The list of ways John Hickenlooper appears to have used his title of Governor of Colorado to personally benefit himself could fill an encyclopedia.

But the persistent, criminal-like activity he engaged in was accompanied by an attitude that he is above it all. Not only did he refuse to attend ethics hearings, but he even stated the mainstream media should be “protecting” him from ethics complaints.

Accepting a role as significant as Governor will always come with a great degree of temptation to abuse power, but the American people deserve leaders who cannot be bought, and who always keep the best interest of their constituents in mind.

That description is the opposite of John Hickenlooper.

Another shifty move by Hickenlooper was well documented and reported on where he appears to have engaged in a lucrative tax write-off scheme using forested land.

Hickenlooper received over 600 acres of land in Park County through a land swap deal with the U.S. Forest Service, and at the time it was valued at approximately $1,400 per acre.

Shortly after, Hickenlooper ordered his own appraisal, resulting in a valuation of nearly $6,000 per acre.

He used these new numbers to negotiate Conservation Easements on the land, receiving more than $1.1 million in federal tax write-offs for the easements.

Years later, an audit found his numbers to be incorrect. Rather than argue his case, he settled for paying back just over $50,000 instead.

In 2018, Hickenlooper selected Mark Weston (the same man who appraised his land for nearly 5x what it was worth) to lead the Colorado Division of Conservation.

Another investigation uncovered millions of dollars in donations from private foundations to the Governor’s Office.

Hickenlooper admits he took the public-private model to a new level, accepting under-the-radar donations and funding programs and even positions in his administration with no oversight. These donations ran in the millions of dollars over the course of Hickenlooper’s 8 years in office.

Some of these donations were completely anonymous.

During an ethics investigation against him in 2020, the Ethics Commission voted unanimously to hold Hickenlooper in contempt after he refused  to comply with a subpoena and testify about his alleged violations of a state gift ban.

Hickenlooper eventually testified, but claimed he could not remember key details surrounding the ethics complaints against him.

In November 2018,a 189 page complaint was filed alleging Hickenlooper took nearly 100 questionable flights while he was Governor, spanning back as far as September of 2011. It appears Hickenlooper had a habit of crisscrossing the globe on private jets owned by wealthy elites, accepting luxury hotel stays and all-expense-paid trips and events.

Additionally, he did not disclose these gifts as required by law.

In June 2020, Hickenlooper was convicted of receiving unconstitutional gifts at the 2018 Bilderberg Conference. The ethics commission agreed unanimously that Hickenlooper violated the gift ban in June 2018 when he attended secretive Bilderberg meetings in Italy.

One perk he accepted was a ride in a Maserati Limousine to the airport.

During an ethics investigation into trips he made in 2018, a taxpayer-funded attorney was hired to defend Hickenlooper. That attorney was Mark Grueskin, a well-known Democratic elections attorney. At a rate of $525 per hour, Grueskin has billed nearly $50,000 to the taxpayers already.

That money is coming from a post-9/11 economic recovery fund called the Jobs and Growth Tax Relief Reconciliation Act of 2003.

Hickenlooper has been accused of accepting ethically questionable flights nearly 100 times during his tenure as Governor.

Due to statutes of limitation, the ethics commission has only been allowed to investigate trips Hickenlooper took during 2018.