January 16, 2024 01:31 PM UTC

"Civility" With Rep. Ken DeGraaf And His Buddy Joe Oltmann

• 2 Comments
• by: Colorado Pols

Nationally infamous 2020 election conspiracy theorist, local gun store owner, and regular proponent of political violence Joe Oltmann enjoyed a fresh recent round of attention after joining with “MAGA King” CD-4 Republican candidate Trent Leisy to organize a convoy of Trump flag-festooned trucks and SUVs from Fort Collins to Oltmann’s Colorado Springs gun shop last month in what we’ll concede a synergistic marketing masterpiece. Leisy’s mission to out-MAGA the carpetbagging Rep. Lauren Boebert got a big boost from Oltmann’s militant supporters, and by militant we do mean in the full-bore camo-clad Meal Team Six sense.

Earlier this month, Oltmann went off on another of his regular boundary-pushing social media rants, boundaries becoming increasingly difficult to push after Oltmann already expressed his desire to hang an unspecified but presumably very large number of people on “gallows all the way from Washington, D.C., to California.” That’s not easy to top without a hard knock on the door from law enforcement a short time later, but with this latest call for followers to “rip the Band-Aid off” and “take chess pieces off the table,” Oltmann is toeing right up to the line of getting himself in trouble once again:

Why are we taking note of this particular Joe Oltmann rant instead of any of a dozen others no less offensive? At the bottom of Oltmann’s call to “take some chess pieces with you” since “you are going to die eventually anyway,” you can see it’s been “liked” by 29 people, one of whom is an elected Colorado state representative, Rep. Ken DeGraaf. DeGraaf as our readers know is one of the most consistently outrageous far-right noisemakers in the House GOP micro-minority, along with his best friend and fellow freshman freakshow Rep. Scott “There Is No” Bottoms.

But this is the first time we are aware of that an elected Colorado lawmaker has endorsed what it sure looks like Oltmann is calling for. It’s a bit strange, since Rep. DeGraff could be considered one of the “chess pieces” that Oltmann wants to “take off the table.” And if not DeGraaf personally, there are nearly a hundred other elected officials DeGraaf works with, among whom there will be more than a few who will find this thinly-veiled call for prominent people to die quite troubling.

We already wouldn’t feel safe in a room with Oltmann, and maybe it’s time to add Ken DeGraaf to that list.