Entering Denver Mayor Mike Johnston’s third floor city hall office, one of the first things you notice is its remarkable lack of clutter. Of course, it has all the personal kitsch you would expect, but it seems to be the office of a real ‘Point A to Point B’ kind of guy, a guy who likes to get things done…in his own way.
It might be easy to label the 51-year-old Johnston, not Johnson, a liberal. But that would be too easy. More accurately, he’s simply a guy who cares about people; wants for them things that will make their lives better, empower them, provide opportunity. And it all begins with education.
“I’m a fourth-generation teacher,” he explains. His mother and grandmother were teachers, a grandfather was a school principal. “Education was always my first love.”
While his Yale undergraduate and law degrees might have been a golden ticket to wealth, that was not a life’s goal. “Even when I went to law school,” he said, “I was pretty certain that I wanted to not practice traditional law, but I wanted to figure out how you could use the law as a tool for social change.” With law degree in hand, he became not a lawyer, but a school principal. In Mississippi.
He would, as promised, return to Colorado and, once again, become a school principal. But beyond the administrative side of the job, he also saw challenges others might have seen but, somehow, never addressed. The job, to him, was not just graduating students, but figuring out how to get them to the next rung, especially non-traditional and immigrant kids.
Perhaps Johnston’s crowning achievement as a school principal was in Thornton. “It became the first public high school in Colorado history where a hundred percent of our seniors all graduated, and a hundred percent all got into four-year colleges.”
He also marshalled legislation that allowed undocumented students—for the first time—to pay in-state tuition at state colleges. Johnston’s fingerprints are also on a number of legislative efforts, including the READ Act, aimed at creating better literacy outcomes for all Colorado students.
In 2009, he won election to the state senate. Combining his two loves, education and public service, Johnston made education his bailiwick in the state legislature. Bills with his name included principal-teacher accountability and the nexus to student academic performance.
The legislature, where winning and losing is as predictable as the tides, was training ground for other runs for public office. Johnston has run unsuccessfully for both Governor and U.S. Senate. But, like all smart politicians, the long game paid off for Johnston.
He was elected Denver Mayor in 2023 just as the country was exiting the darkest days of the pandemic. What awaited the new mayor was the one-two punch of anti-immigrant fever and an accompanying near tidal wave of new arrivals. Denver was not alone. Other big cities were also targeted by opportunistic politicians eager to make a point.
“We did not ask for this problem; we did not choose it. We just had a governor of Texas who started sending us ten or eleven buses a day and, in that moment,” he said, “it’s not a question of whether you agree or disagree with border policy, it’s a question of what you do with 200 women and children on the street corner in Denver in ten degree weather.” Playing Texas-style politics was not an option.
Johnston said he relied on members of his Hispanic Advisory Council on the immigration issue to figure out solutions. Beyond immigration, he said he also budgets time to meet with them about other concerns, including jobs and business across the city. The group includes long time Denver political leader, Ramona Martinez, Nita Gonzalez and Joelle Martinez, CEO of the Latino Leaders Institute.
Denver’s immigrant challenge occurred as he was trying to solve the same homeless conundrum confronting city chief executives across the country. Homeless encampments in parks and sidewalks were growing by the day, sometimes the hour. On that issue, Johnston’s not ready to declare victory but confidently says there’s been significant progress.
“We have closed all of our shelters in hotels. We went from five thousand people we were supporting each night to, now, zero. We’ve dropped our budget below five million (dollars) from what it was once ninety million,” Johnston said. “We provided services by doing what they wanted, which was connecting them to jobs.”
But said the Mayor, mental illness and substance abuse, chronic issues among the homeless, are not just a Denver problem but an American one. “There’s always more services that you want to provide than you have the resources to provide.” Budgets, which are finite, will always be a challenge, he said.
While Johnston deals with the nuts and bolts of the city’s most pressing needs, his attention is also fixed on, arguably, the city and region’s biggest fixation, the Broncos and their future in Denver.
Ever since the Bowlen family sold the team in 2022 to the Walton and Penner families, rumors about moving the Broncos and building a new stadium have run amok. Johnston has heard them, too.
“I have spent a lot of time with the Penners and the Waltons,” Johnston said, acknowledging the scuttlebutt, but feels confident about the team’s future in Denver. “I have been incredibly impressed. They really care about the city, they care about the community, care about the team, they want to win, and I think they want to leave a lasting impact on the community that’s bigger than just football.” He also promised he would make keeping the Broncos right where they are a “top priority,” while ensuring taxpayers are not taken advantage of.
The Broncos and sports, in general, are important to Johnston. He plays in a co-ed soccer league each week. But, also important, is escaping his official duties to be a husband and father.
He and his wife, Courtney, an assistant Denver District Attorney, have three teenaged children. Being home for dinner with family, he said, is an everyday or nearly everyday priority. Spending time with his kids, taking them to soccer, helping with homework or attending school events, is too. Saturdays, he said, “are date night,” with his wife.
On how he sees his own legacy, Johnston is both modest and hopeful, but always with Denver at the heart of his wish. “We want to make Denver the definitive capitol of ‘the new West… the premier city in the American West where you both, can find great jobs, you can have a great quality of life, you can have diverse cultures that all combine together…it’ll be vibrant, and it’ll be safe.”
