonia has sued Pattie Gonia, claiming “irreparable harm.” (A hat tip to Eric Anderson for that one.)

Who won the week?

• Linhart PR is celebrating its 30th anniversary.
• Sarah Meirose was promoted to Director of Public Affairs at Copic.
• The Denver Public Library Friends Foundation has added Barefoot PR co-founder Sarah Hogan to its board.
• Ryan Coogler‘s movie “Sinners” earned a record 16 Oscar nominations, including best director and best screenplay, nominations for Coogler and Best Picture. Actor Michael B. Jordan was recognized with his first Oscar nomination for best actor.
• Vice President J.D. Vance and his wife Usha announced they are expecting their fourth child in July.

• Vail Resorts reports that skier visits are down 20% this year, which the company blamed on the dry, warm fall and winter in the western United States.
• Verizon‘s cell and data services went down for a day this week, leaving millions of customers without service.
• A group of Kaiser Permanente affiliates that includes the Kaiser Foundation Health Plan of Colorado and Colorado Permanente Medical Group P.C. have agreed to pay $556 million to settle allegations they committed Medicare fraud and pressured doctors to list incorrect diagnoses on medical records to receive higher reimbursements.
• It was a tough week for celebrities:
  • Former “West Wing” and “Thirtysomething” actor Timothy Busfield is facing allegations of child sex abuse in New Mexico and California.
  • Former “24” actor Kiefer Sutherland was arrested for allegedly assaulting a ride-share driver.
  • Former “Home Alone” actor Daniel Stern has been charged with soliciting a prostitute.
• Twenty current and former college basketball players have been charged with rigging the outcome of NCAA basketball games. The players represented universities including Tulane, DePaul and Fordham. That news is brought to you by ESPN and its official sports book provider DraftKings.
• Scott Adams, the creator of the comic strip “Dilbert,” passed away from metastatic prostate cancer at the age of 68. At its height, “Dilbert” appeared in more than 2,000 newspapers globally and was made into a short-lived TV series. But “Dilbert” effectively ended in 2023 when Adams shared his view that African-Americans were “a hate group” and that “the best advice I would give to White people is to get the hell away from Black people.”
• The San Francisco 49ers continue to have far more than their fair share of injuries, and some amateur sleuths have identified what they say is the culprit: an electrical sub station located adjacent to the team’s stadium and practice facilities. Experts have dismissed the theory, but a social media post alleging that “low-frequency electromagnetic fields can degrade collagen, weaken tendons, and cause soft-tissue damage” has gone viral among players.
• The International Ski and Snowboard Federation (FIS) suspended two Norwegian ski jumping coaches and the team’s suit technician for 18 months for altering suits during the world championships last year.
• Sebastian Ofner, an Austrian playing in an Australian Open qualifier match, celebrated “winning” the fifth set tie breaker 7-1, only to learn that you must reach 10 points to win in Grand Slams. Naturally, Ofner then lost 12 of the next 16 points to lose the match.

Who won the week?

• In a full-circle moment as it celebrates its 25th anniversary, my firm GFM|CenterTable has rebranded and will once again be known as GroundFloor Media (GFM).
• The Rocky Mountain chapter of the National Agri-Marketing Association (NAMA) has appointed Margaret Fogarty and Leigh Picchetti to its board. Fogarty and Picchetti, the co-founders of Corkboard Communications, will serve as Second Vice President and Treasurer, respectively.
• Laura Schwinkendorf of Barefoot PR and Mark Truax of Pac/West Strategies are winners in the Denver Business Journal‘s 2026 40 Under 40 awards.
• Mandy Melbi has been appointed Vice President of Marketing at Nextworld.
• Matt Wagner has added Adjunct Professor at the University of Denver to his day job as a Vice President at Ogilvy.
• 9News announced that Drew Carney will replace Jordan Chavez as its weekday morning-show anchor. Carney has spent the past 19 years in Portland.
• The Denver Summit NWSL soccer team signed local women’s soccer star Lindsey Horan Heaps. Heaps is a member of the U.S. Women’s National Team and played soccer at Golden High School.

Before I get into this week’s edition of “Who Had the Worst Week,” I wanted to shared that a Celebration of Life for Stacey Sepp is scheduled for Monday, Jan. 26, at 10 a.m. at the Southeast Christian Church in Parker. Members of the community are invited.

Now, onto the list.

