Faith Miller, Colorado Newsline

Colorado’s first Muslim state lawmaker believes words — like those recently used by U.S. Rep. Lauren Boebert — have consequences.

“(Boebert’s) rhetoric is what continues to fuel that hate towards Muslims and gives this unspoken permission to continue that hate,” said state Rep. Iman Jodeh, an Aurora Democrat who is the spokeswoman for the Colorado Muslim Society. “As Muslims, when we hear this kind of rhetoric, we also become scared of her supporters and (have) kind of this heightened awareness of our safety.”

Jodeh said she hasn’t seen or heard of any incidents of discrimination or hate toward Colorado Muslims since Boebert, a Silt Republican, repeatedly labeled Muslim U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar of Minnesota as a member of the “jihad squad” and suggested Omar could be a terrorist.

But Jodeh worried such incidents could occur in the future, and called on Democratic leaders to censure, or publicly reprimand, Boebert and take away her committee assignments.

“This has become normalized in the Muslim community, where we are always at a heightened alert,” Jodeh said. “We don’t have the luxury to just dismiss or pretend like nothing’s wrong.”

On Wednesday, U.S. House progressives introduced a resolution to remove Boebert from the Natural Resources and Budget committees. Rep. Joe Neguse was the only member of Colorado’s congressional delegation on the list of original cosponsors, but Rep. Jason Crow, an Aurora Democrat, signed on Thursday.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi told reporters she had not determined whether to hold a vote on the resolution.

“I don’t feel like talking about what the Republicans aren’t doing or are doing about their members, the disgraceful, unacceptable behavior of their members,” Pelosi said.

But Pelosi reportedly urged restraint during a caucus meeting last week, telling fellow Democrats: “There’s a judgment that has to be made about how we contribute to their fundraising and their publicity,” according to the Associated Press.

Jodeh said she understood that argument, but still believed the House should vote on sanctions for Boebert.

“Condoning, not taking action on behavior like this, means that our nation is regressing,” Jodeh said.

Formal complaint filed

The resolution centers on a campaign event where Boebert, a Silt Republican, described getting into an elevator next to Omar and seeing a Capitol Police officer running toward them.

“I said, ‘Well, she doesn’t have a backpack. We should be fine,’” Boebert said during the speech, a video of which circulated on social media Nov. 25. The comment apparently referred to a backpack that might be worn by a terrorist carrying a bomb.

Then, Boebert claimed she said, “Oh look, the ‘jihad squad’ decided to show up for work today.”

The term “jihad” can refer to a spiritual struggle or a military struggle to defend the religion of Islam, but it is commonly used to describe the “holy war” sought by radical Islamic groups. Meanwhile, the word “squad” is widely used to describe a group of four progressive congresswomen that includes Omar along with Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts and Rashida Tlaib of Michigan.

Boebert had previously referred to Omar as “the jihad squad member from Minnesota” during a Nov. 17 speech on the floor of the U.S. House of Representatives.

“Fact, this buffoon looks down when she sees me at the Capitol,” Omar said on Twitter in response to the video of Boebert’s campaign event, calling the elevator story “made up.” “Sad she thinks bigotry gets her clout.”

Boebert apologized on Twitter to “anyone in the Muslim community” whom she had offended, and reached out to Omar to discuss the incident. During a phone call on Nov. 29, Omar told Boebert she wanted a direct apology, and when Boebert refused, Omar hung up on the Colorado congresswoman.

Republican House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy has expressed no desire to punish Boebert for her behavior.

Wednesday’s resolution from House progressives comes after two national organizations, Muslim Advocates and Bend the Arc: Jewish Action, filed a formal complaint with the House Ethics Committee over Boebert’s comments.

“When elected officials attack religious minorities, they can lay the groundwork for real violence against those communities,” the Nov. 30 complaint said. “Her repeated invocation of the false, offensive stereotype of Muslims as anti-American and terrorist sympathizers gives her many followers a green light to direct hate and threats towards Reps. Tlaib, [André] Carson [D-Indiana] and Omar — as well as all American Muslims.”

Anti-Islamic hate crimes spiked in 2017

History Colorado estimates that approximately 70,000 people, or slightly more than 1% of Coloradans, identify as Muslim. Mosques are concentrated in the Aurora and Denver area, but Boebert’s Western Slope district includes at least one, the Islamic Center of Grand Junction. The mosque’s sign was vandalized in 2019, prompting a show of support from the community.

