Updated on Friday, Oct. 13, 2024, at 11:54 a.m.
Former President Donald Trump spoke Friday afternoon to an audience of thousands of supporters at the Gaylord Rockies Resort and Convention Center on the outskirts of Aurora.
Trump pledged several weeks ago to come visit the city, which he has repeatedly characterized as violently over-run with transnational gang members from Venezuela.
City leaders, community members and law enforcement have painted a more nuanced picture of the situation. Around a dozen people with alleged ties to the Tren de Aragua gang have been arrested for a range of crimes in the metro area.
But the city’s Republican mayor complains the situation has been overblown for political gain and residents say the attention has led to racist threats and intimidation against them.
Watch Trump speak at the rally below:
In his remarks, Trump declared, “I love this state. This state has to flip Republican,” to raucous cheers.
He said he could be spending time on the most beautiful beaches in the world but instead, he came to Colorado to figure out what “the hell happened to Aurora.”
He blasted Gov. Jared Polis, referring to him as a coward, a fraud and pathetic. He also blamed Vice-President Kamala Harris for the surge in new immigrants arriving in the country in the past two years.
“Kamala has imported an army of illegal alien gang members and migrant criminals from the dungeons of the third world,” said Trump. “And she has had them resettled, beautifully, into your community to prey upon innocent American citizens, that’s what they’re doing. And no place is it more evident than right here.”
Researchers have repeatedly found that immigrants, whether or not they are documented, don't commit crimes at higher rates. City officials have repeatedly denied that the gang controls any building or part of the city, as have many residents of the affected buildings.
Of the tens of thousands of new immigrants who have come through Colorado in the past two years, local law enforcement say they’ve arrested around a dozen with suspected gang ties.
Trump announced if re-elected, he would target migrants for mass arrests and deportation and call the effort “Operation Aurora.” He said he’d rely on the Alien and Sedition Act for his legal authority. The 1798 law allows a president wide powers to detain and remove foreign nationals from countries judged to have invaded the United States.
Late in the speech he also declared, “I am hereby calling for the death penalty for any migrant who kills an American citizen.” The line received some of the loudest cheers of the rally.
Trump paused his remarks to show television clips including Fox News segments about migrant crime.
“They burst into a building and held tenants at gunpoint and knifepoint,” Trump said. He also talked more broadly about migrants from all over the world.
“Our criminals are like babies compared to these people. These criminals are the most violent people on earth.”
Cindy Romero, the woman who posted the viral video that sparked the entire controversy in Aurora, briefly joined Trump on stage. Trump called her brave and applauded her for posting the video.
Democratic officials defend Aurora: ‘Trump doesn’t seem to care who he hurts’
Democrats offered their own pre-rebuttal to Trump’s visit and message about Aurora in the city, speaking Friday morning several miles closer to the apartments than the former president at Stanley Marketplace.
Sen. Michael Bennet was blunt in his assessment of the visit. “Donald Trump has invited himself to Aurora to do what Donald Trump does best, which is to demonize immigrants, to lie and to serve his own political purposes.”
Democratic Rep. Jason Crow, an Army veteran who lives in and represents Aurora, defended his community. “We know in Aurora that our vibrancy, our strength, our culture, so much of who we are … are drawn from that beautiful heritage of immigration.”
Crow also wanted to set the record straight. He said he’s spoken with local law enforcement and there is no uptick in transnational gang activity in this area.
“What is occurring is minimal and isolated and, to be clear, never acceptable,” Crow said. “But it’s not a surge, it’s not a change. There is no takeover of any part of this city, of any apartment complex. It has not happened. It is a lie.”
Gov. Jared Polis acknowledged that there are victims of crime in Aurora, but noted that statistics show the city has gotten safer over the last two years. He also pointed out that the city’s mayor, Republican Mike Coffman, has “called out the former president’s lies and distortions about Aurora.”
“It really just shows, as a matter of character, that very often when he speaks, former President Trump doesn’t seem to care who he hurts with his words and his rhetoric or the consequences of what he says,” Polis added.
