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Colorado Senate committee begins review of complaint against Sen. Sonya Jaquez Lewis

By Marianne Goodland January 24, 2025 | updated 7 months ago

The Senate Committee on Ethics began its initial work on the complaint filed against Sen. Sonya Jaquez Lewis, D-Longmont, over mistreatment of legislative aides.

Jaquez Lewis has thrice gotten into trouble over her treatment of aides. In 2023, according to the Denver Post, she was admonished by Senate leadership for “concerning behavior” regarding her aides. An incident followed in December 2023 where she refused to sign a pay card for one of her aides. Senate President Steve Fenberg of Boulder signed the pay card in her stead.

The most recent incident that led to the ethics complaint was the mistreatment of aides. The complaint, filed by the Political Workers Guild on behalf of five former Jaquez Lewis aides, noted that aides were doing personal work during the summer, such as landscaping, tending bars, and walking neighborhoods on behalf of a Jaquez Lewis ally. The Longmont lawmaker used campaign funds to pay for those services, although she did not disclose those payments until last month.

Jaquez Lewis was barred from using state funds to hire legislative aides for the 2025 session and is not assigned to committees.

The ethics committee consists of five members: Chair Sen. Julie Gonzales, D-Denver; senators Dylan Roberts, D-Frisco, and Mike Weissman, D-Aurora; senators Cleave Simpson, R-Alamosa; and John Carson, R-Highlands Ranch. Simpson will serve as the committee’s vice-chair.

Friday’s meeting was largely organizational, a review of procedures, and a review of the scope of the investigation. Jaquez Lewis has until next Friday, Jan. 31, to submit a written response to the committee.

“This is not about any one member,” Gonzales said at the meeting’s onset. “It’s about public trust and ensuring a process that can ensure the public’s trust in our work as senators,” she said.

The committee must complete its preliminary investigation by Feb. 20. In that phase, it must determine whether probable cause exists to find an ethics violation occurred.

The second stage, if the committee finds an ethics violation may have occurred, is if the committee receives a request from Jaquez Lewis for an evidentiary hearing. That timeline, from the finding to the hearing, is about 21 days.

After the hearing, the committee could either dismiss the complaint or recommend action to the Senate, which could include reprimand, censure, or expulsion. The first two would require a majority vote of the Senate, while expulsion would require two-thirds of senators to approve.

The committee will meet again on Feb. 4.

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