This story was originally published by the WND News Center.

A major New York publication has called out Colorado's leftist governor for "gaslighting" the public about a threat to lives and safety created by the takeover of apartment buildings by a gang of Venezuelan thugs, allowed into the United States under his Democrat party's open southern border policies.

Gov. Jared Polis had claimed such problems, documented by officials in the next-door city of Aurora officially, on police records and on video, were just someone's "imagination."

The New York Post, in a holiday posting by its editorial board, pointed out Polis also is an extremist on the border, having "contributed to the migrants' overrun of the state."

"He signed a sanctuary law in 2019, prohibiting probation officers from 'providing an individual's personal information to federal immigration authorities,' and in June, he signed measures making it easier for migrants to get drivers' licenses and government aid," the publication noted.

So "the gang's power-grab in Aurora is inconvenient for Polis," and that has resulted in his "don't believe your lying eyes" approach, it said.

Later, Polis took to social media, appearing to back down on his initial suppositions, to claim that "taking over buildings has no place in Colorado."

The Post charged, "Migrant gangs are turning Aurora, Colo., apartment complexes into hellholes, and the Democratic governor is turning a blind eye. It's an unhappy consequence of being a suburb of sanctuary-city Denver: Venezuelan migrants have spread from the Mile High City, with allegedly gang-affiliated ones claiming apartment buildings as their turf, terrorizing residents."

The editorial cited video evidence showing "suspected Tren de Aragua members stalking through the complex with guns. Another, from the same complex, shows two men breaking into a unit with a tire iron."

Aurora Mayor Mike Coffman has confirmed that at least two apartment buildings have fallen into the hands of an "organized criminal effort" that comes from "a failed policy at the southern border."

Aurora councilwoman Danielle Jurinsky has been advocating for a solution for some time already, providing evidence.

Polis, however, opened the schism between the cities by flat-out denying it is happening.

A statement from his office said the invasion was "a feature of Danielle Jurinsky's imagination" and, the Post said, he then "sneered that Polis 'really hopes that the city council members in charge stop trashing their own city when they are supposed to keep it safe.'"

"This is gaslighting at its worst," the Post said.

Official reports now confirm that several of those gang members have been arrested on suspicion of criminal activity, and the Post noted, "Was it Jurinsky's 'imagination' when local ringleader Jhonardy Jose Pacheco-Chirino and some of his thugs reportedly beat a man at one of these complexes? Or when he was involved in a shooting that wounded two men at the same complex?"

She's accused the Biden-Harris monopoly of causing "suffering" for residents and criticized officials in next-door Denver for incentivizing the criminal activity by creating free housing and other taxpayer-funded benefits for illegals.

Reports explain members of Tren de Aragua, a notorious Venezuelan gang, have taken over buildings, and Jurinsky personally has helped some residents move out.