December 22, 2021 01:14 PM UTC

Serial Liar Eric Nelson Attempts Political Return

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• by: Colorado Pols

Former Aurora School Board Member, state legislative candidate, and fantastical liar Eric Nelson is attempting to make a political comeback in Colorado. Nelson has filed as a candidate for State House 42 (Aurora) — the same House District seat he sought in 2016 before everyone figured out that he was a con artist who was only pretending to be all sorts of things.

Democrats in HD-42 will convene a vacancy committee in early January to fill the remaining term of former Rep. Dominique Jackson, who resigned this week after being appointed by President Biden to serve as a regional administrator in the Department of Housing and Urban Development. Nelson is among the Democratic candidates looking to win that appointment…and hoping that committee members don’t remember that he was caught fabricating most of his resume just a few years ago.

It’s been four years since Nelson finished his term on the Aurora Public Schools board of education; despite numerous calls for his resignation — including pleas from APS board members — Nelson finished out his term but didn’t follow up on threats to seek re-election. We don’t know what Nelson has been doing since then, but more than enough time has passed for him to have invented another half-dozen PhDs and a career as an astronaut.

If you’re unfamiliar with Nelson, here’s a good summary from the Aurora Sentinel in late 2020 when Nelson was attempting to become a member of the Colorado redistricting commission:

A report presented to the board found that Nelson had falsified much of the information on his resume. He did not have any of the four degrees he claimed to have, and several diplomas he provided were faked, the report said. He also represented himself as having been a decorated officer in the Air Force, but was only in active duty for two months in 1998 and did not receive any awards. Of the 40 organizations he listed himself as a member of, many could not be reached or said that he was not a member or only had minor involvement, the report said. [Pols emphasis]

He was formally censured by the board but refused calls to step down. Then-Congressman Mike Coffman also urged the U.S. Attorney’s Office to investigate Nelson under the federal Stolen Valor Act for making false claims about military service.

Reporter Ernest Luning, then of the Colorado Statesman, reported many of the details in 2016 outlining Nelson’s mountain of lies.

It’s not entirely clear as to whether Nelson is more of a clever con man or a delusional head case; in reality, he’s probably some combination of both. Regardless, there’s nothing to stop him from trying to slide his way into another public office. The good people who form the vacancy committee in HD-42 will hopefully decide to choose someone else instead.