March 24, 2023 02:49 PM UTC

Colorado Republicans Treat High Schoolers Like January Sixers

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• by: Colorado Pols

As the Denver Post’s Capitol reports Nick Coltrain and Seth Klamann reported yesterday evening, for the second time this legislative session, the students of nearby East High School marched to the Colorado state capitol building to demand in the wake of gun violence on and near their campus that lawmakers pass stronger gun safety measures:

Hundreds of students from at least five Denver high schools, reeling from another school shooting, filled lawmakers’ offices and surrounded them in the hallways of the Capitol on Thursday to demand safer schools.

The rally was in response to the second shooting at East High School in as many weeks, but violence at any school affects every school, students said. They chanted slogans like “protect schools, not guns” from the Capitol steps…

On Wednesday, two administrators at the school were shot by a student, according to law enforcement. The student suspected of shooting the administrators was found dead by suicide hours later in Park County.

Students arriving at the state capitol to lobby lawmakers in favor of stronger gun safety laws yesterday, continuing today with Denver Public Schools closed for a “mental health day,” met two very different partisan reactions. Sympathetic Democrats welcomed students’ support for four gun safety bills moving through the legislature, and Sens. Chris Hansen and Rhonda Fields promised in response to news that the East High shooter may have utilized an untraceable “ghost gun” to introduce a new bill to ban them completely in the state.

According to a number of witnesses present, however, the interactions between East High students and Republican lawmakers were somewhat less cordial:

Got that, kids? Sen. Larry Liston was “happy” to be “berated” with your “rude and impertinent” “unannounced” grievances about your friends and administrators getting shot. What makes you think Liston can help? It’s not like lawmakers pass laws, right?

As for Republicans who hid in darkened offices as though high school students were January 6th insurrectionists, that’s just rank cowardice. For one thing, these students all went through the capitol’s metal detectors, which is more than we can say for clueless Republican lawmakers with a habit of fumbling their guns in a building where no one else can possess them. Why would armed Republican legislators be afraid of high school students who didn’t even smash any windows to get in the building like January 6th “sightseers?”

As one of Colorado’s longest-serving backbencher safe-seat Republicans, this is far from Larry Liston’s first offense when it comes to general disdain for children. Back in 2008, then-Rep. Liston drew scorn and was forced to apologize after he flat-out called unwed teen parents “sluts” in a debate over teen pregnancy rates. It’s not something Liston would be likely to repeat today, especially in earshot of Lauren Boebert, but we can see that time hasn’t made the kids any more welcome on Larry Liston’s lawn.

This time, Liston and friends helped turn a crowd of East High kids into lifetime Democratic voters.