AURORA, Colo. — Former President Donald Trump repeatedly put Aurora on the presidential debate stage on Tuesday night when he claimed the city has been "taken over" by violent migrants.
"You look at Aurora, in Colorado," Trump said during the first minutes of the debate with Vice President Kamala Harris, in answer to a question on the economy. "They are taking over the towns. They are taking over buildings. They're going in violently. These are the people that she and Biden let into our country."
Aurora Police say a Venezuelan gang has some members in the area but that it hasn't taken over apartment buildings, let alone taken over a city of 400,000 people.
The issue began to make news last month, when city officials closed Aspen Grove Apartments for health and safety issues and evicted about 300 people.
The claims of violent gang takeovers were largely kickstarted by Republican Aurora City Councilwoman Danielle Jurinsky, who has said Venezuelan gangs are taking over parts of Aurora since early August, after a large group gathered in Aurora on Venezuela's election night.
Last month on the social media platform X, Jurinsky said "A GANG HAS TAKEN OVER several apartment complexes in Aurora!"
Republican Aurora Mayor Mike Coffman had pushed back on Jurinsky's initial claims, but he offered conflicting statements in interviews, sometimes within hours.
The claims were repeated by some local news media and snowballed to reach larger audiences through Fox News, InfoWars and other conservative media.
On Wednesday, Coffman and Jurinsky released a joint statement addressing the situation in Aurora. This joint statement is their first unified communication.
The statement's goal was to "clear the record about the widely reported presence of Tren de Aragua (TdA) in Aurora and across the metro area."
It reads in part:
"The city’s duty is to make sure it gathers and presents factual, accurate, and comprehensive information about any issue affecting the community. We reiterate that the safety, security, and well-being of community members and visitors is of paramount concern to us and the city.
As for the perception and reality of public safety in Aurora, please understand that issues experienced at a select few properties do not apply to the city as a whole or large portions of it. TdA has not 'taken over' the city. The overstated claims fueled by social media and through select news organizations are simply not true. Again, TdA’s presence in Aurora is limited to specific properties, all of which the city has been addressing in various ways for months."
The joint statement goes on to say that Aurora Police have been arresting people with suspected TdA connections "well before" the concerns caught national attention. The city also made a webpage to track Aurora Police's developments.
Jurinsky's prior comments
On July 29, Jurinsky wrote on Facebook about a large gathering during Venezuela's election at an Aurora shopping center parking lot. She wrote that "Venezuelan flags" were flying among thousands who "took over and completely shut down a part of our city."
About a week later, Jurinsky claimed in a public safety committee meeting that the gathering was a "test" by gangs she believed were taking over apartment complexes and parts of the city.
"The three of us believe that there is a gang problem, a huge gang problem, that apartment complexes and areas of our city are being taken over," she said at the time. "I think this was a test. I think this was a test. They're here. We know they're here. We think this was a test and they and they essentially got away with it, right?"
At that same meeting, Aurora Police Deputy Chief Chris Juul told the City Council that “there is some influence” from Tren de Aragua, known as TdA, in the city, adding, “We don’t know that all the information that’s publicly out there right now is correct. It’s probably not.”
Jurinsky offered no evidence that the July gathering at the shopping center was gang-related, saying, “This is what we believe. Our opinions are not up for debate."
Her rhetoric carried on to social media, where her repeated claims of gang takeovers were amplified.
"And I repeat... A GANG HAS TAKEN OVER several apartment complexes in Aurora!" Jurinsky said in a post on X on Aug. 28, reposting a video showing men with guns opening doors in an apartment complex.
"I have said many times that this is not just an Aurora problem. This is a national problem. I don't know that entire cities are being taken over, but certainly, entire complexes are," Jurinsky said in another post Sep. 3.
Recently, Florida-based law firm Perkins Coie, which represents the lender holding the mortgage on Whispering Pines apartment complex, released a 10-page report alleging that a Venezuelan gang had "forcefully taken over" the property.
The report claimed gang members violently broke into empty units, tried to extort tenants for rent money and severely beat a staff member last November.
Coffman's prior comments
Republican Aurora Mayor Mike Coffman had pushed back on Jurinsky's initial claims, but he offered conflicting statements in interviews, sometimes within hours.
On Aug. 29, Coffman told Fox News that apartments had fallen to Venezuelan gangs.
“So, there are several buildings that are actually under the same ownership, out of state ownership, that have fallen to these Venezuelan gangs,” Coffman told America Reports anchor Sandra Smith.
That same day, he said in an interview with 9NEWS that the situation in Aurora was exaggerated.
On Sep. 9, Coffman told KOA talk radio host Ross Kaminsky that he wanted to solve the gang issue, but Jurinsky was pursuing a "political" goal "to continue the issue ... and continue that narrative through the November election."
The joint statement by Coffman and Jurinsky was not released as a result of Aurora being name-dropped by Trump on a national stage, according to Jurinsky.
"The statement was actually going to be released yesterday, before the debate, but there just wasn't enough time to get it done," Jurinsky said in a reply to 9NEWS anchor Kyle Clark on X. "The release of the statement today has nothing to do with the debate."