March 7, 2025 • 13 mins
A CU REGENT PUTS HER BUSINESS AHEAD OF THE UNIVERSITY And then yells "RACISM" if you point it out. Jimmy Sengenberger writes here about how Wanda James, who is a CU Regent who also owns pot stores, worked to get money to study high potency pot at the university pulled. She also threw a fake racism conniption fit over the "Tea on THC" campaign put out by the public health department, alleging that since one cartoon image was of a black child in the womb, the campaign was racist. She ignored the white babies that were also depicted in utero because this was never about racism, it's about protecting her business from information that might make people think twice about smoking pot.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:03):
I mean a rob.
Speaker 2 (00:06):
Why are you playing that?
Speaker 3 (00:08):
We're not supposed to talk to Jimmy Seinberg anytime, so.
Speaker 1 (00:13):
Tries later.
Speaker 3 (00:14):
Maybe No, I'm kidding, of course, because I'm trying to
talk to him twice already. Jimmy Seckenberg writes twice weekly
column for the Denver Gazette, conveniently fills in here for
me on the show when I'm gone, and also is
a mean harmonica player as well. So all of that together,
and now he's joining us on the show to talk
about one of the CU regents who may be putting
(00:36):
her own, her own vested interest in front of the
interest of the CU that she is.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
Supposed to serve. Jimmy, welcome back to the show, my friend.
Speaker 1 (00:47):
Hey Mandy, thanks for having me. And yeah, this is
a fascinating story, to say the least.
Speaker 2 (00:52):
Well you know what I mean. It's okay.
Speaker 3 (00:55):
I'm gonna let you explain it and then I will
give you my impertinent commentary on the story as you go,
because I have words on this.
Speaker 1 (01:04):
I think it's worth setting a little context as to
who wanded James in as CU regent first, because she
has a reputation as being a black trailblazer in the
legal pot industry. In two thousand and nine, she opened
a medical dispensary in twenty fifteen, first black owned pot
(01:26):
shop in the country that was legal for recreational purposes,
and she helped both Governors Hickenlooper and Polish shape marijuana
policy in the state. By the way, speaking of Polish,
she ran his first campaign for Congress back in I
think two thousand and eight. Not only that, she's a
self described pothead who.
Speaker 4 (01:46):
Gets elevated daily and is one of the mentors of
none other than Tay Anderson. The good sense of who
wanded James is okay?
Speaker 3 (01:57):
Now, that set the table quite beautifully for we're about
to talk about now, Jimmy.
Speaker 2 (02:01):
There was a story that came.
Speaker 3 (02:02):
Out what months two ago where the new campaign the
t on THCHC from the Health Department. She raised quite
the stinks, see your Regent Wanda James, allegedly because she
found it deeply, deeply racist that they used an image
of a black baby in the womb as if to
(02:24):
demonize all black potential mothers as pot smokers. But it's
my understanding there was also a white baby in the
womb in other images from the campaign.
Speaker 1 (02:33):
Correct, yes, and not just the babies, but various stages
of development, both black and white. And apparently the black
babies were offensive when simply, it seems to me the
campaign was trying to relate to multiple groups and put
out images that would reflect the communities that are within
(02:54):
her state. And to me, that's entirely reasonable. And it
is the Colorado University of Colorado's Insoots School of Public
Health that is driving this project called t on THHC.
