PERRY: Facts belie Trump officials’ TdA gang claims in Aurora and Denver, again

The Trump administration’s growing credibility problem mushroomed again over the past week, this time because of more lies, distortions and propaganda linked to immigrant issues in Aurora and Denver.

For months, federal officials have made vast, inflammatory claims about immigration raids and Venezuelan gang activity across the nation and here in Aurora. And for months, those claims have collapsed under even casual scrutiny or they even contradict one another.

The result is a mass-deportation campaign built only on rhetoric rather than facts, or even reality, and the public is increasingly aware of the campaign of lies.

Let’s start with last week’s congressional testimony from acting ICE Director Todd Lyons. Before a Senate oversight committee, on Feb.12, Lyons claimed that unnamed local police in Aurora sabotaged their planned 2025 ICE raid at the Edge of Lowry apartments by “making notifications” that tipped off their targets. When tactical teams arrived, he said, protesters were waiting and the complex was empty.

Duh.

He offered no evidence, as 9News reporter Marshall Zelinger first pointed out. Aurora officials denied the accusation, saying the city and its police department were not involved in planning or thwarting any federal immigration enforcement plans.

Lyons’ fable doesn’t just lack proof. It contradicts what other Trump administration officials previously said about the very same episode.

Last year, Trump Border Czar Tom Homan and U.S. Border Patrol Chief Michael Banks blamed the media for leaking word of Aurora raids, also without providing any evidence.

Now, Lyons blames the police.

Neither Trump regime fabrication squares with the facts at the time. The Edge of Lowry complex was already in the process of being shut down by the city over abhorrent living conditions, caused by errant landlords, not gangs. During the raid, The Sentinel reported that only 23 of 60 units were occupied. A contractor working there during the operation said he “did not see them take anyone away.”

Lyons last week called the complex “full” of Tren de Aragua gang members, straining credulity.

Even immigrant rights advocates admitted that their protests and warnings at the time were simply based on information provided by the Trump administration itself. Trump officials warned before their raids that they were headed to the home of Trump’s “Operation Aurora” to make some arrests. So the groups warned everyone they could and told them what to do if they were home when ICE came knocking: Don’t answer the door. So they didn’t.

Duh.

This is not an isolated case of fantasy passed off as government facts and policy.

Last August, U.S. Attorney Peter McNeilly stood before a bank of media cameras in Denver, flanked by federal agents and local police and declared a staggering takedown of Tren de Aragua in Colorado was underway.

He warned the gangsters not to use the state as its U.S. headquarters and vowed relentless pursuit.

Oy gevalt, you say?

The imagery was unmistakable. McNeilly described an organized, transnational criminal enterprise directing chaos and mayhem in Aurora from a notorious Venezuelan prison.

Seven months later, the facts have surfaced, and another Trumpy narrative is overturned.

Of the 30 defendants charged in the much-touted sting, nearly half have taken plea deals that significantly reduce their potential sentences, according to reporting this week by Colorado Public Radio reporter Allison Sherry. Court records show the indictments mentioned the TdA gang only in passing. Defense attorneys describe a far different picture as the cases unfolded. There is no wanton cartel hierarchy. This was a loose collection of impoverished and desperate immigrants drawn into undercover sting operations by offers of cash.

Undercover federal agents repeatedly returned to the same men, offering thousands of dollars for guns and drugs. And sometimes, the men didn’t have any of it and had to scramble to make good on the enticing deals.

Even an alleged and much-touted murder-for-hire plot appears, in court documents, to have grown out of government-initiated conversations and escalating cash lures.

Sure, none of this excuses criminal conduct. Guns and drugs were sold. Serious charges were filed. Prison time will follow, and it should.

But it does undermine the apocalyptic rhetoric that cast Aurora as ground zero for a foreign gang invasion.

Remember this?

Now-former Councilmember Danielle Jurinsky helped start all this when she sounded the alarm, all over local TV and radio stations and national TV on Fox News, about an alleged, ghastly, gang infiltration in Aurora during the presidential campaign in the fall of 2024. She pushed back when police, along with many other state and local officials, claimed the situation was under control, The Sentinel wrote last August in stories about McNeilly’s Denver presser. 

“The previous leadership knew exactly what this was, but like I said, they were so focused on protecting an image that they completely lied about it and denied the entire situation,” Jurinsky said. “So they knew. They knew the whole time.”

Yes, they did. They knew the truth, and they told the truth. And now, once again, we have more proof of that.

Aurora and Denver were infused with about 40,000 Venezuelan immigrants a couple of years ago, trafficked here by Texas state officials. Some of them were or became criminals. But they were few and far between the other criminals born and raised right here in the USA.

Trump, Homan, Lyons, McNeilly and Jurinsky helped make Aurora wrongly infamous for being TdA gansta central, which has hurt businesses, residents and, most importantly, immigrants and people of color.

There’s no doubt that the nation as an immigration problem. But it needs to be solved in Congress with thoughtful, fair and effective legislation. It won’t be, and can’t be, solved by pounding the country with racist lies and rhetoric, especially in places like Aurora, which values diversity and its immigrant community.

Truth’s out, again, folks. Do with it what you will. But if you continue to believe that mountain of bigoted bull these posers keep pumping out, you do it knowing it’s lies, and damned lies.

 Follow @EditorDavePerry on BlueSky, Threads, Mastodon, Twitter and Facebook or reach him at 303-750-7555 or dperry@SentinelColorado.com