Colorado Governor Defends Aurora Against Trump’s Migrant Claims

Colorado Gov. Jared Polis on Sunday defended the city of Aurora against claims by Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump that the city has been overrun by Venezuelan immigrants.

“It’s a really great, diverse city and it’s growing rapidly. It’s probably going to be the No. 1 or No. 2 city in Colorado in the next 10 or 20 years,” Polis, a Democrat, told CBS’s “Face the Nation” host Margaret Brennan. “So it’s a great city, it’s safer than it’s ever been. Like every city — Chicago, L.A., mid-sized cities, Denver — there’s obviously been a gang problem in Aurora for decades and I feel like we’re finally turning the corner.”

Trump uses Aurora and Springfield, Ohio, as his favorite examples of everything he believes is wrong with the Biden administration’s immigration policies, often with scary anecdotes but without providing any verifiable details.

“Under border czar Harris, Venezuelan gangs have taken over entire apartment buildings in Aurora, Colorado,” the former president said yesterday at a rally in North Carolina. “The governor is scared to death of Colorado. He’s a liberal governor. He doesn’t know what to do. The guy is so scared of these guys, and maybe you can’t blame him.”

When asked how he responded to the personal attack, Polis said, “I went shopping in Aurora yesterday. What a lot of Americans need to know is that Aurora has a population of over 400,000, it’s the third largest city in Colorado, violent crime has gone down two years in a row, auto thefts have gone down two years in a row. It’s a great city. I’m there all the time.”

Aurora has seen an influx of about 40,000 migrants into its already diverse community in recent years, driving up housing costs. A special task force of Aurora police detectives was appointed in August to investigate the Venezuelan gang’s alleged connections to the city.

However, Trump’s claims that the Venezuelan gang is “taking over” — as he said at a rally in California on Sept. 13 — are grossly exaggerated, Polis and others say.

“This is the difference between electing a president who bends the law and a president who has made a career of enforcing the law,” Polis told Brennan. “Kamala Harris is someone who looked criminal enterprises in the eye, put criminals behind bars as a district attorney, and she’s going to bring that same attitude to the White House to make America safer.”

Trump said at a rally on Long Island on Wednesday that he plans to visit Aurora in the coming weeks.