Didn't you a few months back interview a couple of
researchers from this program, so you know what they are
(03:16):
doing here is trying to educate the public about the
high potency of THHC today, which is multitudes what it
was twenty thirty years ago, and especially when it comes
to kids. And so Wanda James made a big stink
about this, saying, we know what. I'm a regent and
(03:36):
this is happening with the University of Colorado. I'm calling
it racist and I'm going to take to LinkedIn and
not only that, but i am going to reach out
to Governor Polis and his office and say I want
to get the funding pulled for this because this while
it is a campaign of the School of Public Health
(03:57):
as well as the Public Benefit Corporation in Health. It
was mandated several years back, I think in twenty twenty
one by the state legislature, which said, we are tasking
the School of Public Health with doing this research and
an education campaign, and we're going to spend money from
the marijuana tax fund to do it, which seems entirely
(04:21):
reasonable for the application of that money, right, And yet,
of course Wanda James has to make us think about it,
because not only is she a regent, but she has
a hot shot of her own and a brand that
is personal to her that she has to maintain. And
that's what I think is really going on here. And
(04:42):
we have some new developments as I report on in
my column. But I'll pause there.
Speaker 3 (04:46):
Well, I mean, it looks fairly obvious that she's merely
trying to protect her business model. But in your column,
you actually said, and this is a quote. She claimed
the campaign quote pushed a false and dangerous narrative that
cannabis stunts brain development, demanding its website be taken down immediately.
(05:07):
So she's arguing with the science that shows that much
like cigarette smoke can affect you know, natal development.
Speaker 2 (05:14):
That also cannabis smoke can do the.
Speaker 1 (05:16):
Same and for children as they get older, Like if
a teenager were to start taking pot because you're doing
pot because you know it can affect brain development is
proporately when you're under the age of twenty five. Well yeah,
she's arguing that that has been debunked and yet doesn't
provide any contrary evidence. And what's striking to me is
(05:38):
these are researchers at her own institution that are presenting
the science and she has the audacity to critique them
on this to the point of saying, I want to
get the funding stripped. Which interesting, Mandy is I actually
got a response from Wanda to an email I had
sent asking several straightforward questions, and of course she didn't
(06:01):
directly answer any of the questions, but you shared a
lot of things, including calling it a Republican led smear campaign,
attempt to silence black leadership, and more. But what really
was interesting to me is that she tuted having produced
real results because she'd managed to get some apologies and
(06:21):
to get the images removed. And I'm sitting here wondering, Okay,
if you managed to accomplish that, then why did you
take it the next step to remove the funding and
not just say Okay, I'm gonna move on. And that's
where the conflict of interest business interests real seems to
come into play.
Speaker 3 (06:41):
I mean to advocate that money be stripped away from
the university that she's supposed to serve in and of
itself should be to throw everything into question that she's done.
Now do you know are they still funding this study?
Speaker 1 (06:54):
Yeah, as of now, nothing has changed. So there are
two developments that have happened. Once, the Guts Office did
send a request from Mark Farandino, the former Senate president
who's the budget director for Police, sent a letter that
included within it, and this is to the Joint Budget
Committee at the Legislature, a request to eliminate the funding
(07:15):
all together. Whereas back in oh November they said let's
just reduce it from two million dollars annually to one
million dollars. Then suddenly, just days after Wanda James makes
a big stink about it, the request is let's get
rid of the funding all together. That's development. One big development.
Number two is that CU regents started hearing from staff,
(07:39):
from teachers, faculty members, from constituents about this, claiming or
complaining about it and saying, look, something's up here. Can
you look into this, what's going on? And so the
chair of the Board of Regents, Kelly Renaissan who's a Democrat,
and the vice chair of the Board of Regions, Ken Montera,
who's a Republican, put in a requests to the university's
(08:01):
legal counsel and said, hey, can you look into this
and see if there are any policies or laws that
may have been violated here? And just last Friday, a
week could go today he came back with a memo
to them saying, here are several policies relating to conflicts
of interest and do influence things like that, and even
several statutes that she may have violated. And of course
(08:26):
that's where she went to say, this is ridiculous, this
is all racist, what is going on here? And yet
it's simply them doing their fiduciary obligation, as the two
of them told me to look into this as regents,
and she's forgotten that. Well.
Speaker 3 (08:44):
I mean, Jimmy, this is and the use of the
race card by her is so is so on brand
I mean, I hate to say it like that, but
it is so expected and really frustrating. And when people
talk about, you know, false accusations of racism, then make
it really hard for people who are dealing with actual racism.
