He Was Arrested During His 2022 Congressional Campaign. Now, He’s Going for Governor.

If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again. Or, in Joshua Rodriguez’s case, try, try, try, try, try, try, try again.

Rodriguez, 41 of Aurora, is a Libertarian candidate running for governor of Colorado in the 2026 election. It’s at least his eighth time seeking elected office, according to Federal Election Commission filings and news reports. His previous attempts include bids for the Arvada City Council, mayor of Arvada, the U.S. Senate in Colorado and Arizona, the U.S. House for Colorado’s Fourth and Eighth Congressional Districts — and, most recently, president of the United States.

He hasn’t had much luck. In addition to not winning any of those offices, Rodriguez made headlines in 2022 when he was arrested on identity theft charges in the middle of his congressional campaign.

“I may never win an elected title, but that’s not why I’m there,” Rodriguez says. “I see a problem and I say it out loud. I keep going and keep going, and fighting and fighting. That’s politics.”

Rodriguez pled guilty to felony identity theft and misdemeanor cybercrime in November 2022, according to the First Judicial District Attorney’s Office. He was sentenced to a three-year deferred judgment and probation.

The charges stem from 2020, when Rodriguez was accused of creating fake GoFundMe accounts impersonating a woman whom Rodriguez was suing, according to his arrest affidavit. The woman, a moderator of a neighborhood Facebook group, created a real GoFundMe for her legal fees because Rodriguez had sued her for “slander” after she removed him from the group for allegedly using it to solicit donations for his city council campaign, the affidavit reads. A judge ruled against Rodriguez in the lawsuit in May 2021, according to Jefferson County Court records.

The arrest wasn’t Rodriguez’s first scandal. While running for Arvada City Council in 2018, he was accused of making a fake endorsement ad under the name of a resident who had openly criticized his candidacy. At the time, Rodriguez told news outlets that he was “catfished” by someone impersonating the resident who offered a paid endorsement. Rodriguez sued 9News’ anchor and parent company over its report of the accusation, but later dismissed the lawsuit, according to 9News. (When asked, Rodriguez says he “maybe, yeah” withdrew the lawsuit, suggesting it was “probably” part of an “undisclosed settlement.”)

In February 2022, the Arvada Press reported that Rodriguez filed for his congressional campaign with the FEC using an address that was sold to a different owner in 2021. FEC records show that Rodriguez initially filed to run for CD8 — the most politically competitive district in the state — using an Arvada address in January. He changed his candidacy to CD4 using an Aurora address in April. While it is legal for a candidate to run for a congressional district they don’t live in, providing false information in a statement of candidacy may violate federal election laws, the FEC notes on the form.

The Arvada Police Department has records of eleven cases involving Rodriguez from 2018 to 2022, including one from February 2022, though none of the cases resulted in criminal charges, according to Public Information Officer Chase Amos.

Notably, Rodriguez ran for the U.S. Senate in both Arizona and Colorado in 2020 under the same “Joshua Rodriguez for Unity” principal committee registered in Arvada, according to FEC filings. In Colorado, he lost out on the nomination during the Unity Party’s convention in April. In Arizona, he ran as a write-in candidate and received only 69 votes in November, according to state election records.

The U.S. Constitution requires senators to be inhabitants of the state they will represent at the time of their election. Rodriguez tells Westword that he did not move to Arizona during this time and claims he does not recall running for the U.S. Senate in Arizona. When asked when he last lived in Arizona, Rodriguez says, “It’s hard to know. Not sure.”

Rodriguez blames his long, messy history seeking office on other people. In explaining his 2022 arrest, Rodriguez mentions a viral video he posted in 2020 showing Aurora police officers holding a family at gunpoint, alleging that his online posts inspired “opposition from police departments politically.”

“I had to take a big punch,” Rodriguez says. “I don’t mind taking punches because you know what? There’s a lot of fighting going on in politics. That’s kind of what people are just going to have to deal with. I call it fake news.”

Rodriguez claims his city council run ended because he was “gerrymandered” out of his district. He abandoned his mayoral campaign because he alleges that someone told him the current mayor was planning to sue him over financial regulations. He says he voluntarily left the Colorado Senate race to let his opponent win. And he claims he withdrew his presidential candidacy because he was upset that Donald Trump was invited to the 2024 Libertarian Party National Convention to “steal Libertarian votes.”

Rodriguez for Governor?

Rodriguez’s campaign for governor aims to “reinvent Colorado 100 percent,” he says. To prove he’s capable of doing so, he is trying to run six ballot measures for the 2026 election.

The proposals are as follows:

1. Eliminate the state income tax.
2. Eliminate property taxes.
3. Lower the voting age to sixteen.
4. Integrate artificial intelligence into classrooms to create personalized lesson plans for each individual student.
5. Enhance child digital safety by “expanding digital forensics units, dismantling trafficking rings, and requiring technology companies to block and report exploitation networks.”
6. Establish a “restitution-based” criminal justice system that requires certain offenders to financially compensate victims.

Rodriguez says he plans to submit the ballot initiative proposals on September 26. They will have to be reviewed and approved by Legislative Council Staff, the Secretary of State and the Title Board. Rodriguez will then have to collect 124,238 signatures for each measure to earn a spot on the ballot.

“I have the vision for Colorado, and I’m showing that through ballot initiatives that people can read,” Rodriguez says. “If they like my ideas and they want someone to lead them, vote for me.”

This time around, Rodriguez is running for governor as a member of the Libertarian Party. That’s the same party he used to run for president in the 2024 election cycle, but he is known for jumping between political parties.

During his congressional candidacy in 2022, he initially filed as a Democrat for CD8 in January, according to FEC records. In February, he switched to run as a Republican. Then in April, he switched to the Libertarian Party, and changed to CD4 instead of the eighth district. In 2020, he ran for Senate in Colorado and Arizona as a member of the Unity Party.

“Colorado, they need a Libertarian. They don’t need another Republican or Democrat. They need someone neutral-based, independent,” Rodriguez says. He explains his party switching as “networking and looking into” each party for information purposes.

Rodriguez is one of 36 candidates currently filed to run for governor.

He is the only registered Libertarian candidate as of September 26, so maybe he finally has a shot at winning a primary. Maybe.