• Flu hospitalizations in Colorado have surged to their highest levels in 20 years, and medical experts expect it to only get worse in the coming weeks.
• President Donald Trump‘s revenge tour against Colorado appeared to be in full force over the holidays. First, he vetoed a bill that would have funded a pipeline to bring clean water to 50,000 residents in heavily Republican southeast Colorado, infuriating conservative U.S. Reps. Lauren Boebert and Jeff Hurd. Then, he offered holiday wishes to Gov. Jared Polis and Mesa County D.A. Dan Rubinstein (“I wish them only the worst. May they rot in Hell. FREE TINA PETTERS!”). And, finally, his EPA ordered that Tri-State‘s coal-burning plant in Craig remain open rather than shut down as planned this week.
• In a bit of stunt-casting, Cards Against Humanity has hired Jeffrey Epstein – no relation to the disgraced financier – as a spokesman to appear in the card game’s new commercial. The company explained, “We were looking to cast a big name—someone who could really grab people’s attention—and we found the perfect guy. He wasn’t even that expensive.”
• Aspen Daily News Publisher David Cook announced he is selling the newspaper to Florida-based Hoffmann Media Group. HMG has been on a buying spree over the past few years, and The New York Times profiled its billionaire CEO David Hoffmann last year.
• The long-awaited Denverite article on turmoil at the Denver Metro Chamber finally appeared, and it put CEO JJ Ament squarely in the crosshairs. Rumors of the article had circulated for more than nine months.
• Back in October, Sam Tabachnik at The Denver Post published an incredibly unflattering article about Chuck Horning, the combustible owner of the Telluride ski resort. It included details such as he was booed out of an upscale restaurant, he engaged in fist fights with his son and the resort’s CEO, and he sexually harassed and/or assaulted multiple women. Now, Horning is in the news again, this time for shutting down the entire resort during the prime holiday season because members of the ski patrol went on strike.
• A woman was found dead on a hiking trail in Larimer County in what authorities believe to be the first fatal mountain lion attack in more than 25 years.
• The University of Colorado now owns the longest bowl win drought among Power 4 conference members. It last won a bowl game in 2004.
• President Donald Trump is quick to claim his late-night TV show host adversaries have low ratings, so he can’t be happy that last week’s Kennedy Center Honors special that he hosted saw record-low ratings.
• Tesla is no longer the best selling electric vehicle manufacturer in the world. That title now belongs to China‘s BYD, in part because Tesla sales declined 9% last year.
• Champagne sparklers held too close to the ceiling likely sparked a fire at bar at a Swiss ski resort on New Year’s Eve. The fire killed at least 40 and injured another 120.

Who won the week?

• One of Denver‘s most accomplished PR professionals, Steve Silvers, announced he has retired effective the end of 2025. Silvers most recently was a partner at Silvers Jacobson, and he and his business partner Paul Jacobson have now closed the firm.
• Planview promoted Leslie Marcotte to Vice President of Corporate Marketing.
• Dovetail Solutions added Monica Kurtz as Vice President of Client Success.
• Fletcher Group Senior Account Executive Alexa Stegeman has been selected as a Rising Star in Ragan’s Top Women in Communications 2026 awards.
• Jay Clark published his book, “Build Your Ballpark: Powerful Lessons and Inspiration to Help Make Your Mark and Boost Your Impact.“
• The Denver Post added Nate Peterson as its new sports editor. Peterson, who formerly led the Vail Daily’s newsroom, replaces Matt Schubert, who left to become Deputy Managing Editor at The Athletic.
• Pete Coors has been named Grand Marshal of the 2026 Stock Show Kick-Off Parade.
• Colorado Avalanche players Nathan MacKinnon, Cale Makar and Devon Toews have been named to the Canadian Olympic hockey team, and Brock Nelson was named to Team USA. The 2026 Winter Olympics in Milano Cortina, Italy, start February 6.

Recessions and economic booms may come and go, but we were reminded again in 2025 that crisis communications is – and always will be – a growth industry. Below is a stroll down memory lane as we remember some of the disasters that defined 2025.

JANUARY 2025

• The L.A.-area wildfires in Palisades and Eaton caused an estimated $164 billion in damage.
• An understaffed air control tower at Reagan National Airport in Washington, D.C. contributed to an American Airlines flight colliding with a military helicopter, killing 67 people.
• A spectator was killed at a high school track and field meet on the University of Colorado’s Colorado Springs campus when a competitor lost control of a hammer in the hammer throw event and hurled it into the stands.
• Two Oregon men who set out in the Gifford Pinchot National Forest to find conclusive proof that Sasquatch exists died of exposure. 
• A Southwest Airlines pilot was removed from a plane and arrested for being inebriated as he was seated in the cockpit performing preflight checks.
• A former CBI DNA scientist who worked on thousands of cases, was charged with 102 felonies alleging that she manipulated evidence. Prosecutors identified more than 1,000 convictions that could have relied on her evidence, and an unknown number of cases may not have been prosecuted due to her faulty findings.