This is exactly what all of this is. This is
(09:05):
gindap take racism that she is using to further her
own business interests. And that's that's shameful.
Speaker 2 (09:13):
You know, it's just not frustrating.
Speaker 3 (09:16):
It's it's just irritating and frustrating, and nobody seems to
be wanting to hold her to account.
Speaker 1 (09:22):
Well, And that's the thing here that's encouraging is the
chair and vice chair Renaisson and Montera clearly saw this
as something that needed to be examined. They've passed it
along to the Attorney General's office, although I don't expect
so Wiser will do anything on it. They've passed it along,
forwarded along to the State Ethics Commission. And I'm not
sure what level of district attorney. Does it have to
(09:43):
be in Denver, which is the area she represents. Could
it be elsewhere? But there could be a district attorney
who would say I'm going to look into this, in
part because Mandy this is interesting. One of the statutes
that the attorney for the Universeversity identified is a felony,
A class for felony about attempt to influence a public servant. Recently,
(10:09):
Tina Peters was convicted and put to nine years behind
bars and a bulk of that, a good chunk of
that with three convictions of that exact same felony.
Speaker 2 (10:21):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (10:23):
Wow, We'll see, We'll see if anybody takes it seriously. Jimmy,
great job reporting on all of this stuff. And it's
just I don't know if you know this, Jimmy, but
I created a snitch line and I've asked people my
listeners that if they know of any kind of shenanigans
or monkey business with their local government, their school district,
their whatever, I want them to email me at Mandy
(10:44):
Colonel at iHeartMedia dot com. And I've already gotten some
really good leads. So perhaps you and I can collaborate
on some things.
Speaker 1 (10:52):
That could be exciting. Can I say one more thing?
Speaker 2 (10:55):
Absolutely so.
Speaker 1 (10:57):
Not only does she want to pull the funding, but
as Westward reported, she wants the funding to get directed
Wanda James to marijuana business owners who qualify for social
equity licenses. Now, this is important.
Speaker 4 (11:11):
Because her company and her organization were involved in creating
these licenses for black and brown business owners in the
pot industry in twenty twenty.
Speaker 1 (11:24):
And then the next year went about pushing for the creation.
Speaker 4 (11:28):
Of a cannabis loan program that lo and behold.
Speaker 1 (11:32):
Would only go to social equity licensees, which included Wanda James,
and she was one of the first two recipients. And
now she wants the funding to go from g on
THHC this educational program from Colorado School of Public Health
to social equity owned pot shops.
Speaker 3 (11:51):
Do we know how many social equity owned pot shops
other than hers there are?
Speaker 1 (11:58):
I don't know an exact number. I believe just kind
of a handful. It's not too many. But that's a
good question. I should look into that.
Speaker 3 (12:06):
Yeah, let me know when you find out that this
is all you know, nice work if you can get
it right.
Speaker 2 (12:11):
I mean, this is so.
Speaker 3 (12:14):
This is one of the things that the Democrats and
people on the left have done really, really brilliantly, and
we're seeing it now with some of the insane spending
that has been uncovered and the Environmental Protection Agency literally
giving climate grants of two billion dollars to people who
had never done anything in climate before.
Speaker 2 (12:31):
Once you get into.
Speaker 3 (12:32):
The government grift system and you figure out how to
grift while giving other politicians cover by saying, look, they
care about social justice, they care about equity, they care
about all that, and.
Speaker 2 (12:43):
At the same time they're just lining in their pockets.
Speaker 3 (12:46):
That, my friends, is next level grift and the Democrats
and the left have mastered it, and the right. I
don't want to say we need to learn how to
do it better, but we need to learn how to
spot it sooner and stop it before it has chance
to take hold.
Speaker 1 (13:00):
Just really, you've just explained Mandy why I made a
point in the beginning of saying she was one of
Kay Anderson's mentors.
