ARI SHAPIRO, HOST:
National headlines have described an armed Venezuelan gang taking over an apartment building in Colorado. These stories stem from a cryptic video that circulated widely in the news and on social media. Colorado Public Radio's Kyle Harris explains what happened.
KYLE HARRIS, BYLINE: Last week, a video from the Denver suburb of Aurora was seemingly everywhere on social media and then started airing on TV stations. It showed men with guns in an Aurora apartment complex, allegedly filmed by a scared resident. We haven't been able to independently confirm the source of the video. But when Donald Trump talked about it on the "Lex Fridman Podcast," he said the facts are clear.
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DONALD TRUMP: You saw in Aurora, Colo., a group of very tough young thugs from Venezuela taking over big areas, including buildings. They're taking over buildings. They have their big rifles.
HARRIS: Shortly after the video appeared, Colorado's Republican Party sent a fundraising letter claiming the state is under violent attack, and Venezuelan gangs have taken over Aurora. But what's actually true is far from clear. It is true that in the last two years, more than 40,000 Venezuelan immigrants have arrived in the Denver metro area. And it is true that many now live in Aurora. It's also true Aurora police have recently arrested 10 members of a Venezuelan gang called Tren de Aragua. But Aurora's interim police chief, Heather Morris, says there's no evidence of a gang takeover of apartment buildings in her city. Her department recorded this video after she talked to residents of the allegedly gang-run apartment building.
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HEATHER MORRIS: I'm not saying that there's not gang members that don't live in this community. But what we're learning out here is that gang members have not taken over this complex.
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UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: This is now our only press conference that we're aware. So thank you so much for coming.
HARRIS: At a press conference called by people who live in the building, called The Edge at Lowry, resident Moises Didenot said criminals don't live there at all.
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MOISES DIDENOT: (Speaking Spanish).
HARRIS: He says, "we're fathers of families. We're mothers of families. We're hard-working people."
Didenot says it's the owner of the apartments who's the criminal here for taking their rent but not keeping the building habitable. Dozens of residents cheered as Didenot spoke.
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DIDENOT: (Speaking Spanish).
(CHEERING)
HARRIS: They say they have no fear of gang members or other criminals, other than vigilantes who are promising to bring guns to take back Aurora from Tren de Aragua. Tenants walked reporters through apartments infested with rodents, bed bugs and broken appliances. They say the company that manages them, CBZ Management, doesn't return their calls for repairs. In early August, CBZ emailed reporters a statement from a public relations firm, alleging a, quote, "violent takeover" by Tren de Aragua of multiple buildings the company owns.
CBZ owners will not identify who in the company specifically alleged the gang takeover. They did not respond to our requests to speak on the record. Aurora's mayor, Republican Mike Coffman, says he is concerned about crime at the apartments but denies there's a gang takeover. And he calls the owners out-of-state slum lords. Immigrant rights advocate Jennifer Piper with the American Friends Service Committee thinks the apartment owners are alleging a gang takeover to shirk their responsibilities.
JENNIFER PIPER: All this stuff about Tren de Aragua is a great distraction from the systemic problems that exist around housing in the city of Aurora.
HARRIS: Piper says she hasn't seen xenophobic rhetoric as bad as it is now in her 20 years of advocacy. Aurora Mayor Coffman says the buildings are a criminal nuisance. The city of Aurora has been trying to get the building's owners to make the apartments livable for around two years and initiated legal action earlier this year. What's next is unclear, but some media outlets continue to report a Venezuelan gang takeover as fact.
For NPR News, I'm Kyle Harris in Aurora, Colo. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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