FEBRUARY 2025

• The Girl Scouts of Colorado warned that a King Soopers employee strike put millions of dollars of cookie sales at risk.
• Waffle House started charging a $0.50 surcharge per egg due to a shortage caused by an aggressive strain of the avian flu.
• The Trump administration banned AP reporters from the White House for reusing to use the term “Gulf of America.”
• President Donald Trump ordered the iconic Resolute Desk removed from the Oval Office for a deep cleaning after Elon Musk‘s son wiped a booger on it during a reporter Q&A event.
• Hyde Park Jewelers in the Cherry Creek Shopping Center was the victim of a slow-motion robbery that saw thieves steal $12.3 million in jewelry and watches over eight hours.
• Skype, the pre-pandemic king of video chat services, shut down amid competition from Zoom, Teams, FaceTime, Webex and Google Meet.

MARCH 2025

• More than 25 people were injured in South Korea when fighter jets participating in a live-fire drill accidentally dropped bombs on a civilian area.
• Boulder‘s Comprise PR filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.
• The town of Amagansett in the Hamptons spent tens of thousands of dollars – $24,800 alone to an arbitrator – in an attempt to determine who stole a $25 gift card from a local elementary school. 
• University of Colorado regent Wanda James and her fellow regents argued about allegations she inappropriately used her public position to benefit the marijuana dispensary she owns.
• Tesla issued a recall for 46,000 Cybertrucks – nearly every one it had produced – due to a risk that its stainless steel panels can fall off. 
• Former Rocky Mountain News reporter Norm Clarke passed away.
• A United Airlines flight from Los Angeles to Shanghai was forced to return to the U.S. two hours into the flight when one of the pilots realized he had forgotten to bring his passport. 

APRIL 2025

• The Denver Nuggets fired head coach Michael Malone just two years removed from winning an NBA Championship.
• Actor Rob Lowe was not amused when a Beverly Hills sightseeing tour bus driver pointed him out to passengers as “John Stamos.” Lowe, who was on a sidewalk near Rodeo Drive, confronted the driver of the open-air bus and told him he needed to “Get better at your job.”
• President Donald Trump went to war with Harvard University after it refused to acquiesce to his demands on a variety of issues. President Trump froze $2.2 billion in grant funding and then asked the IRS to revoke its tax-exempt status as punishment for defying him.
• University of Colorado QB Shedeur Sanders, a projected first-round draft pick, slid to the fifth round in the NFL draft.
• The executive producer of “60 Minutes” resigned abruptly, declaring that pressure from executives at CBS parent company Paramount was undermining the show’s journalistic independence.
• Denver Broncos Hall of Fame quarterback John Elway was driving the golf cart from which his business partner and former agent fell and died.

MAY 2025

• The NFL fined the Atlanta Falcons $250,000 and Jeff Ulbrich, the team’s defensive coordinator, an additional $100,000 after Ulbrich’s son made a cruel prank phone call to University of Colorado quarterback Shedeur Sanders during the NFL’s draft. Ulbrich’s son took Sanders’ confidential phone number from a team-issued iPad that his father left unlocked.
• A climber had to be rescued a second time while attempting to summit Mt. Fuji after he went back up to retrieve the cell phone he dropped during the first rescue.
• Two years after taking lighter fluid and a match to billions of dollars in brand equity by dropping the name HBO from its Max streaming service, executives at Warner Bros. Discovery announced that it would rebrand back to HBO Max.
• A Colorado Rockies fan sued the team after he was hit in the eye with a foul ball. In his suit, he alleged that the team is so bad that it encourages fans not to pay attention to what is happening on the field.

JUNE 2025

• Gov. Jared Polis unveiled his “Bridge to Nowhere” concept that did the seemingly impossible: it united the political left, center and right in opposition.
• Boulder found itself again in the wrong kind of national spotlight after a hate crime targeting the city’s Jewish community killed one person and injured seven others.
• The former Dominion Voting Systems executive who sued MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell for defamation won a $2.3 million judgement, but it was Lindell who claimed victory after the jury only awarded the plaintiff just 3.5% of what was asked.
• A postal carrier who stole, filled out and submitted 19 mail ballots as part of a rogue plan to test the security of Colorado‘s signature verification process was sentenced to five years in jail. 

JULY 2025

• CBS parent company Paramount agreed to pay $16 million to President Donald Trump to settle his lawsuit against “60 Minutes.” Experts were certain Paramount would prevail in the suit, but noted that Paramount needed governmental approval for its plan to sell itself to Hollywood studio Skydance, which it eventually did.
• Sean “Diddy” Combs was convicted of transporting prostitutes. Combs was found not guilty on more serious charges, but he also faces more than 50 civil lawsuits.
• Chris Martin of Coldplay inadvertently outed a couple who apparently were having an affair.
• Jared Leonard, the Denver restaurateur known for the Michelin-recommended AJ’s Pit Bar-B-Q, was indicted on fraud charges for allegedly receiving more than $1 million in pandemic relief loans under false pretenses.
• Malcolm-Jamal Warner, best known for playing the lovable and charismatic son Theo on “The Cosby Show,” drowned while on vacation in Costa Rica at the age of 54.