From 2011 through 2020, a total of 51 anti-Islamic hate crimes were reported in Colorado, more than half of which involved intimidation. About 1 in 5 involved simple assault, which the FBI defines as a physical attack that does not involve a weapon or cause serious injury.

Over the past several years, there were times when mosques in Colorado increased security, Jodeh said, due to former President Donald Trump’s rhetoric and policies. Trump issued an executive order in 2017 banning people from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the U.S. Courts blocked the original order as well as a second version, though the Supreme Court upheld a third version of the so-called “Muslim ban” in 2018, which remained in place until now-President Joe Biden revoked it after taking office.

The FBI, which tracks hate crime data, reported nine anti-Islamic hate crimes in Colorado in 2017. That was the highest number recorded in Colorado since 2011, when nine such crimes were also reported.

In 2018 and 2019, six anti-Islamic hate crimes were reported in Colorado each year, according to the FBI. Two such crimes were recorded in 2020.

“It wasn’t just rhetoric, it was actually violent actions,” Jodeh said of anti-Muslim hate in Colorado during the Trump administration, noting the trend had started before Trump was elected. “Now that he’s gone,” she added, “people like Boebert are carrying that torch and are happily (using similar rhetoric).”

Those looking to support Muslims or the Muslim community should do so by “defending that person or that group of people when they’re not present,” Jodeh said.

“When people can use their privilege to defend a marginalized group, that is the ultimate sign of allyship and solidarity,” she continued. “That person of privilege can stand up or set the record straight. It can be that person of privilege coming to a mosque, learning from a Muslim, taking the initiative to become well-informed — but it really alleviates a lot of the pressure when allies step up, and again, do it when we’re not around.”

Colorado Newsline is part of States Newsroom, a network of news bureaus supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Colorado Newsline maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Quentin Young for questions: info@coloradonewsline.com. Follow Colorado Newsline on Facebook and Twitter.

Aurora police showed a pattern and practice of racially biased policing, excessive use of force and “failing to record required information when it interacts with the community," according to the investigators, who were appointed by Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser.

Officers used force against non-white racial and ethnic groups 2.5 times more often than they used force against white people, according to the report.

The investigators also found that Aurora Fire Rescue had a pattern and practice of illegally administering ketamine. The powerful sedative, which can cause dissociative effects, is sometimes used by first responders to calm or subdue people having a mental health emergency.

Weiser said his team read almost 3,000 reports regarding the use of physical force by Aurora police officers and conducted dozens of interviews. The 14-month investigation also encompassed more than 220 hours of in-person ride-alongs with officers and firefighters, nine months of observing weekly Force Review Board meetings, and feedback from “scores" of Aurora community members, according to the report.

Aurora police failed to abide by the requirements of Colorado's Senate Bill 20-217, which requires officers to have a legal and public safety basis for making a stop, Weiser said during a news conference Wednesday.

SB-217 allowed Weiser's office to conduct a “pattern or practice" investigation into Aurora police and fire departments.

“This pattern or practice authority, as it's known, is a tool the federal government has had for some time," Weiser explained, “but Colorado became a national leader by providing our department with the ability to engage in such investigations."

Weiser said he recommends and urges the city of Aurora to enter into an agreement with his office to ensure it comes into compliance with the state and federal law. People whose rights were violated by Aurora police or paramedics should reach out to Weiser's office to provide their input in crafting the agreement, called a consent decree, Weiser said.

The city will be required to hire an independent monitor to oversee changes at the police and fire departments, Weiser said. This will include “elevating" standards and training of officers and paramedics to meet the legal requirements, and adding more accountability for misconduct.

Renewed attention on Elijah McClain

The Aurora Police Department vaulted into the national spotlight in June 2020, after videos went viral showing the violent arrest of George Floyd, a Black Minneapolis man who died at the hands of a white police officer — sparking protests against police brutality and racial injustice nationwide.

Protesters in Denver and Aurora brought new attention to the local case of Elijah McClain, a 23-year-old who died after his violent arrest in August 2019 by Aurora officers. McClain was contacted by officers while walking home from a convenience store and was injected by Aurora Fire paramedics with a dose of ketamine that was far too high for someone his size. He was hospitalized after the incident and taken off of life support several days later.

Following an outcry over the deaths of McClain and other Black people detained by police, state lawmakers passed a sweeping police accountability measure and Gov. Jared Polis signed it into law. Senate President Leroy Garcia, a Pueblo Democrat, and Sen. Rhonda Fields, an Aurora Democrat, along with Reps. Leslie Herod and Serena Gonzales-Gutierrez, both Democrats from Denver, led SB-217.

