Religious extremist group meddles in Greeley-Evans school board race

Truth & Liberty Coalition led far-right rally for election denier Tina Peters in 2021

A Woodland Park-based evangelical Christian group associated with Charis Bible College has begun to meddle in the school board race for Greeley-Evans District 6, just days before ballots are set to be mailed to voters.

On Oct. 11, Sherrie Peif, a blogger employed by the Denver-based libertarian think tank The Independence Institute, posted to a Weld County Republican group on Facebook an “Election Guide” apparently produced by the Truth & Liberty Coalition. The guide includes responses to conservative hot-button questions from all seven candidates for the D6 school board.

The coalition apparently asked the candidates about “transgenderism,” “boys in girls’ sports,” “sex education,” “parental rights” and “social studies / history.” Those topics are already being pushed by three far-right candidates for the D6 school board: Stacey Casteel, Ashlee Tilley and Scott Rankin.

The guide also features this incredibly weird statement:

“This election guide has been approved for use in churches by a constitutional attorney licensed to practice before the U.S. Supreme Court.”

The Truth & Liberty Coalition is a 501(c)4 nonprofit group based in Woodland Park that “promotes erasing the separation of church and state,” according to The Colorado Sun.

The election guide distributed online by Peif claims to be paid for by the coalition, with William R. Korb as registered agent. However, a search of Colorado Secretary of State records performed Thursday night found no documented spending by the group in the D6 election, nor any political committee in the state with Korb as its agent.

In 2021, the Sun wrote about a political rally organized by the coalition in support of disgraced former Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters, who still faces charges for breaching Mesa’s election security stemming from her denial of the 2020 presidential election results.

Debbie Perry-Smith, who came from Littleton to emcee the event, noted that jet contrails were making Xs in the sky above the rally. She also made repeated references to being “above the targets.”

…

The Truth & Liberty Coalition, based at a 493-acre campus and sanctuary near Woodland Park, was involved in recent school board elections, including in Mesa County, where conservative candidates won board seats. The coalition distributed guides for what school board candidates should talk about. The Coalition also funded some of the candidates.

The coalition, which operates the Charis Bible College in Woodland Park, in September held a political conference on its campus to fire up conservative candidates and elected officials. Some of those at the Mesa County rally Wednesday attended that seminar. The coalition has a partnership with WallBuilders, an organization based in Aledo, Texas, that promotes a pseudo history of the religious basis of the U.S. government and has called for biblical law in the U.S.

Needless to say, the Gadfly thinks Greeley-Evans voters shouldn’t follow an “election guide” prepared by a group of chem-trail weirdos who support breaching election security in Colorado and pushing religious extremism in our schools.

The Gadfly hasn’t yet endorsed in the D6 race — nor in the Greeley City Council’s at-large race — but he will obviously have to do so soon, if extremist groups outside our cities are secretly distributing campaign materials.

Ballots are set to go out Monday, and Election Day is Nov. 7.

The Gadfly strongly encourages his readers to vote.