Late on Friday, a story broke that the prank to put a portrait of Russian President Putin in place of a portrait of President Trump was executed by ProgressNow’s Alan Franklin. As if anyone else would have done such a lame and childish prank. But Franklin didn’t do it alone. He enlisted a young aide to Speaker Crisanta Duran, who has subsequently lost her security access to the Capitol and was disciplined.

It’s pathetic that Franklin and ProgressNow troll-in-chief, Ian Silverii, husband of state Rep. Brittany Pettersen, would convince a young staffer to compromise her career to help them pull off their meaningless prank without regard to her future.

9News, which broke the story, said that Silverii’s status as a political commentator for the news channel was under review. Of course, Silverii is allowed to blow up his own career all he wants, but using a staffer like that is pretty low-brow.

We aren’t alone in our surprise that Democrats would so callously compromise the security of the State Capitol. Senate President Kevin Grantham also issued a statement of the stupid prank in a press release:

“Political pranks are one thing, but it crosses a line, in my opinion, when public spaces in the Capitol are misused and abused the way they were in this case. This building belongs to all the people of Colorado and I’m frankly shocked that anyone who works on staff here — and works for the top Democrat in the House, no less — would be a party to something as inappropriate and over the line as this.”

It’s bad enough to compromise security for a prank, but for one as dumb is this one is just idiotic.