State representative Crisanta Duran gave $100 to the Hancock campaign, a donation recorded on May 10 -- the day before she endorsed Chris Romer and became deputy manager of his campaign.
But then, maybe Duran -- an attorney who was very busy last year, in the middle of a grocery-store union fight and then battling Mark Thrun for a seat in the Colorado Legislature -- just didn't have time time to explore the key topic of Secure Communities and discover the differences between Hancock and Romer.
She had by May 22, when she e-mailed a missive with the subject line "Why Tom Tancredo's Endorsement of Michael Hancock Matters":
It's not surprising that Tom Tancredo endorsed Michael Hancock. Michael's position on 'Secure Communities' is simply unacceptable. 'Secure Communities' has done little to make our neighborhoods more 'secure.' In fact, it has resulted in 5,880 American citizens being wrongly identified by Immigration and Customs Enforcement as being undocumented persons and subject to deportation in the past year alone. Racial profiling is never acceptable. No victim should ever be afraid to call the police for fear of being deported. There is no doubt that the 5,880 American citizens identified probably do not look like Roy, Rachel or Chris Romer. They probably look like me, James Mejia or maybe even Michael Hancock. Yet, Chris Romer is the only candidate in the Denver Mayor's race who is willing to make the pledge to opt out of this program and demand an end to racial profiling. There are some voters who have told me that they are having a difficult time deciding who to vote for in this race. Let's face it, Chris may not be the first person you'd like to grab a beer with. But the one thing that we know about Chris is that he has always stood up for what he believed was right, even if it wasn't easy or popular. He fought for undocumented students to gain access to the American dream by receiving in-state college tuition. He reformed the payday loan industry in Denver so companies couldn't charge ridiculous interest rates. He cracked down on the mortgage industry and supported tougher regulations for brokers to protect consumers from dishonest lenders. Chris has a clear track record of standing up for progressive values. Now it is time to stand with him. Vote for Chris Romer for Denver Mayor.
Asked for her source of the Tancredo endorsement, Duran cited an online Denver Post story; no one from the Romer campaign ever contacted Tancredo -- (and the Hancock campaign has actively avoided him). Tancredo's "endorsement" of Hancock never existed, of course; the rumor grew out of a lunch with Peter Boyles at which Tancredo said that if he lived in Denver, he'd probably vote for Hancock. Nothing more, nothing less.
After that private conversation went public ("Never have lunch with Peter Boyles," says Tancredo), both Tancredo and Romer recorded a tongue-in-cheek "Viva Romer" statement. That pretty much laid the Tancredo endorsement issue to rest -- not that Tancredo deserved a place in the Denver mayoral debate at all.
More from our Calhoun: Wake-Up Call archive: "Chris Romer: The 527 pushing him in mayor's race hasn't evolved from dirty dinosaur tactics."