A Colorado Republican’s embarrassing night out is getting a second life on voters’ screens as she fights for reelection.
A renewable energy super PAC has launched ads reminding voters that Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-CO) was thrown out of a 2023 performance of the musical “Beetlejuice” after complaints about her behavior, The Daily Beast reported Friday.
The spots, paid for by the Invest in Tomorrow Coalition, run a news anchor’s narration over grainy surveillance video from inside the theater. “She and her companion, explicitly groping each other repeatedly,” the narrator says.
The ad then pivots to pocketbook issues. “Costs are skyrocketing in Colorado, and politicians are failing us,” it says. “If Lauren Boebert can’t be trusted in a room full of kids, then she can’t be trusted in the halls of Congress.”
The incident first made headlines in September 2023. Boebert initially downplayed it, writing on X that she “plead guilty to laughing and singing too loud.” Security footage soon undercut that account, showing Boebert vaping and taking flash photos, and showing her and her date, Quinn Gallagher, getting handsy.
At the time, even fellow conservatives piled on. Meghan McCain called her “trash,” and Ann Coulter dismissed her as a “totally embarrassing bimbo.”
Boebert eventually apologized in a statement released by her campaign, pointing to her recent divorce and saying she “genuinely did not recall vaping” that night.
“There’s no perfect blueprint for going through a public and difficult divorce, which over the past few months has made for a challenging personal time for me and my entire family,” she wrote. “I’ve tried to handle it with strength and grace as best I can, but I simply fell short of my values on Sunday.”
Boebert switched to Colorado’s 4th District ahead of the 2024 election, won, and is now seeking a second term in the reliably Republican seat. A poll funded by the PAC shows her leading her Democratic opponent 45 percent to 40 percent, with an independent candidate at 9 percent and 6 percent of voters undecided.
She was recently embroiled in a fresh scandal after a complaint filed with the House Ethics Committee accused her of sex with three staffers and alleged that a roughly $200,000 payment followed after one threatened to go to the committee. The complaint was filed by the head of a political action committee that has targeted Boebert for years. Boebert’s office has said there is “zero truth” to the allegations.