AUGUST 2025

• ESPN officially cut ties with media analyst and former Denver Bronco Shannon Sharpe two weeks after he settled a lawsuit accusing him of rape.
• The annual Dragon Boat Festival threatened to leave Denver due to “dead fish, increasingly warm and shallow water, blue algae blooms, and a lack of filtration from untreated runoff” pouring into Sloan’s Lake.
• WNBA players endured a new trend of sex toys being thrown from the stands onto the court. 
• Former Colorado Public Radio host and reporter Vic Vela announced he was diagnosed with early-onset Alzheimer’s disease. The diagnosis is the latest challenge for Vela, who has been open about his struggles with drug addiction and living with HIV.
• Retired New York Yankees Hall of Fame reliever Mariano Rivera tore his Achilles tendon playing in the team’s annual Old-Timers’ Day game.
• The Wall Street Journal reported that Nexstar, the owner of Fox31 and CW2, was negotiating to acquire Tegna, the owner of 9News. A deal has been reached and only regulatory approvals are needed to close the transaction.

SEPTEMBER 2025

• Evergreen High School was the latest Colorado school to experience gun violence. There have been 13 school shootings in our state since Columbine in 1999.
• Conservative political activist Charlie Kirk was shot and killed at a college event in Utah.
• President Donald Trump coerced ABC and its affiliate stations into suspending the late-night show “Jimmy Kimmel Live!“ after he and his followers objected to a joke Kimmel told related to Charlie Kirk‘s assassination.
• Winners of Publishers Clearing House sweepstakes learned the hard way that nothing is forever, not even “Forever” prizes that guaranteed $5,000 per week for life. The company filed for bankruptcy, and winners are no longer receiving their prize money.
• President Donald Trump defied decades of scientific research to declare a clear link between acetaminophen – the active ingredient in Tylenol – and autism. Adding insult to injury, it took President Trump three attempts to correctly pronounce “acetaminophen” during his televised press conference, even with whispered coaching from his subordinates standing behind him.
• Xcel Energy agreed to pay $640 million to settle claims that its transmission lines were partly responsible for the devastating Marshall Fire in Boulder County that caused an estimated $1.7 billion in damages.

OCTOBER 2025

• Legendary golfer and two-time U.S. Ryder Cup captain Tom Watson apologized to the winning European team after badly behaved and drunken American fans lobbed profanities and insults – and a few beers – at the European competitors.
• Members of the Trump administration lost their minds when the NFL announced that Puerto Rican superstar Bad Bunny would perform at the halftime of the Super Bowl. 
• A Gallup poll found that the advertising and PR community is viewed favorably by only 29% of the public, ahead of only the pharmaceutical industry and the federal government. 
• iHeartMedia went through another round of mass layoffs, and KOA NewsRadio morning host Marty Lenz was among those let go.
• Fox31 meteorologist Kylie Bearse shared harrowing details about a 69-year-old man who has been stalking her for more than two years, and her frustrations about not being able to get the Denver D.A.’s Office to file more serious charges.
• Colorado basketball legend Chauncey Billups was arrested as part of an FBI investigation into gambling and “sports rigging” operations linked to multiple mafia crime families.
• Tulane University banned Colorado Academy students from being considered for early admission because a single CA student reneged on an acceptance offer.
• Denver was the biggest loser on this season’s “Love is Blind” reality dating show. John Frank at Axios noted, “It’s widely acknowledged that the city has a horrible dating scene, and the show somehow made us look even worse.”

NOVEMBER 2025

• Fourteen people died after a UPS cargo plane crashed on takeoff at the Louisville, Kentucky, airport. 
• The FAA cut 10% of flights at the 40 busiest airports in an attempt to “alleviate the pressure” on over-worked air-traffic controllers during the government shutdown.
• The clear winners of election night in Colorado were progressives, tax increases and teachers union-endorsed candidates. The biggest loser? That would likely be Aurora City Councilwoman Danielle Jurinsky, who spent the past year parroting President Donald Trump‘s exaggerated claims of “gang-takeovers” of her city.
• Investigators determined that the password for the Louvre’s video surveillance system was “Louvre” when thieves stole jewels worth $100 million from the museum.
• Some guests were given only 10-15 minutes to vacate hotel rooms when the Marriott-backed chain Sonder unexpectedly declared bankruptcy. 
• The Wall Street Journal reported that the Colorado Rockies‘ GM position is actually the most coveted in Major League Baseball because it “is viewed as the sport’s ultimate sadistic challenge.”
• A Russian K9 police dog selected to perform the ceremonial pre-game puck drop at a KHL league hockey game successfully dropped the puck from its mouth and then promptly bit two players.
• Martin Bally, a senior executive at Campbell’s Soup, is no longer with the company after a lawsuit accused him of calling the company’s soups “highly processed food” for “poor people,” complaining that “f–king Indian” colleagues are “idiots,” and that the company’s soups use “bioengineered meat.”