Speaker 3 (13:07):
Yep, it explains so much. Jimmy Sangenberger, you can read
his columns twice a week in the denverg Ezech.
Speaker 2 (13:16):
Jimmy, we'll talk to you against sou and my friend.
Speaker 1 (13:19):
Thank you. Have a great weekend.
I mean a rob.
Speaker 2 (00:06):
Why are you playing that?
Speaker 3 (00:08):
We're not supposed to talk to Jimmy Seinberg anytime, so.
Speaker 1 (00:13):
Tries later.
Speaker 3 (00:14):
Maybe No, I'm kidding, of course, because I'm trying to
talk to him twice already. Jimmy Seckenberg writes twice weekly
column for the Denver Gazette, conveniently fills in here for
me on the show when I'm gone, and also is
a mean harmonica player as well. So all of that together,
and now he's joining us on the show to talk
about one of the CU regents who may be putting
(00:36):
her own, her own vested interest in front of the
interest of the CU that she is.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
Supposed to serve. Jimmy, welcome back to the show, my friend.
Speaker 1 (00:47):
Hey Mandy, thanks for having me. And yeah, this is
a fascinating story, to say the least.
Speaker 2 (00:52):
Well you know what I mean. It's okay.
Speaker 3 (00:55):
I'm gonna let you explain it and then I will
give you my impertinent commentary on the story as you go,
because I have words on this.
Speaker 1 (01:04):
I think it's worth setting a little context as to
who wanded James in as CU regent first, because she
has a reputation as being a black trailblazer in the
legal pot industry. In two thousand and nine, she opened
a medical dispensary in twenty fifteen, first black owned pot
(01:26):
shop in the country that was legal for recreational purposes,
and she helped both Governors Hickenlooper and Polish shape marijuana
policy in the state. By the way, speaking of Polish,
she ran his first campaign for Congress back in I
think two thousand and eight. Not only that, she's a
self described pothead who.
Speaker 4 (01:46):
Gets elevated daily and is one of the mentors of
none other than Tay Anderson. The good sense of who
wanded James is okay?
Speaker 3 (01:57):
Now, that set the table quite beautifully for we're about
to talk about now, Jimmy.
Speaker 2 (02:01):
There was a story that came.
Speaker 3 (02:02):
Out what months two ago where the new campaign the
t on THCHC from the Health Department. She raised quite
the stinks, see your Regent Wanda James, allegedly because she
found it deeply, deeply racist that they used an image
of a black baby in the womb as if to
(02:24):
demonize all black potential mothers as pot smokers. But it's
my understanding there was also a white baby in the
womb in other images from the campaign.
Speaker 1 (02:33):
Correct, yes, and not just the babies, but various stages
of development, both black and white. And apparently the black
babies were offensive when simply, it seems to me the
campaign was trying to relate to multiple groups and put
out images that would reflect the communities that are within
(02:54):
her state. And to me, that's entirely reasonable. And it
is the Colorado University of Colorado's Insoots School of Public
Health that is driving this project called t on THHC.
Didn't you a few months back interview a couple of
researchers from this program, so you know what they are
(03:16):
doing here is trying to educate the public about the
high potency of THHC today, which is multitudes what it
was twenty thirty years ago, and especially when it comes
to kids. And so Wanda James made a big stink
about this, saying, we know what. I'm a regent and
(03:36):
this is happening with the University of Colorado. I'm calling
it racist and I'm going to take to LinkedIn and
not only that, but i am going to reach out
to Governor Polis and his office and say I want
to get the funding pulled for this because this while
it is a campaign of the School of Public Health
(03:57):
as well as the Public Benefit Corporation in Health. It
was mandated several years back, I think in twenty twenty
one by the state legislature, which said, we are tasking
the School of Public Health with doing this research and
an education campaign, and we're going to spend money from
the marijuana tax fund to do it, which seems entirely
(04:21):
reasonable for the application of that money, right, And yet,
of course Wanda James has to make us think about it,
because not only is she a regent, but she has
a hot shot of her own and a brand that
is personal to her that she has to maintain. And
that's what I think is really going on here. And
(04:42):
we have some new developments as I report on in
my column. But I'll pause there.
