Out Boulder County condemns anti-transgender mailers aimed at Latino voters

Oct. 28—Out Boulder County is denouncing Spanish-language mailers and radio ads with anti-transgender messages that are aimed at Latino voters.

The mailers are from America First Legal, a political non-profit group led by Stephen Miller, an aide to former President Donald Trump.

"To use transgender people as a political weapon to attempt to mislead Latino voters is disgusting and dangerous," Out Boulder County Executive Director Mardi Moore said in a written statement. "Hundreds of hateful bills targeting transgender youth, their families and adult transgender people have been introduced in statehouses across the county. Transgender people have disproportionately high rates of death by suicide and murder. Shame on Stephen Miller and American First Legal."

One of the local recipients of the fliers was Boulder County Commissioner Marta Loachamin, who lives in Longmont. She said this is the only election flier she's received that's all in Spanish.

"It's scare, it's fear," she said. "It's offensive on the standpoint of attacking LGBTQ people. It's really falling into the national narrative. We, too, in Boulder County are being attacked with these types of propaganda and hate speech and hate mail."

She said another concern is the flier provides neither voter education nor education about candidates or ballot issues.

"A lot of my work continues to be around access to information and resources," she said. "This is in direct conflict."

The Colorado Sun reports that the mailers falsely claim that Democratic President Joe Biden and his liberal allies "are pushing radical and irreversible gender experiments on children" like blocking puberty and removing genitalia.

The mailers also feature a photo of Rachel Levine, an assistant secretary at the U.S. Department Health and Human Services, a Biden appointee who is the first transgender person to hold a federal office requiring U.S. Senate confirmation, according to the Sun.

Ruby Lopez, who coordinates Out Boulder County's Spanish access and queer and trans people of color programming, said in a written statement that she hopes Latino voters "won't fall for these lies."

"These political attacks are deeply personal to me and to other people like me," she wrote. "As a Latine transgender woman, I know personally the way that misinformation can lead to discrimination and violence. Transgender people are tired of being used as political punching bags and deserve better."