DECEMBER 2025

• The University of Michigan head football coach was abruptly fired and then taken into police custody several hours later as part of an assault investigation.
• The Trump administration is abandoning the “woke” font Calibri in favor of Times New Roman. Secretary of State Marco Rubio issued a directive that blamed “radical” diversity, equity, inclusion and accessibility programs for what he said was a misguided switch to Calibri during the Biden administration.
• Disgraced journalist Olivia Nuzzi’s new book “American Canto” sold only 1,165 hardcover copies in its first week on the shelves.
• Rocky the Raccoon broke into a Virginia liquor store, broke several bottles of whiskey, apparently drank some that spilled on the floor, and then passed out in the store’s bathroom. 
• A Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office SWAT sergeant resigned before he could be fired after being found to have responded to the Evergreen High School shooting incident while intoxicated.
• Pantone released its “Color of the Year” for 2026, and it was basically white. But because it’s Pantone, it had to give it a clever name, so technically “Cloud Dancer” is the color of the year.

• More than 125 people are dead and 200 are unaccounted for in Hong Kong after a group of high-rise apartment buildings caught fire. The buildings were undergoing renovations, and bamboo scaffolding that is common in China and mesh netting that protected passersby appear to have quickly spread the fire.
• Martin Bally, a senior executive at Campbell’s Soup, is no longer with the company after a lawsuit accused him of calling the company’s soups “highly processed food” for “poor people,” complaining that “f–king Indian” colleagues are “idiots,” and that the company’s soups use “bioengineered meat.”
• Colorado State Sen. Faith Winter was killed in a multi-car accident on I-25 the day before Thanksgiving. Winter made headlines over the past several years for sharing allegations of sexual harassment against a fellow legislator that resulted in his expulsion, suffering a head injury in a bicycle accident and taking a leave of absence last year to seek medical treatment for alcoholism. Police are still investigating the cause of the accident.
• Twitter/X introduced a new feature that identifies the country of origin for its accounts, and it quickly made clear that “many of the most influential personalities in the ‘Make America Great Again‘ (MAGA) movement on X are based outside of the U.S., including Russia, Nigeria and India.”
• Some of the gray wolves released in western Colorado as part of the voter-approved reintroduction plan have now made their way to the metro Denver area, according to data released by Colorado Parks and Wildlife. If you hear a cackling sound, that is just western-slope ranchers, and it is hard to blame them.
• Xcel Energy has asked the Colorado PUC for permission to raise rates by $356 million – a 9% increase that would translate to a $10/month increase for the average consumer customer.
• The fight to free former Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters intensified this week, with the Trump administration demanding Colorado turn her over into federal custody and a bipartisan group of Colorado county election clerks demanding she remain in a state prison. Curiously, Gov. Jared Polis‘ decision to remain quiet on the subject created a vacuum that caused both sides to ratchet up the intensity.
  • Meanwhile, Peters’ attorney is now suggesting that the Trump administration should conduct a military raid on the prison to free her, and conservative podcaster Joe Oltmann called for the executions of Gov. Polis, AG Phil Weiser and Secretary of State Jena Griswold. Enjoy those Thanksgiving dinner conversations with relatives!
• A website glitch caused the European electronics retailer MediaWorld to accidentally sell $1,000 iPads for about $17. Customers who ordered them received them a week later, and then, about two weeks after that, the company contacted them saying the advertised price had been incorrect and that they could either return the iPads or pay the difference minus a $150 discount.
• Secretary of Defense War Pete Hegseth has turned his sights on an unlikely target: the Boy Scouts. Part of Hegseth’s problem: the woke Boy Scouts changed their name to Scouting America and now allow girls to participate.
• Colorado State University suspended two players – QB Darius Curry and offensive lineman Liam Wortmann – for the team’s final game this season after they were captured on video spitting on opposing players during last week’s game against Boise State.
• President Donald Trump has used the power of his office to extract a personal favor from global media conglomerate Paramount: a “Rush Hour 4” movie. Paramount is fighting Netflix and Comcast for the right to acquire Warner Bros. Discovery, which would require FCC approval.
• How is 90-year-old ESPN “College Gameday” legend Lee Corso enjoying his retirement? “It sucks,” he says.

Who won the week?