Speaker 3 (04:46):
Well, I mean, it looks fairly obvious that she's merely
trying to protect her business model. But in your column,
you actually said, and this is a quote. She claimed
the campaign quote pushed a false and dangerous narrative that
cannabis stunts brain development, demanding its website be taken down immediately.
(05:07):
So she's arguing with the science that shows that much
like cigarette smoke can affect you know, natal development.
Speaker 2 (05:14):
That also cannabis smoke can do the.
Speaker 1 (05:16):
Same and for children as they get older, Like if
a teenager were to start taking pot because you're doing
pot because you know it can affect brain development is
proporately when you're under the age of twenty five. Well yeah,
she's arguing that that has been debunked and yet doesn't
provide any contrary evidence. And what's striking to me is
(05:38):
these are researchers at her own institution that are presenting
the science and she has the audacity to critique them
on this to the point of saying, I want to
get the funding stripped. Which interesting, Mandy is I actually
got a response from Wanda to an email I had
sent asking several straightforward questions, and of course she didn't
(06:01):
directly answer any of the questions, but you shared a
lot of things, including calling it a Republican led smear campaign,
attempt to silence black leadership, and more. But what really
was interesting to me is that she tuted having produced
real results because she'd managed to get some apologies and
(06:21):
to get the images removed. And I'm sitting here wondering, Okay,
if you managed to accomplish that, then why did you
take it the next step to remove the funding and
not just say Okay, I'm gonna move on. And that's
where the conflict of interest business interests real seems to
come into play.
Speaker 3 (06:41):
I mean to advocate that money be stripped away from
the university that she's supposed to serve in and of
itself should be to throw everything into question that she's done.
Now do you know are they still funding this study?
Speaker 1 (06:54):
Yeah, as of now, nothing has changed. So there are
two developments that have happened. Once, the Guts Office did
send a request from Mark Farandino, the former Senate president
who's the budget director for Police, sent a letter that
included within it, and this is to the Joint Budget
Committee at the Legislature, a request to eliminate the funding
(07:15):
all together. Whereas back in oh November they said let's
just reduce it from two million dollars annually to one
million dollars. Then suddenly, just days after Wanda James makes
a big stink about it, the request is let's get
rid of the funding all together. That's development. One big development.
Number two is that CU regents started hearing from staff,
(07:39):
from teachers, faculty members, from constituents about this, claiming or
complaining about it and saying, look, something's up here. Can
you look into this, what's going on? And so the
chair of the Board of Regents, Kelly Renaissan who's a Democrat,
and the vice chair of the Board of Regions, Ken Montera,
who's a Republican, put in a requests to the university's
(08:01):
legal counsel and said, hey, can you look into this
and see if there are any policies or laws that
may have been violated here? And just last Friday, a
week could go today he came back with a memo
to them saying, here are several policies relating to conflicts
of interest and do influence things like that, and even
several statutes that she may have violated. And of course
(08:26):
that's where she went to say, this is ridiculous, this
is all racist, what is going on here? And yet
it's simply them doing their fiduciary obligation, as the two
of them told me to look into this as regents,
and she's forgotten that. Well.
Speaker 3 (08:44):
I mean, Jimmy, this is and the use of the
race card by her is so is so on brand
I mean, I hate to say it like that, but
it is so expected and really frustrating. And when people
talk about, you know, false accusations of racism, then make
it really hard for people who are dealing with actual racism.
This is exactly what all of this is. This is
(09:05):
gindap take racism that she is using to further her
own business interests. And that's that's shameful.
Speaker 2 (09:13):
You know, it's just not frustrating.
