Shawn Mitchell is a former Republican member of the Colorado Senate, representing the 23rd district from 2005 to 2013.

Mitchell served as Special Counsel to the Colorado Attorney General, where he was a legal policy advisor and one of the top aides to former Colorado Attorney General Gale Norton.

The comments were made at a formal hearing of the Workers' Compensation committee: Mitchell tried to comfort a nervous witness, by stating, "I just want to pass on a tip that sometimes when I'm in committee and I'm nervous I relieve that by imagining the chairwoman in her underwear.

Mitchell is a former Senior Fellow at the Independence Institute, a conservative and free-market think tank in Denver.

He also served 3 years on the Denver Rocky Mountain News Board of Editorial Contributors.