Rep. Boebert seeks Venezuelan gang facts in Aurora among political allies

AURORA | U.S. Rep. Lauren Boebert began what she dubbed a fact-finding session Friday about Venezuelan gang violence in Aurora by calling for a “polite discussion.”

That turned out to be an easy ask, given that the only people she let speak already agreed about the much-disputed severity of the perceived crisis. They said it was huge, and the solution was electing more Republicans.

“There was no fact-finding in the congresswoman’s discussion. It was very, very slanted and staged for political grandstanding,” said Brother Jeff Fard, a longtime metro area advocate for youth and civil rights who showed up to what Boebert billed as a briefing at Aurora city hall, uninvited by the congressperson.

“Let’s just say it left me feeling like I need to take a shower,” he added about a meeting he had hoped would separate fact from fiction in a controversy that has deeply divided local, state and federal officials and thrust Aurora into national notoriety.

Boebert’s briefing amounted largely to a campaign event for Republican John Fabbricatore, a former U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) field office director working to unseat Rep. Jason Crow, a Democrat, from his 6th Congressional District seat.

The other speakers were the same cast of far-right, anti-immigration Republicans who headlined a political function for Fabbricatore the evening earlier.

Among them, U.S. Rep. Chip Roy of Texas assumed the curious role of briefing the Coloradans at the table about the blighted low-income apartment complexes in Aurora that he and other anti-immigrant conservatives locally and nationally claim have been overrun by violent members of Tren de Aragua, a Venezuelan prison gang also known as TdA. Thomas Homan, a former acting director of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in the Trump administration, also explained the local situation he seemed to know little about to the group of Coloradans. 

Both out-of-staters defended the out-of-state company that owns the apartment complexes in question.

Crow lashed out at Roy on Saturday a flurry of social media posts in reaction to Boebert’s roundtable.
“Chip, know what doesn’t solve problems at the border? Your hatred of immigrants,” Crow said in a post on X.  “Know what would’ve? The bipartisan border deal you deliberately tanked when Trump asked you to.”

Boebert blamed “sanctuary city policies” that provide services to immigrants for luring them in the first place and “hindering local government” in its response to rampant violence she said they’re committing. She called for more coordination between ICE and local governments on the issue.

Jurinsky repeated some of the false claims about Venezuelan migrants that she has been making for more than a month. 

She said migrants committed several crimes at a meet-up in a shopping center parking lot on July 29, the day of Venezuela’s election. That assertion has been debunked by Aurora Police who say no injuries were reported, no arrests were made and no one was ticketed or summoned at that event. 

Jurinsky also tried to cast doubt on the migrant residents complaining about some of the blighted apartment complexes that have made news in the past few weeks.

 “They aren’t residents, they’re occupants,” she said, claiming, without evidence, that the only people remaining in those buildings are those without proper leases.

Boebert left no time, as promised, for questions or public input about what was said at her meeting. Still, residents lashed back at Jurinsky’s claims over the weekend.

Francy Rodgriguez, a recent Venezuelan migrant, invited the council member to see her lease, payment receipts and living conditions in the two-bedroom apartment for which she sells cookies, candy and sodas to make the $1,800 a month rent payment.

“The place doesn’t get repaired or cleaned, the utilities don’t run, the trash doesn’t get picked up. There’s no property manager anywhere around and nobody for us even to give rent to,” she said through a Spanish-language translator. 

To Jurinsky’s claim that tenants like her aren’t legitimate residents of their complexes, Rodriguez snapped back, saying Jurinsky isn’t a legitimate council member. 

“A true councilwoman would come speak with us in person, listen to us, and treat us like humans, not animals,” she said.

Meanwhile, Aurora Mayor Mike Coffman — who did not attend Boebert’s briefing — made a public turn-about this weekend on the apartment buildings and the gang situation in them.

After meeting with residents in Rodriguez’s complex on Helena Street. and those in a similarly blighted complex owned by the same landlord on Dallas Street, he posted on Facebook Friday that he has come to the conclusion “that a Venezuelan gang is not in control of either of these two apartment complexes,” as the property owner has claimed as justification for not maintaining the buildings.

Coffman said the city has offered to place two Aurora Police officers for two weeks in each apartment complex if the owner agrees to provide onsite property managers, presumably to clean the places up, make repairs and address code violations. He said City Manager Jason Batchelor is still waiting for a response on the offer.