When picking a nominee to challenge Democratic senator Michael Bennet this fall, GOP delegates shocked everyone by humiliating front-runner state senator Tim Neville and his powerful gun-rights backers. Neville didn’t even meet the threshold needed to appear on the state’s June 28 primary ballot.

Instead, they gave 70 percent of the vote to Darryl Glenn, a 49-year-old former Air Force lieutenant colonel who now is a county commissioner in Colorado Springs. The charismatic Glenn gave a rousing speech to the crowd on debt, ending federal funding of sanctuary cities, and the Iran nuclear deal. He called himself a “Christian constitutionalist conservative.” The biggest applause line came when Glenn, an African American, declared, “I hope the reporters are listening, because I’ve got news for them: All lives matter.”

He then made a direct appeal to Republicans who believe that party leaders in Washington have squandered their control of both houses of Congress and been passive in fighting President Obama: “I’m tired of hearing about Republicans reaching across the aisle. We need to step up and lead, ladies and gentlemen.”

Glenn has the momentum coming out of this weekend’s convention, but in the June primary he will still have to defeat four challengers who used an alternate signature-gathering route to secure a place on the ballot. Nevertheless, Glenn is clearly now the man to beat.