About
Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.) has represented Colorado’s 3rd Congressional District in the U.S. House of Representatives since 2021, when Trump’s endorsement helped her become the first woman to win in the Republican-leaning district. An extremist who supports QAnon and works to stand out as a firebrand, she was reelected in 2022 in a race that was so close it triggered an automatic recount. Ultimately, she won by roughly 500 votes (50.06%).
During her first term, Boebert made headlines for heckling President Biden during his 2022 State of the Union speech, arming herself on Capitol Hill, ignoring Covid mask rules, and making islamophobic comments about Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.). In Congress, she serves as communications chair of the far-right House Freedom Caucus, co-chair of the Congressional Second Amendment Caucus, and a member of the right-wing Republican Study Committee.
Prior to holding public office, Boebert ran Shooters Grill, a gun-themed restaurant in Colorado’s ranch country where she encouraged staff members to carry guns and defied local health restrictions by remaining open during the pandemic. She was forced to close the restaurant in July 2022 when the landlord refused to renew her lease.
Despite her limited experience in politics, Boebert was heavily involved in perpetuating the Big Lie, helping Trump to sow doubts about the legitimacy of the process well before the 2020 election.
January 6, 2021
- Two organizers of Stop the Steal rallies identified Boebert as one of the congressional Republicans involved in planning the protests in Washington, D.C., according to reporting by Rolling Stone.
- As Trump supporters ransacked offices in search of Democratic officials during the attack on the Capitol, Boebert tweeted details of the lockdown and noted when Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) had “been removed from the chambers.”
- The Jan. 6 Wild Protest in D.C. promoted Boebert as a speaker, according to the event website. She co-organized the event with Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.), according to USA Today.
- At 7:30 am on Jan. 6, Boebert tweeted: “Today is 1776,” a reference to the year the Declaration of Independence was adopted during the American Revolution.
- Just hours after Trump’s supporters stormed the Capitol, Boebert joined 146 other congressional Republicans in refusing to certify Biden’s win of the presidential election.
- Boebert voted against impeaching Trump for his role in inciting the mob that disrupted the congressional proceedings underway that day.
- She also voted against establishing a House committee to investigate the genesis of the violent assault on the Capitol and congressional members and staffers at work inside.
The Big Lie
- For months leading up to the 2020 election, Boebert cast doubt on the integrity of the electoral process, and called on supporters to become poll watchers.
- In the months following the election, Boebert doubled down on the claim that the election had been stolen.
- On Jan. 6, in arguing against certifying Arizona’s electoral votes on the House floor, Boebert claimed that voters “know that this election is not right and as their representative I stand here to represent them…. the members who stand here today and accept the results of this concentrated, coordinated, partisan effort by Democrats, where every fraudulent vote cancels out the vote of an honest American, [have] sided with the extremist left.”
- In January 2021, Boebert was temporarily banned from Twitter after pushing misinformation about the election. In addition to many other tweets about the election, on Jan. 9 she wrote: “Hillary must be pissed it took the DNC until 2020 to successfully rig an election.”
- During the speech on Nov. 27, 2021 in which Boebert referred to Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) as a member of the “Jihad squad,” she also claimed yet again that the 2020 election was “unconstitutional and illegal” and said that she had spoken with Trump, who she said condoned the push to prevent congressional certification of the results.
Election Audits
- Days after the 2020 election, Boebert called for an audit of the entire election, tweeting: “The nation’s entire voting procedure changed due to COVID-19.”
- Boebert advocated for an audit of the 2020 election in Colorado, where Republican plaintiffs filed suit in November 2021 seeking an audit.