TOM LLAMAS: We are back now with another American city in the center of a firestorm over immigration. Former President Trump has claimed Aurora, Colorado, is being overrun by Venezuelan gangs. We sent Gabe Gutierrez there to find out if it's true.
GABE GUTIERREZ: This video of armed men roaming an apartment complex in Aurora went viral. It was captured by Cindy Romero's security camera.
CINDY ROMERO: This was terrifying. And I don’t wish it on anybody.
GUTIERREZ: She says the nightly violence forced her to move, and she showed us the bullet holes in her car.
ROMERO: It was never meant to be political when I released it, of course. It was meant to bring awareness so the people in my building could get help.
GUTIERREZ: Her videos thrust Colorado's third largest city into the national spotlight, prompting former President Trump to repeatedly rail against Venezuelan migrants here, including today.
TRUMP: They're going in with guns that are beyond even military scope and they're taking over apartment buildings and they're literally taking over those towns.
GUTIERREZ: Trump and his allies have highlighted a Venezuelan prison gang: Tren de Aragua, or TdA. Homeland Security officials tell NBC News they have more than 100 criminal investigations nationwide into TdA, including for sex trafficking and shooting police officers, calling TdA “the next MS-13”, a violent gang from el Salvador. But police in Aurora stress the gang is not overrunning their city, and that it's unclear whether the gang is responsible for any violent incidents at three apartment complexes, one of which has been shut down. Immigrant Carlos Orizgoti lives in another.
(IN SPANISH): Do you believe the story has been exaggerated?
CRLOS ORIZGOTI (IN SPANISH): Yes. Yes.
GUTIERREZ: He tells us the story has been exaggerated for political reasons and that most Venezuelans are here to work.
MIKE COFFMAN: I want the former president to come because I want to show him the city. I want to show him that the narrative is not accurate by any stretch of the imagination.
GUTIERREZ: Mike Coffman is Aurora's mayor.
You're a Republican.
COFFMAN: Correct.
GUTIERREZ: You're a Donald Trump supporter.
COFFMAN: I'm going to vote for the president.
GUTIERREZ: But you don't agree with him on this particular narrative.
COFFMAN: No.
GUTIERREZ: We asked the mayor whether he regretted saying it first, the apartments had fallen to the gang. He says he does not. Because he was going off police reports he’d been given at the time. Tom.
LLAMAS: All right, Gabe Gutierrez for us tonight. Gabe, we thank you for that.