Crow added Trump is using Aurora, “because they see an opportunity to try to lie and distort the situation.”
Crow held a round table with recent immigrants the day before the rally and said many told him that they were afraid that anti-immigrant feelings have increased.
Sen. John Hickenlooper and Denver Rep. Diana DeGette also spoke up in defense of Aurora and criticized Trump’s inaccurate description of the community and its newest members.
After the speech, Aurora's Republican mayor, Mike Coffman said he was disappointed Trump hadn't taken the opportunity to see the reality of the city.
"The reality is that the concerns about Venezuelan gang activity in our city – and our state – have been grossly exaggerated and have unfairly hurt the city’s identity and sense of safety," Coffman said in a statement. "The city and state have not been “taken over” or “invaded” or “occupied” by migrant gangs. The incidents that have occurred in Aurora, a city of 400,000 people, have been limited to a handful of specific apartment complexes, and our dedicated police officers have acted on those concerns and will continue to do so."
Ahead of Trump, Boebert and others amplify claims about Aurora
Multiple Colorado congressional candidates and representatives spoke at the rally ahead of Trump. Gabe Evans, the Republican running for CD 8 spoke about his race, one of the key seats the GOP hopes to flip in November.
Jeff Crank, the candidate for CO-5 in Colorado Springs, and Rep. Greg Lopez, who currently represents CO-4, both spoke about the border, crime rates and drugs. They shared their concerns for those issues across the state and in their districts.
Congresswoman Lauren Boebert had arguably the biggest responses from the crowd. She called on residents of Aurora to vote for John Fabbricatore, a former high-ranking ICE official who is the GOP candidate for District 6.
Boebert got the crowd to chant, “Move that bus” referring to the removal of migrants.
At one point Boebert said “Illegal immigrants, they deserve one thing… a one-way ticket home,” to loud cheers in the crowd.
Harriet Hageman, a Congresswoman from Wyoming, spoke as well as the Colorado Republican Chair, Dave Williams. They called on the crowd to support Trump and to ensure Republican influence in Colorado.
As he took the stage, Trump shouted out Boebert, Lopez and Hageman, and endorsed Evans, Fabbricatore and Crank for Congress.
A quiet scene at the apartment buildings Trump was talking about
While Trump and others were speaking at the Gaylord, Rick Martinez was holding a one-person rally in front of the Edge at Lowry, the apartment complex that was oftentimes the center of Trump’s speech.
Wearing a shirt depicting a hand shushing Trump and holding a sign urging readers to vote for Kamala Harris, Martinez, a resident of West Denver, said he felt compelled to travel to the apartment complex because he disagreed with Trump’s rhetoric that Aurora has been “invaded” by immigrants.
“It's just sad that he would make a mockery out of these people and make them look like they're such a bad group of people that are coming over here from Venezuela, traveling thousands of miles just to get to another country, to have a better chance at life for their kids and their families,” Martinez said.
Martinez, who by 1:30 p.m. had spent about an hour and a half in front of the apartment complex, said he hadn’t seen anything he thought was out of the ordinary. He said he held polite conversations with residents and neighbors, many of whom don’t speak fluent English.
Aside from Martinez, the complex was relatively quiet. From some windows, many of which were broken and shoddily repaired with makeshift cardboard barriers, sounds of children playing could be heard. Residents came and went from their buildings, avoiding a small group of reporters waiting outside the apartments.
CPR’s Caitlyn Kim and Denverite’s Paolo Ziacita contributed to this story.
- Donald Trump to visit Aurora Friday
- Trump wants to visit Aurora. The Republican mayor says “bring it on”
- Trump says he’s coming to Aurora, doubles down on claims of Venezuelan gang violence
- What Trump said about Aurora immigrants and gangs at Tuesday’s debate (and what we know)
- Everyone’s talking about a Venezuelan gang in Aurora. Here’s what we know — and what we don’t
- Tren de Aragua in Aurora, explained in 5 minutes
