For years, Rep. Lauren Boebert has helped push one of the most inflammatory narratives in America’s culture wars: the suggestion that LGBTQ visibility, drag performances and inclusive education are connected to the “grooming” of children.
Now, the Colorado Republican is confronting allegations involving her own family that put those words under a very different spotlight.
Boebert’s 21-year-old son, Tyler Boebert, was arrested Aug. 9 in Colorado and charged with multiple felonies related to the alleged sexual exploitation of a child. Authorities say the case involves sexually explicit material and a girl who was 17 at the time of the alleged conduct. Tyler Boebert was 18. He was released after posting a $10,000 bond and is scheduled to appear in court Aug. 19.
The charges are allegations, and Tyler Boebert has not been convicted of the offenses. But the arrest has renewed scrutiny of his mother’s long history of invoking child sexual abuse terminology while attacking LGBTQ people and LGBTQ-inclusive programs.
Years of “Grooming” Rhetoric
In 2022, Boebert attacked the use of LGBTQ-inclusive flashcards in a North Carolina preschool classroom. The cards included images representing families with same-sex parents.
“We went from Reading Rainbow to Randy Rainbow in a few decades, but don’t dare say the Left is grooming our kids!” Boebert wrote at the time.
The controversy was not about allegations that a teacher had sexually abused a child. It centered on LGBTQ representation in educational materials.
That distinction matters.
“Grooming” has a specific meaning in the context of child sexual abuse: behavior through which an offender gains access to, establishes trust with or manipulates a child in preparation for exploitation or abuse. Applying the term broadly to LGBTQ representation turns language associated with an actual form of child victimization into a political weapon.
Boebert also invoked the term while criticizing Generation Drag, a reality series involving teenage drag performers. Responding to a promotional clip for the show, she wrote, “Siri, define grooming.”
And in 2023, when participants in New York City’s Drag March sarcastically chanted about “coming for your children” — a provocative response to accusations that LGBTQ people were targeting children — Boebert again characterized participants as “groomers.”
Taken together, the comments contributed to a political environment in which the word “groomer” increasingly became attached not necessarily to evidence of sexual predation, but to LGBTQ identity, drag performances, transgender issues and discussions of sexuality or gender in schools.
Then the Allegations Came Home
The accusations against Tyler Boebert are fundamentally different from a political disagreement over flashcards or a television show.
Authorities have charged him with crimes.
According to reporting on the case, investigators allege that sexually explicit material involving a 17-year-old girl was connected to Tyler Boebert when he was 18. The case emerged from a broader investigation involving explicit videos of underage girls.
Again, a criminal charge is not a conviction, and Tyler Boebert is entitled to the presumption of innocence.
But politically, the situation presents an uncomfortable contrast for his mother.
Lauren Boebert repeatedly used the language of child sexual exploitation to characterize people and institutions she opposed even when there was no allegation that a child had actually been sexually abused. Now that her own son is facing felony charges explicitly involving the alleged sexual exploitation of a child, the terminology is no longer rhetorical.
It is written into a criminal case.
Boebert Responds as a Mother
Boebert’s response to her son’s arrest has been considerably more measured than the language she has sometimes used against her political opponents.
“I love my son,” she said in a statement following the arrest, while acknowledging the seriousness of the allegations and expressing concern for those affected.
That reaction is understandable from a parent.
A mother can love her child while recognizing that serious allegations deserve investigation and due process.
But Boebert’s critics are asking whether LGBTQ families deserved the same restraint.
When LGBTQ-inclusive flashcards appeared in a classroom, Boebert reached for the language of grooming. When teenagers participated in a television program about drag, she invoked grooming again. LGBTQ people have repeatedly watched ordinary discussions about their families, identities and lives become entangled with accusations associated with sexual predators.
The arrest of Boebert’s son does not make Lauren Boebert responsible for anything he allegedly did. Nor would it be fair to judge an entire family based on the alleged conduct of one adult member.
That is precisely why the moment raises a larger question about her previous rhetoric.
If one person’s alleged misconduct should not be used to condemn his mother, his family, his religion or his political community, why should unrelated misconduct ever be used to cast suspicion on millions of LGBTQ people?
The Problem With Turning “Groomer” Into a Political Label
Protecting children from sexual exploitation should not be a partisan issue.
Neither should the word “grooming” become shorthand for “a person whose sexuality or gender identity I dislike.”
When accusations of child predation become routine political insults, the seriousness of actual exploitation risks getting buried beneath culture-war outrage.
There is no contradiction in demanding that the allegations against Tyler Boebert be handled fairly while also examining his mother’s public record. He deserves due process. Any alleged victim deserves dignity and protection. And LGBTQ Americans deserve not to be collectively associated with child sexual abuse simply because politicians find the accusation politically useful.
Lauren Boebert’s son’s arrest does not prove anything about Lauren Boebert herself.
But it does expose the danger of a standard she helped normalize: treating proximity to something you disapprove of as evidence of “grooming.”
Now that an allegation involving the sexual exploitation of a minor has reached her own family, the distinction between political rhetoric and an actual criminal accusation has rarely been clearer.
And perhaps that distinction should have mattered all along.
