State Sen. Sonya Jaquez Lewis, a Longmont Democrat, announced her resignation Tuesday, Feb. 18, just as a Senate ethics committee prepared to release its findings on allegations that she mistreated legislative aides and staffers.
“I have the opportunity to serve with a regional not-for-profit that focuses on developing future women and LGBTQ+ leaders through an international lens,” she wrote on Facebook, declining to name the organization due to pending paperwork.
Jaquez Lewis, a licensed pharmacist, was first elected to the Colorado House in 2018 and won a state Senate seat in 2020. She was a member of the Colorado Democratic Latino Caucus and previously served on the Boulder County Board of Health and as president of Rocky Mountain Equality, formerly Out Boulder County.
In her resignation post, she described serving in the legislature as emotionally, physically, and financially demanding, while also saying she had accomplished more legislative goals than she could have dreamed of. “I am ready for some real and true time off,” she wrote.
Early last year, several former aides accused Jaquez Lewis of creating a toxic workplace, withholding wages and isolating staff, according to CPR. Others alleged she used campaign funds to pay aides for personal tasks like landscaping and bartending, failing to report the expenses until media coverage exposed them, The Colorado Sun reported.
On Jan. 10, the Political Workers Guild filed an ethics complaint on behalf of former aides and staffers, accusing Jaquez Lewis of wage theft, underreporting campaign spending and abusing power dynamics.
Jaquez Lewis denied the accusations, calling them “full of distortions and falsehoods” and referring to one allegation as “actionable slander” in her formal response to the complaint on Jan. 31. She acknowledged that aides in general are underpaid and often feel unappreciated but said she was being unfairly singled out.
“I agree that these issues should be raised and resolved,” she wrote. “Unfortunately, however, I am being made the artificial focus of this larger conflict. I am being dragged through the mud for political ends. With false allegations, the PWG is using me to showcase its concerns.”
An investigation later found that a letter of support Jaquez Lewis submitted in her defense was likely written without the knowledge or consent of the former employee it was attributed to, according to Ed DeCecco, director of the Office of Legislative Legal Services.
Jaquez Lewis was reelected in November after running unopposed. A Democratic vacancy committee will select her replacement to represent Longmont, Erie and Lafayette.
The Democratic party nationally must pay more attention to state legislative races. State Houses of Represenatatives are the bodies responsible for redistricting of election districts after the census which will occur in 2030. While Colorado is a fairly equally divided state, most states’ state legislative districts have been molded thru the years by Republican controlled bodies–supported and shaped by Alec—a Repub group that trains state lawmakers on how to keep control of state offices.
Democrats need to start today to provide the necessary financial and strategic support to states where there is even a slight chance of gaining control before the census gerrymanders state voting districts —which could leave We the People stuck with Repub Congresses for another decade. There are a number of states which could possibly be convinced to elect Democrats to the House, but they will need financial and strategic support from the National Committee. We need to stop focusing our time and money only on the national elections and recognize that the decision makers are those state reps who draw those redistricting maps—you know–the maps that look like a snake doing the Watusi. If they are allowed to control the 2030 Congressional redistricting we will end up once more with a House that does not truly represent us.
Let your representatives know you want the national Democratic Party to focus on the House Races in 2026, 2028 and 2030–rather than throwing money at national races where the results are rigged against us because of the gerrymandering of the House of Representatives.
Just. Wow. Run unopposed with a D. Get elected. Maybe the electoral public needs better sources of info and party needs to pay attention