• Denver Post sports editor Matt Schubert left the paper for an as-yet undisclosed new opportunity.
• Denver Broncos linebacker Alex Singleton will return to the field this weekend, just weeks after surgery to remove a cancerous testicular tumor.
• Colorado State University hired Jim Mora, Jr. as its new head football coach. Mora joins CSU from the University of Connecticut, and he previously served as head coach of UCLA and the NFL‘s Atlanta Falcons and Seattle Seahawks.
• Ole Miss head football coach Lane Kiffin – described by The Wall Street Journal as “college football’s most hated man” – has become the prize in a bidding war by three blue-blood programs: Ole Miss, the University of Florida and LSU. Sometime this weekend, he almost certainly will become the highest-paid head coach in college football history. The only question is by which university.
• Robert Irwin, son of the late “Crocodile Hunter” Steve Irwin, won this season’s “Dancing with the Stars.”

• More changes are coming to KOA NewsRadio. A few weeks ago, the station let “Colorado Morning News” co-anchor Marty Lenz go as part of a broader round of iHeartRadio layoffs, and now it is moving conservative talk-show host Ross Kaminsky to fill the 6-9 am weekday slot. “Colorado Morning News,” which previously aired from 5-9 am, will now air only from 5-6 am.
• Fewer PR firms expect to see profits in 2025, an industry report published by Davis+Gilbert found. Only 44% of PR firms expect profit gains, and just half project revenue rising — both lows not seen since 2021.
• At least 13 people died and more are still missing after a UPS cargo plane crashed on takeoff at the Louisville, Kentucky, airport. The crash forced UPS to close its Worldport hub facility that processes millions of packages for roughly 360 incoming and outbound aircraft each day.
• The Trump administration is cutting 10% of flights at the 40 busiest airports starting today. The administration said the reductions were an attempt to “alleviate the pressure” on over-worked air-traffic controllers, but critics said the move would cause more problems than it would solve. As of this morning, surgical cuts by airlines have resulted in few disruptions.
• History Colorado is being accused of censorship by a coalition of First Amendment-rights organizations for rejecting a painting that is critical of Gov. Jared Polis and Sens. Michael Bennet and John Hickenlooper. Sens. Bennet and Hickenlooper are currently candidates for governor and senate, respectively, and the museum’s chief creative officer says exhibiting the painting “could constitute a violation of the Fair Campaign Practices Act, which prohibits government institutions like History Colorado Center from making contributions to a candidate running for office.” The ACLU and others say it wouldn’t. Regardless, Gov. Polis and Sens. Bennet and Hickenlooper can’t be happy with the resulting Streisand Effect.
• The Houston Independent School District has sued Texas Attorney General Ken Paxson after his office ruled the school district must turn over emails to and from the district’s public relations firm to media outlets who have requested them because they do not qualify for attorney-client confidentiality.
• The Pentagon‘s draconian press policy may have caused mainstream media outlets like Fox News, The New York Times, The Washington Post, NBC, ABC and CBS to walk away, but it has replaced them with new media outlets such as Mike Lindell‘s LindellTV and the influential pro-Trump activist Laura Loomer.
• Dallas Cowboys defensive end Marshawn Kneeland died of an apparent suicide. He was 24.
• The clear winners of election night in Colorado were progressives, tax increases and teachers union-endorsed candidates. The biggest loser? That would likely be Aurora City Councilwoman Danielle Jurinsky, who spent the past year parroting President Donald Trump‘s exaggerated claims of “gang-takeovers” of her city. As Westword noted, “We named the controversial Aurora City Council rep a Person to Watch in 2025, and now you can watch her leave her seat.”
• A Thai businessman who co-owns the Miss Universe Organization has apologized for publicly berating Miss Mexico, causing her to walk out and several other contestants to join her in solidarity.
• Following a months-long search, former NFL star Antonio Brown was apprehended in Dubai by U.S. Marshals on an attempted murder charge. He will be extradited to Miami.
• Yale researchers have done the math and calculated that Elon Musk’s “politically partisan and culturally warlike personae” have cost Tesla the sale of 1 million to 1.26 million cars from October 2022 to April 2025. Meanwhile, Tesla shareholders just approved an unprecedented $1 trillion pay package for Musk, so …
• The owners of MSNBC will spend $20 million on marketing to promote its rebrand to MS NOW.
• Hail, uninsured motorists and car thefts have driven Colorado car insurance costs to be the fifth-highest in the nation.
• U.S. Rep. Lauren Boebert “attended a Halloween event in a costume meant to depict a Mexican woman, wearing a sombrero and carrying a sign that read ‘Mexican Word of the Day: JUICY.’ The sign went on to mock Spanish accents with the line, ‘Tell Me If Juicy ICE coming.’ Her companion was dressed as an ICE agent.”
• Ryan Seacrest and Anderson Cooper can breathe a sigh of relief. NBC has cancelled its upcoming “Snoop Dogg’s New Year’s Eve” special.
• If you are looking for a winter home, a Palm Beach, Fla. house considered a tear-down is available for a mere $185 million.
• Investigators determined that the password for the Louvre’s video surveillance system was “Louvre” when thieves stole jewels worth $100 million from the museum last month.

