Colorado State Sen. Sonya Jacquez Lewis resigns amid ethics complaint, allegations of aide mistreatment
Colorado Democratic state Sen. Sonya Jacquez Lewis announced early Tuesday morning that she would be resigning from the State Senate to work at an LGBTQ+ nonprofit. It comes as she's been put at the center of an ethics complaint surrounding alleged mistreatment of her staff.
Jacquez Lewis, whose district includes Longmont, Lafayette, and Erie, was first elected to the State Senate in 2021 after serving as a state representative for two years. The first pharmacist elected to the legislature, she's sponsored several bills to increase access to and transparency surrounding healthcare in the state.
She's also led legislative initiatives on gun violence prevention, reproductive rights, gender-affirming care, climate change, and more.
"I have served my constituents with pride and productivity. I have passed an enormous amount of legislation and policy that hopefully benefits every citizen of Colorado and some have become national benchmarks," she wrote in a Facebook post announcing her resignation on Tuesday. "As the first Pharmacist ever elected to the Legislature and serving during one of our country's greatest health crisis, I felt like I was able to contribute uniquely to improving access to affordable health care and lowering the cost of prescription drugs."
While she didn't indicate what organization she would be working with, she described it as a "regional not-for-profit that focuses on developing future women and LGBTQ+ leaders through an International lens."
In January 2024, Jacquez Lewis was the subject of an ethics complaint filed by the Political Workers Guild of Colorado, a labor union that represents legislative aides, campaign workers, and political organizers. The PWG accused her of mistreating aides, generally, and specifically, using campaign funds "to hire aides to do work outside of the aide job description," citing an article by the Colorado Sun.
"In light of continuing mistreatment of two additional staff, PWG has sent a letter to Senate Leadership calling for the immediate resignation or removal of Sen. Jacquez Lewis," the union said in a December 2024 statement.
In January 2025, Jacquez Lewis responded to an ethics complaint, saying she was being made the primary target of a broader issue surrounding the treatment and compensation of political workers and that she was being denied due process in the investigation.
"I am being made the artificial focus of this larger conflict. I am being dragged through the mud for political ends. With false allegations, the PWG is using me to showcase its concerns. Other members are more than happy to put a focus on me so that they divert attention from their own issues and the larger issues of aide concerns," she said, in part. "The process by which this complaint is being investigated is unfair to me, to my constituents and to any sense of due process. I am being asked to answer a complaint that is largely bereft of specifics and, as noted above, refers to some material I have never seen, within ten (10) days."
