Redistricting chairman defends Facebook posts: ‘I’m not a conspiracy theorist’

During the first few meetings of Colorado’s inaugural Independent Congressional Redistricting Commission, Danny Moore has been personable, inclusive and considerate, and his fellow redistricting commissioners even selected him to be the commission’s chairman.

But online, Moore is more jagged. His Facebook posts, which had previously been public but which are now not publicly visible, spread untrue theories about the 2020 election, urged people not to believe prevailing information about COVID-19 and accused the media of duplicity and violence.

In the months following the 2020 election, Moore, one of the congressional redistricting commission’s four Republican members and now the commission’s chairman, published posts and comments questioning the outcome of the 2020 presidential election, calling it “the Democrat steal” and repeating the untrue assertion that President Joe Biden did not get more votes than former President Donald Trump.

He claimed that “mass mail-in ballots can be controlled by the people you give them too [sic]” and suggested that, “the media, blue-state officials, social media, Judge Judy, the establishment, the Intelligence Community, and the Global elite” instead defeated Trump.

In one post, Moore wrote, “The Republicans let the Democrats change our voting system in the courts over the last two years. Now we must go back to court and erase those gains.”

Asked about the posts, Moore said he’s not a conspiracy theorist.

“I’m a citizen, who like many conservatives were disappointed at the elections,” Moore said.

Moore read articles, he said, that made similar claims to what he posted.

“I don’t know if those things are true or not, but in my circle we share these things between us and we debate these things,” he said.

Now, Moore said, he doesn’t believe that Trump received more votes than President Biden.

“Joe Biden is the duly elected president,” he said. “Joe Biden is the commander-in-chief.”

In the early months of the coronavirus pandemic, Moore railed against media coverage of COVID-19, calling CNN the “Chineses [sic] News Network” and accusing them of, “lying to the American people and endangering the lives of American’s [sic] and those of the world.” He further claimed, “They know it, but they are lying to you anyway.”

Moore said he thought at the time the media was lying about the deadliness and contagiousness of the coronavirus. Moore said he didn’t believe then and doesn’t believe now what the media has reported about the origin of the virus.

In other posts from early 2020, Moore argued that calling COVID-19 the “Chinese Virus” isn’t racist, and claimed that a photo of a local marijuana dispensary with a full parking lot was evidence that, “People are harming themselves and the price we WILL pay will overwhelm our hospitals and in the long run kill far more people than this Chinese Wuhan virus.”

In the wake of a fatal shooting in downtown Denver during a summer 2020 Black Lives Matter demonstration, where a private security guard hired by a local TV station shot and killed a counter protester, Moore accused the TV station of staging a confrontation and instigating violence.

“A man lost his life in a setup confrontation staged by #9newsdenver. They [sic] guys who murdered this patriot was hired by #9News and one of their reporters along with a BLM member walked the sidewalk trying to goat [sic] someone into responding. Several people walked away, but have a story to tell about what happened. #9NewsWatch should be held accountable. #9NewsKill”

Moore said his Facebook posts are expressions of his opinions and that he invites questions about them.

“My opinion is no more or less than anyone else’s opinion, but in this country we have to be able to express our First Amendment rights, without fear of being canceled by one side or another,” Moore said. “In my circles of friends, people who are both progressive and people who are conservative, we do that, and we do that without judgment.”

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