Who won the week?

• Pax8 communications VP Barry Hawkins has retired. Fun fact: Barry’s daughter, Amanda Hawkins, regularly sings the National Anthem at Colorado Avalanche home games.
• Denver-based creative agency Karsh Hagan has partnered with Arizona-based Madden Media to deliver expanded integrated services in the tourism, hospitality, outdoor recreation, healthcare, higher education and retail industries.
• I’m not sure which list to put this on, but the Denver Broncos are the least confidence-inspiring 8-2 NFL team in decades.
• The Colorado Rockies are poised to make what could be their first good decision in years as the team finalizes a contract for Paul DePodesta to run baseball operations. DePodesta was a key figure in the “Moneyball“-era Oakland A’s and later ran the Los Angeles Dodgers.
• The man charged with throwing a sub sandwich at a federal agent in protest of Trump administration policies was acquitted of misdemeanor assault by a Washington, D.C., jury. The jury found that throwing the 12-inch deli sandwich from what prosecutors described as “point-blank range” was not an attempt to cause injury.

• Tulane University has banned Colorado Academy students from being considered for early admission this upcoming year because a single CA student reneged on an acceptance offer last year.
• WPP, parent company of PR firms such as Burson and Ogilvy, saw revenue fall nearly 6% in Q3, an ominous sign that sent its stock reeling 18% to set a new 27-year low.
• Denver Mayor Michael Johnston‘s penchant for “secrecy and spin” is causing him to lose trust with some voters. In just the last week, he has faced mounting criticism for unilaterally renewing the city’s contract for the Flock surveillance system, a secret deal with developers that increased the amount of DIA-adjacent land they received in exchange for the former Park Hill Golf Course, and an ugly fight with the parent company of The Denver Post over $2 million in unpaid rent. And this is happening at the same time he is asking voters to green light $950 million in bonds.
• After seemingly free-falling for years, Prince Andrew finally hit rock-bottom this week when King Charles punished him in the only way that remained – stripping him of his royal titles and booting him from his royal residence. He is now known simply as Andrew Mountbatten Windsor. Andrew has been a key player in the Jeffrey Epstein scandal.
• Denver was the biggest loser on this season’s “Love is Blind” reality dating show. John Frank at Axios noted, “It’s widely acknowledged that the city has a horrible dating scene, and the show somehow made us look even worse.”
• The governor of Louisiana announced that LSU athletic director Scott Woodward would have no say in who the team’s next head football coach is. Why? The last two coaches Woodward hired – Brian Kelly at LSU and Jimbo Fisher at Texas A&M – were owed a combined $130 million in buyouts after they were fired before their contracts expired. Not surprisingly, Woodward was fired a day after the governor’s comments.
• In some parts of the country, seeing the first robin is considered the unofficial start of spring. In Colorado, we know winter is upon us when we have our first skier-triggered avalanche of the season.
• Speaking of skiers, The Denver Post had an incredibly unflattering profile of Telluride ski resort owner Chuck Horning. Among the allegations: he was booed out of an upscale restaurant, he engaged in fist fights with his son and the resort’s CEO, and he sexually harassed and/or assaulted multiple women.
• Ten million YouTube TV subscribers have lost access to Disney-owned channels such as ABC, ESPN and FX due to a financial dispute..
• Perth, Australia, beat out Denver as host for the 2030 Gay Games, an event that would have brought 12,000 athletes and $110 million in economic activity to our city. Denverite‘s Kyle Harris reported that the U.S.‘s “recent turn toward anti-transgender federal policy” and “the Trump administration’s mass deportation of immigrants” left many global leaders concerned whether Denver would be a safe destination for the event.
• Karine Jean-Pierre, the former press secretary to President Joe Biden, is having the kind of book tour that authors have nightmares about.
• An independent investigation into Denver Public Schools board member John Youngquist found he more likely than not engaged in “belittling, dismissive and condescending behavior” toward some district staff members and exhibited bias in interactions with some district leaders of color.
• Layoffs abound: UPS is cutting 48,000 jobs, Amazon is laying off 14,000, GM 3,300 employees, Paramount 2,000 employees and Capital One is cutting another 400.
• Don’t screw with a Long Island wine importer. That’s a lesson the Times of London learned the hard way. The paper wanted to get former NYC Mayor Bill de Blasio‘s take on Zohran Mamdani, the Democratic candidate seeking to be the city’s newest mayor, so a reporter apparently Googled de Blasio’s name and sent an email to the first email address it returned. Unfortunately, that address actually belonged to wine importer Bill DeBlasio who offered his expansive thoughts on the candidate. The paper printed the responses, and politician Bill de Blasio immediately disputed the quotes. The paper then claimed the wine importer “falsely claimed” to be the former mayor, but DeBlasio released the emails showing that, “I never once said I was the mayor. He never addressed me as the mayor. So I just gave him my opinion.”
• Somehow, former Colorado State University head football coach Jim McElwain received some of the stiffest penalties in the University of Michigan‘s “sign stealing” scandal. McElwain was the head coach at Central Michigan University when one of his assistant coaches allowed a UM spy on the team’s sideline in a game against Michigan State to decipher the Spartans’ signals. The now-retired McElwain apparently was not aware of the plot, and yet he received a two-year “show-cause” penalty that is essentially a two-year ban. Sherrone Moore, the UM offensive coordinator at the time who has since been promoted to UM head coach, received a three-game suspension.

