Republican gubernatorial candidate Bob Beauprez has faced a flurry of harsh criticism from the CU student body following allegations earlier this month that he illegally obtained damaging information on rival Democrat Bill Ritter.
Beauprez’s campaign allegedly obtained secret information from an FBI database, which was then used in attack ads against Ritter. The ads in question, featuring a description of Ritter’s case files from his time as district attorney, sparked controversy because only police and federal officials have the authority to access and view the databases where the files were stored.
One ad tells the story of Carlos Estrada Medina, an illegal immigrant arrested on charges of heroin dealing. Ritter plea-bargained Medina’s case to a lesser charge, and Medina was not deported after his arrest, contrary to immigration law.
“Several months ago, we were approached by a source in federal law enforcement who had seen firsthand Bill Ritter’s despicable policy of purposefully putting deportable criminal aliens right back into our communities, only to commit crimes again,” Beauprez said in a prepared statement. “Bill Ritter is demanding to know his name so he can destroy this person.”
Beauprez refused to reveal the name of his source, although several news sources, including the Denver Post and Rocky Mountain News, identified him to be Cory Voorhis, an Immigrations and Customs Enforcement agent based in Denver.
Brian Smith, a sophomore accounting major and the chairman of the College Republicans, said that there was “too much spin on this issue” in the media.
“The sad part is that the real issue–Ritter plea-bargaining with a heroin dealer who later assaulted a 12-year-old girl when he should have been deported– is being ignored,” Smith said.
Beauprez later said that he had no knowledge that the information had come from the protected National Crime Information Center database, or that it was both illegal to access the database without authorization.
“Bob Beauprez is just a sleaze,” said Charlotte Royer, a junior political science major. “It’s obvious that he’s lying, and if you lie as a proclaimed ‘leader’ in the public sphere, then you deserve whatever punishment you get.”
Trevor Pincock, a senior linguistics major and former president of the College Democrats, expressed a similar skepticism with Beauprez’s explanations.
“His culpability in this situation is especially ironic since he passed legislation imposing harsher penalties for the misuse of the NCIC database,” he said. “I don’t think Beauprez will win this race, but legal action should be taken immediately, in keeping with the standards that Beauprez himself helped set.”
While the investigation continues into the potentially illegal actions of the Beauprez campaign and Voorhis, the current race polls show Ritter leading over Beauprez. A Ciruli poll of 501 likely voters released Oct. 28 shows Ritter leading Beauprez 52 to 33 percent.
“If he doesn’t win, he’s done. You’ll never hear from him again,” Royer said.