Speaker 3 (09:16):
It's it's just irritating and frustrating, and nobody seems to
be wanting to hold her to account.
Speaker 1 (09:22):
Well, And that's the thing here that's encouraging is the
chair and vice chair Renaisson and Montera clearly saw this
as something that needed to be examined. They've passed it
along to the Attorney General's office, although I don't expect
so Wiser will do anything on it. They've passed it along,
forwarded along to the State Ethics Commission. And I'm not
sure what level of district attorney. Does it have to
(09:43):
be in Denver, which is the area she represents. Could
it be elsewhere? But there could be a district attorney
who would say I'm going to look into this, in
part because Mandy this is interesting. One of the statutes
that the attorney for the Universeversity identified is a felony,
A class for felony about attempt to influence a public servant. Recently,
(10:09):
Tina Peters was convicted and put to nine years behind
bars and a bulk of that, a good chunk of
that with three convictions of that exact same felony.
Speaker 2 (10:21):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (10:23):
Wow, We'll see, We'll see if anybody takes it seriously. Jimmy,
great job reporting on all of this stuff. And it's
just I don't know if you know this, Jimmy, but
I created a snitch line and I've asked people my
listeners that if they know of any kind of shenanigans
or monkey business with their local government, their school district,
their whatever, I want them to email me at Mandy
(10:44):
Colonel at iHeartMedia dot com. And I've already gotten some
really good leads. So perhaps you and I can collaborate
on some things.
Speaker 1 (10:52):
That could be exciting. Can I say one more thing?
Speaker 2 (10:55):
Absolutely so.
Speaker 1 (10:57):
Not only does she want to pull the funding, but
as Westward reported, she wants the funding to get directed
Wanda James to marijuana business owners who qualify for social
equity licenses. Now, this is important.
Speaker 4 (11:11):
Because her company and her organization were involved in creating
these licenses for black and brown business owners in the
pot industry in twenty twenty.
Speaker 1 (11:24):
And then the next year went about pushing for the creation.
Speaker 4 (11:28):
Of a cannabis loan program that lo and behold.
Speaker 1 (11:32):
Would only go to social equity licensees, which included Wanda James,
and she was one of the first two recipients. And
now she wants the funding to go from g on
THHC this educational program from Colorado School of Public Health
to social equity owned pot shops.
Speaker 3 (11:51):
Do we know how many social equity owned pot shops
other than hers there are?
Speaker 1 (11:58):
I don't know an exact number. I believe just kind
of a handful. It's not too many. But that's a
good question. I should look into that.
Speaker 3 (12:06):
Yeah, let me know when you find out that this
is all you know, nice work if you can get
it right.
Speaker 2 (12:11):
I mean, this is so.
Speaker 3 (12:14):
This is one of the things that the Democrats and
people on the left have done really, really brilliantly, and
we're seeing it now with some of the insane spending
that has been uncovered and the Environmental Protection Agency literally
giving climate grants of two billion dollars to people who
had never done anything in climate before.
Speaker 2 (12:31):
Once you get into.
Speaker 3 (12:32):
The government grift system and you figure out how to
grift while giving other politicians cover by saying, look, they
care about social justice, they care about equity, they care
about all that, and.
Speaker 2 (12:43):
At the same time they're just lining in their pockets.
Speaker 3 (12:46):
That, my friends, is next level grift and the Democrats
and the left have mastered it, and the right. I
don't want to say we need to learn how to
do it better, but we need to learn how to
spot it sooner and stop it before it has chance
to take hold.
Speaker 1 (13:00):
Just really, you've just explained Mandy why I made a
point in the beginning of saying she was one of
Kay Anderson's mentors.
Speaker 3 (13:07):
Yep, it explains so much. Jimmy Sangenberger, you can read
his columns twice a week in the denverg Ezech.
Speaker 2 (13:16):
Jimmy, we'll talk to you against sou and my friend.
Speaker 1 (13:19):
Thank you. Have a great weekend.
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