Who won the week?

• Jane Dvorak received the PRSA Educators Academy‘s David Ferguson Award, in recognition of her work with educators and students to bridge professional and academic experiences. 
• Barefoot PR is celebrating its 15th anniversary.
• M&C Communications has been selected as agency of record for the national nonprofit Hope for Stomach Cancer.
• KOA NewsRadio radio announcer Dave Logan will call his 600th Denver Broncos game on Sunday.
• Stunt marketing is alive and well, as evidenced by KFC‘s ample media coverage of a Colonel Sanders look-a-like sitting behind home plate at Game 2 of the World Series. KFC was promoting one of its chicken sandwiches.
• Fun fact: Colorado has at least four Rocky Mountain bristlecone pine trees that are more than 2,100 years old.
• A.I. chip maker Nvidia is now worth more than $5 trillion. It was only seven years ago that Apple was the first company to achieve and sustain a $1 trillion market cap.

• Colorado basketball legend Chauncey Billups – he is an NBA champion, NBA Finals MVP and Hall of Famer who played at the University of Colorado and for the Denver Nuggets – was arrested as part of an FBI investigation into gambling and “sports rigging” operations linked to multiple mafia crime families.
  • A gambling scandal is the least surprising result of the professional sports leagues’ embrace of partnerships with sports books. Jason Gay at The Wall Street Journal call it “the most inevitable scandal in sports.“
• A woman in South Korea killed one person and injured eight others when she set her apartment building on fire trying to kill a cockroach. She used a homemade “blowtorch” that combined a pain relief spray can and a lighter.
• The security team members responsible for protecting the priceless artifacts at the Louvre in Paris are #OpentoWork.
• Casa Bonita has a surprise critic: actress Brooke Shields. She is the president of the Actors’ Equity Association, the union that represents the costumed characters that roam the restaurant, and her complaint is about a lack of a contract between the restaurant and the union.
• Tesla’s net income dropped 37% in Q3 despite increasing vehicle sales, undermining an otherwise record-setting quarter ahead of an upcoming vote on a new pay package for CEO Elon Musk that could be worth as much as $1 trillion.
• The Denver Post has stopped paying rent it legally owes to the City and County of Denver for space in, ironically, The Denver Post building that the city acquired in 2024. The Post hasn’t occupied its space in the building in more than seven years, and it appears that the Post parent company is trying to force the city into a buy-out of its lease.
• A jury awarded nearly $20 million to six bystanders who were injured when a Denver Police officer fired into a crowd while trying to shoot an armed man in LoDo.
• Target is eliminating about 1,800 corporate positions, Meta is laying off 660 people, and Rivian is laying off another 600.
• Denver Broncos linebacker Dre Greenlaw spent the first six weeks of the season trying to get healthy enough to play, finally played in Week 7, and then summarily got suspended for Week 8 for threatening an official. The suspension will cost Greenlaw about $273,000 in salary.
• Old people + racquet sports = eye injuries.
• With unrest in the Middle East, war in Ukraine, and rising tensions with Russia and China, the Pentagon has ordered a Navy aircraft carrier to the … Caribbean?
• Current Denver Broncos head coach Sean Payton and former Denver Broncos QB Russell Wilson are in the dumbest feud possible.
• Baseball may be known as the “American Pastime,” but a small town outside Toronto claims the game was invented in Canada.

Who won the week?

• B Public Relations ranked No. 15 on The Wall Street Journal‘s list of “Most Loved Workplaces.“
• Sarah (Davis) Bonar was promoted to PR & External Communications Lead at Children’s Hospital Colorado.
• Dana Stone has joined AdventHealth as a contract communications consultant.
• ShroderHaus added Robin Zimmerman as a Senior Account Director.