PUEBLO COUNTY – It’s a scary situation for Pueblo County Clerk Gilbert Ortiz.
On Monday, he told News 5 he’s been receiving some threatening letters, possibly from angry voters or a candidate upset about the mayor’s race.
Ortiz said he received the first letter back in March and the most recent one showed up last week. The latter accused Ortiz of fixing the mayoral elections for candidate Steve Nawrocki.
Ortiz said, “This one isn’t as threatening as the first one, but we’re not taking any chances.”
He said the letter he received in March “just said that an S-Storm was coming…it was ominous enough for me to call the sheriff’s department and the Colorado Bureau of Investigation.”
After that, things were quiet for several months, up until last week when Ortiz opened another letter.
“It’s pretty nerve-wracking. You try to stay calm and think about what you have to do as an official.”
The author of the letter wrote:
“I think there is a FOX in the counting of Mayor votes, one who is eating the ones they don’t want in…Ortiz maybe it is time for you to resign as it seems every election there are problems in counting the votes…NAWROCKI is the wrong person for Mayor…by by Ortiz”
“Somebody didn’t like that Steve Nawrocki was in second place and blamed it on me.”
He wants to make one thing clear: “It’s all up to our citizen judges and we use the same number of democrats as we do republicans to count those ballots.”
When it comes to these threats Ortiz said he can take care of himself, but he has his family to think about as well.
“Mostly what I’m doing is just making sure they’re aware of where they are and who’s around them.”
In the meantime Ortiz is going to “sharpen my pencil and plan the runoff election.”
Ortiz said he has no idea where these letters are coming from. The postal tag on each one says Denver, but Ortiz said all of Colorado’s mail goes through Denver’s general mail facility.
