On Jan. 14, every district attorney in Colorado will take the oath of office and begin a four-year term of seeking justice and public safety consistent with the values of their individual jurisdiction and within the limitations of Colorado’s ever-weakening laws. For the first time in more than 60 years in Colorado, a new judicial district will come into existence, and with it, a brand new district attorney’s office. I am honored to have the opportunity and obligation to be the first DA to lead the new 23rd Judicial District.

This jurisdiction — comprising Douglas, Elbert and Lincoln counties — begins at a unique time and place in Colorado’s history.

Colorado is far from a “top-10 safest state,” as pledged by Gov. Jared Polis in 2022. Colorado has the eighth-highest violent crime rate in America. After dipping to their lowest levels in 2013, violent crime rates now rival those of 1994 and 1995, shortly after Denver’s notorious “Summer of Violence.” After several years as our nation’s No. 1 state for auto theft, Colorado has improved — to the fourth worst. Overall, Colorado is the fourth-worst state nationally for combined violent and property crime rates per the FBI.

The growing perception of our Queen City by the surrounding metro area suburbs is its streets are increasingly unsafe, littered by drug-addicted and mentally ill homeless people, and filled with tens of thousands of “newcomers,” or whatever synonym we are using these days. When soft-on-crime policies fail — as they always do — the results don’t stay within the borders of the city that adopts them; they spread into the surrounding counties.

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Arapahoe County, the reduced version of the old 18th Judicial District, is the buffer between Denver and the 23rd. Eighty-five-ish percent of the population of Colorado’s third-largest city lives within its borders. Arapahoe is on its own to absorb all the normal amount of violent crime generated in Aurora, but with the added complication of an undeniable Venezuelan gang problem (aka Councilwoman Danielle Jurinsky’s imagination figment).

The counties of the new 23rd intend to set themselves apart from the trends of the metro area to its north. There is an unprecedented unity of purpose — a cohesion of interests — in keeping our counties safe and just. Every level of government — local, state and federal — are committed to working together to make this a community upon a hill. Our community takes pride in and supports our law enforcement officers and first responders. Our sheriffs and district attorneys are the highest vote-getters of anyone on their ballots. Our residents choose to live here because they want their businesses and families to be safe, they expect the laws to be enforced, and they know fear strangles freedom.

Our approach will be to resist the spread of the criminal element emboldened by laws and policies that favor offenders over victims, lawlessness over law and order. We intend to do something radical by focusing on choices: we choose to enforce the law. The message to the public, here and elsewhere, is this: if you come here and choose to steal from us, if you come here and choose to victimize us, you should expect us to choose to incarcerate you.

Thieves get locked up. Shoplifters, car thieves, burglars — all will have the opportunity to experience our jail. Drunk drivers get removed from the road and their homes. And those who run from, or harm our law-enforcement officers — well, we will seek to take away even more of their freedom on top of any other crime they committed.

When it comes to illegal immigration, it is important to remember no local law enforcement agency, including the district attorney, is responsible for enforcing federal law. We are not extensions of the federal government, and we will not be forcibly “deputized” to do their jobs. Enforcement of immigration laws is the exclusive province of the feds. However, no district attorney should craft exceptional case dispositions or plea bargains to prevent the enforcement of those same immigration laws. All should expect to be treated equally under our laws. The only advice for a law-abiding society to give to the “undocumented” is to choose to get documented. Barring that appropriate choice, they should choose to be on their best behavior and follow all of our other laws. Finally, if they have chosen to be undocumented and chosen to violate more of our laws, they should expect us to choose to incarcerate them.

Our prison sentencing system has been broken for many years. Our left-leaning legislature has passed several laws making things better — for offenders. Recent laws have made it easier to avoid prison and easier to get less time behind bars for criminal conduct. The results are undeniable. Despite our significant increase in crime, our prison population continues to dwindle.

The answer is to de-emphasize the Department of Corrections. A two-year jail sentence — which is much harder to achieve since the legislature reduced maximum sentences for misdemeanors to an immigration-pleasing 364 days — results in more time behind bars in the county jail, than in prison.

Beginning in 2025, communities have the opportunity to choose to distance themselves from the failed policies of Colorado and Denver and focus on how local government can make life better for their constituents. The good people of the 23rd Judicial District have already made their choice, and that is for law and order.

George Brauchler is district attorney-elect for the 23rd Judicial District and former district attorney for the 18th Judicial District. He has served as an Owens Early Criminal Justice Fellow at the Common Sense Institute. Follow him on Twitter(X): @GeorgeBrauchler