Lawmakers must ensure the Colorado attorney general's office gets the financial resources it needs — whether from the state budget or perhaps through federal help — to investigate other local police departments as needed under SB-217, Herod told reporters Wednesday. She encouraged Colorado residents to report police misconduct to Weiser's office.

“It's definitely happening in Aurora," Herod said during a virtual news conference. “It's likely happening in other places as well."

Weiser's team analyzed internal Aurora police data, dating back to 2018, to uncover the department's pattern of racially biased policing, according to the report. The investigators found statistically significant disparities in the way police interacted with, arrested and used force against Black people and other people of color as compared with white people.

“These disparities persisted across income, gender, and geographic boundaries," the report said.

On their ride-alongs with Aurora police officers as they responded to calls and interacted with community members, investigators saw officers “using force to take people to the ground without first giving them adequate time to respond to officer commands," the report said. Officers also would frequently tell people “stop resisting," even when they did not appear to be resisting the officers' control.

Aurora police officers failed to document police stops as required by SB-217, the investigators found. The state law requires agencies to record, and ensure there is a legal basis for, all police stops, even investigative stops — a category for which Aurora has “little to no" documentation, according to the report.

The report also noted that current Aurora police policies don't adequately describe when it's appropriate to conduct an investigative stop, also known as a “Terry stop" or a “stop and frisk." When agencies don't meet certain legal standards for conducting investigative stops, the practice has been tied to racial bias.

Meanwhile, the investigators found Aurora Fire's ketamine review process was inadequate to ensure paramedics followed the law on when and how to inject people with the powerful sedative. The review process “failed to identify problems when ketamine was inappropriately administered or was administered at the request of police, and therefore did not improve its processes and training to prevent future violations."

A new Colorado law, which Polis signed July 6, prohibits officers from “using, directing, or unduly influencing" the use of ketamine upon another person and from “compelling, directing, or unduly influencing" a paramedic to administer ketamine. The law, House Bill 21-1251, was in part a response to McClain's death.

“We hope that this is just the beginning of what this law can do to protect Coloradans," said Mari Newman, a civil rights lawyer who is representing the estate of Elijah McClain in a federal lawsuit. Newman added that she hoped other Colorado police departments wouldn't “wait for the attorney general to conduct a similar investigation" before changing racist practices.

Grand jury indictment

The city of Aurora, its police and fire departments, and the people implicated in McClain's death could face further consequences beyond the attorney general's oversight.

A grand jury, convened by Weiser to investigate the death of McClain and file charges if necessary, indicted three officers and two paramedics on 32 total counts, including reckless manslaughter and criminally negligent homicide. The five men — Officers Nathan Woodyard, Randy Roedema and Jason Rosenblatt, and paramedics Jeremy Cooper and Peter Cichuniec — were formally charged Sept. 1 and turned themselves in to Glendale Police Service. They each posted a bond of $10,000, according to a Glendale Police spokesperson.

Initially following McClain's death, former 17th Judicial District Attorney Dave Young had cleared Woodyard, Rosenblatt and Roedema of all criminal wrongdoing.

But an independent review commissioned by the city of Aurora found that Aurora police officers and paramedics mishandled the encounter that led to McClain's death, according to a February report.

The Aurora City Council commissioned the firm 21CP Solutions to make broader recommendations about police department policy, and those recommendations were released in August. In recent months, Aurora police have begun implementing changes aimed at restoring trust with the community — such as acquiring an updated body-worn camera system in July and commissioning an outside organization to draft new use-of-force policies.

Aurora police did not immediately respond to a request for comment Wednesday. Aurora Mike Coffman tweeted a statement: “Most of the findings are not new and our Chiefs of Police and Fire Rescue have been working hard for over a year to address many of them," Coffman said. “I'm confident that the issues raised in the Attorney General's report, along with the other outside investigations commissioned by our city, will be corrected and that we will achieve an outcome that respects the rights of everyone who lives and works in our diverse community."

Weiser's investigation team found that the culture of the Aurora police contributed to the frequent use of force by officers. Officer training doesn't address the department's specific needs, and current policies are “are short on detail or practical guidance, often doing little more than reciting the legal requirements set forth in court cases and applicable statutes or regulations," the report said.

The department also fails to hold officers accountable for improper use of force, according to the report. Instead, it relies on “formal and informal systems that favor findings that officers followed policy and that hamper candid feedback on how to improve."

