A coalition of labor unions said this week that a poll it fielded in a Democratic legislative primary in Denver wasn’t meant to inflame racial bias after another group of union leaders cried foul, accusing the poll’s sponsors of using the survey to launch “overtly racist and outrageously false attacks” on one of the candidates running in Colorado’s June primary.

The poll, conducted earlier this month among likely primary voters in Denver’s House District 6, asked Democrats to respond to a variety of positive and negative statements about Elisabeth Epps and Katie March, the two candidates seeking their party’s nomination for the open seat in the June 28 primary, though it was only the questions about Epps that drew condemnation from her supporters.

“Last week, a nasty push poll was used to attack candidate & community leader @elisabethepps,” the progressive Colorado Working Families Party tweeted with a link to a letter signed by unions and labor leaders demanding an apology from the poll’s sponsors and a commitment “to do better.”

Formed in March with funding from five unions, One Main Street Colorado, the independent expenditure committee that paid for the poll, issued an apology on Tuesday “to anyone who viewed a recent scientific poll with a racial bias, as that was not the purpose of our research.”

But a spokesman for the group denied the survey was a “push poll” – a campaign tactic disguised as a public opinion survey designed to influence or yield a specific outcome, including injecting negative information, rather measure respondents’ pulse – and said the group was conducting a standard “battery test” poll to determine what voters are looking for in a candidate and to test both candidates’ strengths and weaknesses.

Rejecting criticism that the poll included false attacks on Epps, One Main Street announced this week that it had launched a website – EppsPublicRecords.com – linking to tweets and court documents that back up the premises behind its questions.

“I remain naive enough to think it’s possible to have a campaign about issues and ideas and our values and experience,” Epps told Colorado Politics, adding that she hadn’t looked at excerpts posted to social media but trusted that her supporters have her back.

She also questioned whether isolated statements culled from more than 100,000 tweets she’s posted over roughly 15 years were “good faith” representations.

“We are so much more than a single thing we say,” Epps said. “We give peoples space to grow on things they need to grow on and double down on things they don’t.”

March condemned the poll on social media and told Colorado Politics she hopes the race stays focused on the issues.

“My campaign did not pay for this poll or have anything to do with its creation,” March tweeted. “I’m very sorry to see this happening when my campaign has been about policies I’ll fight for, not negativity. I strongly encourage anyone engaging in this primary to stick to the issues affecting HD6.”

In a second tweet, she added, “I always disavow false, racist and misogynistic attacks. I am focused on talking with Denver voters every day about the issues they face and how we can take on the issues that will improve their lives.”

The primary will almost certainly determine who represents the seat held by term-limited House Speaker Alec Garnett in one of the state’s most reliably Democratic districts. It pits Epps, a prominent criminal justice reform advocate and founder of the Colorado Freedom Fund, who is Black, against March, a veteran legislative aide with endorsements from more than three dozen current and former state lawmakers, including Garnett and his predecessor, former House Speaker Crisanta Duran, a fellow Denver Democrat.

Under its new boundaries, HD 6 stretches from the state Capitol on its western edge to Lowry and Fairmont Cemetery to the east, including all or parts of the Capitol Hill, Uptown, Congress Park, Cheesman Park, East Colfax, Hale and Montclair neighborhoods in Denver and Lowry and Windsor Gardens in Aurora.

One Main Street Colorado was formed in March and has reported receiving $70,000 in contributions from five labor unions – Rocky Mountain Pipe Trades District Council No. 5, Journeyman Plumbers Gasfitters Local Union 3, Laborers International Union of North America Local No. 720, Northwest Regional Organizing Coalition and West Metro Firefighters Local 1309.

While some of the unions have donated to March, a spokesman said the group has yet to decide which candidates it will endorse or which legislative races it will get involved in, adding that putting the HD 6 poll in the field was part of the process of deciding those questions.

The reaction was swift as voters who’d been polled – the survey went out via text message and in live phone calls, a spokesman for its sponsors said – took to social media to share screen shots and denounce the poll and the group behind it.

“Colorado machine Democrats hit progressive champ @elisabethepps with racist push poll,” tweeted one Democrat who linked to a tweet from another who described the poll as “disgusting” and tagged Epps’s primary rival.

The poll’s questions about Epps ranged from laudatory descriptions of the candidate – one passage noted she “led the fight to win justice and multi-million dollar payouts for peaceful Black Lives Matters demonstrators brutally attacked by police during the George Floyd protests” – to  passages that sparked outrage among Democrats, including calling her “a self-described anarchist” and maintaining that her 2016 opposition to Hillary Clinton “despite the high stakes of controlling the U.S. Supreme Court” resulted in “women’s reproductive rights being taken away.”

Calling the poll “absolutely inexcusable,” the letter organized by Colorado Working Families Party said a core belief of the labor movement is that “an injury to one is an injury to all.”

The letter was signed by 17 officers and executives of local unions, including the president and executive director of the Colorado AFL-CIO, the Colorado WINS association of state employees, the Denver Area Labor Foundation and local branches of the Communication Workers of America and the United Steelworkers.

“Ms. Epps is the daughter of a long time union member, and as such is unquestionably part of our labor family. Regardless of what endorsement decisions our institutions may or may not make in this race, we can and will steadfastly stand against dirty, unethical attacks on members of our family,” the letter said.

“Together, we call upon One Main Street Colorado to publicly apologize for conducting this egregious attack upon Ms. Epps, and to make a public commitment to campaigning in a positive, issue-based, and factual manner going forward. We believe these are the most appropriate first steps to remediate the harm that has been done to Ms. Epps.”

“We really wanted to take a look at this race and figure out where folks are and where the community is and what kind of candidate they want to support,” said Andrew Short, a veteran Democratic consultant and spokesman for One Main Street.

“It takes courage, honesty, and integrity to ask the tough questions in our communities,” the group said in a statement to Colorado Politics. “We strongly condemn racism and examined the public information available to obtain feedback from the community.”

Added the group: “Regardless of political affiliation, anyone running for office should be held accountable and answer the tough questions regarding their public court records and stances on issues important to our neighborhoods.”

Wendy Howell, Colorado Working Families Party’s state director and a signer on the letter, told Colorado Politics that the attacks on Epps didn’t come as a surprise.

“When a bold community leader like Elisabeth Epps runs, we know they will face nasty attacks – particularly when they are winning,” she said.

Dismissing the website put up by One Main Street Colorado as “biased” and “in some cases inaccurate,” Howell said she didn’t expect it would dissuade Epps’s supporters.

“But regardless of what attacks may come, there is deep love from the community for Ms. Epps and her bold leadership, as evidenced by her strong win at the Democratic Assembly, and her impressive fundraising lead,” she said. “Nothing on this website will change that.”

Epps said if a handful of tweets nearly a decade old proved anything, it’s that she’s serious when she says she never intended to run for office and hadn’t been cultivating a public image over the years.

“My life’s work is centered in a ridiculous, often back-breaking commitment to giving people the benefit of the doubt. That is what I do,” she said.

“It does not strike me as unfair that people who are acting in good faith should ask hard questions about things I’ve said,” Epps added. “That feels like a good tradeoff. But there’s that big question mark of ‘good faith.'”

Primary ballots start going in the mail on June 6 and are due back to county clerks by 7 p.m. June 28.