ELBERT, Colo. (KDVR) — Three candidates for the Elizabeth School Board woke up Tuesday to a disturbing sight: their campaign signs had been vandalized.
David Fletcher, a current school board member and one of the candidates whose sign was defaced, said he wasn’t surprised to see the damage. The signs, which he shares with two other conservative candidates, were all marked with swastikas early Tuesday morning.
“I think that they are just some people that are filled with hate,” Fletcher said. “Who knew I was going to be painted as a Nazi just for running for school board?”
Fletcher says tensions in the local political scene have likely increased due to the district’s ongoing court battle with the ACLU over books it tried to remove from school libraries.
While some may disagree with the policy, Fletcher said hate symbols were an unacceptable response.
“They did this all in the dead of night like the cowards they are,” Fletcher said. “There’s no discourse in that. They didn’t want a discourse anyway.”
While the vandalism was upsetting, Fletcher said his faith in the community was quickly restored when neighbors showed up to help clean the signs.
“When people saw the signs had been defaced, there were others out there trying to clean them off for us,” Fletcher said. “That’s the kind of community we live in.”
Fletcher also noted he and his team plan to clean the remaining defaced signs and put them back up on the roads ahead of the election.
The three candidates have also asked the Elbert County Sheriff’s Office to investigate the incident.
Anthony Sutton is a business strategist and writer with a passion for management, leadership, and entrepreneurship. With years of experience in the corporate world, he shares insights on business growth, strategy, and innovation through management-opleiding.org.