Another cause of the patterns and practices of civil rights violations, according to the report: Aurora City Charter gives an entity called the Civil Service Commission, which oversees the hiring of police officers and firefighters, the ability to overturn disciplinary actions against officers.

The city of Aurora cooperated with Weiser's investigation team throughout the investigation, the report said. But if the effort to come together with the city on a consent decree proves unsuccessful, the attorney general's office plans to seek a court order forcing the police and fire departments to make changes.

The investigation team appointed by Weiser included several people who worked as law enforcement officers, including a former chief of police in Arlington, Texas, according to the report. Other team members were said to have had extensive experience as prosecutors or public defenders.

“We appreciate that the risks that first responders take must stand equally alongside a deep commitment to the rule of law," the report said. “By working to elevate law enforcement, our community can both be safe from danger and free from racial discrimination. Indeed, it is critical that community members can trust that law enforcement operates fairly and is worthy of their trust."

Colorado Newsline is part of States Newsroom, a network of news bureaus supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Colorado Newsline maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Quentin Young for questions: info@coloradonewsline.com. Follow Colorado Newsline on Facebook and Twitter.

Wayne Williams, the former Colorado secretary of state who's newly in charge of Mesa County elections, said he hasn't heard from Clerk and Recorder Tina Peters since the news broke that her office was under investigation.

Williams said he hadn't tried to reach Peters.

This article was originally published at Colorado Newsline

“My focus is on trying to make the election work," he told Newsline on Tuesday. “I know the commissioners have made pleas to her to come in and start (running) the recording and motor vehicles side, but my focus is to run an election. That's what I'm charged to do, and that's what I'm going to do."

Williams, a Republican, is currently serving in a nonpartisan role on Colorado Springs City Council in addition to supervising Mesa County's November election.

Peters hasn't been seen in Mesa County since Secretary of State Jena Griswold — Williams' Democratic successor — announced Aug. 9 that she was investigating a “serious breach" of election security protocols at Peters' office. A few days later, Griswold accused Peters of allowing an unauthorized individual to attend a May software upgrade, known as a “trusted build," for Dominion Voting Systems machines.

Peters is also under investigation by the 21st Judicial District attorney's office and the FBI.

Meanwhile, Peters appeared Aug. 10 at a South Dakota “Cyber Symposium" hosted by MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell, a fervent supporter of former President Donald Trump who has made false claims that widespread fraud cost Trump the 2020 presidential election. Election conspiracy theorists said they would use evidence from hard drive images of Mesa County's Dominion machines to validate their theories, but no such evidence has emerged.

Peters, a Republican, wrote in a Sept. 1 email to the Mesa County attorney's office that she had been working “remotely," according to the Grand Junction Daily Sentinel. While Peters didn't specify what she was working on, the non-elections-related responsibilities of her office include overseeing vehicle registrations and marriage licenses, among other duties.

While Peters' exact location is unknown, Lindell has said he's hiding her in a safe location.

Peters has not returned multiple requests for comment from Colorado Newsline.

Williams on Reiner: No conflict

Griswold originally appointed Sheila Reiner, the Mesa County treasurer and former county clerk, to replace Peters as top elections official. Mesa County commissioners rejected the appointment and hired Williams instead. Later, Griswold filed a lawsuit to officially strip Peters of her elections authority and appoint Williams as the designated elections official. The county commissioners intervened, saying only they had the power to designate Williams the top elections official.

Williams said the question of who was in charge hadn't caused conflict between Reiner and himself.

He and Reiner worked together to get new elections equipment installed in Mesa County by an Aug. 31 deadline in time to mail ballots to military and overseas voters.

“She and I have been talking by either email, text or phone, multiple times on most days," he said.

Williams said he's able to do some of the Mesa County work remotely but plans to be in Grand Junction “fairly often" in October, when the election will be in full swing. Grand Junction lies nearly 300 miles west of Colorado Springs, where Williams is a city council member.

“I have continued to participate in City Council meetings and will continue to do that. … I have always worked more than 40 hours a week, and so that doesn't bother me," said Williams, who has a private legal practice.

“I'm not taking on any (legal) clients right now," he added, “because that would be more bandwidth than I have."

Colorado Newsline is part of States Newsroom, a network of news bureaus supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Colorado Newsline maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Quentin Young for questions: info@coloradonewsline.com. Follow Colorado Newsline on Facebook and Twitter.