July 30, 2025 10:47 AM UTC

A Big Beautiful Billion-Dollar Hole In Colorado's Budget

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• by: Colorado Pols

Today, Colorado General Assembly leaders met at the Capitol to get reports on the expected impact to Colorado’s budget this year from passage of the Republican federal budget reconciliation bill: a budget that was balanced during this year’s session as required by the state constitution, now coming up short by an estimated billion dollars as a direct result of the “We’re All Going To Die Act.” A press release from Democratic leadership makes no attempt to hold back their resentment:

“By pushing through H.R.1, Republicans in Washington recklessly slashed programs that Colorado families count on like Medicaid, food assistance, and children’s health care, and they punted the tough decisions to the states,” said Senate President James Coleman, D-Denver. “With this irresponsible bill, they dealt a billion-dollar blow to our state budget. We have difficult decisions ahead and will do everything we can to minimize the harm, but there’s no avoiding the fact that these cuts will hurt Colorado families.”

“When the General Assembly adjourned three months ago we had a balanced state budget, and now we don’t,” said Speaker Julie McCluskie, D-Dillon. “Republicans’ federal budget has blown a billion dollar hole in our state finances and increased health insurance premiums by nearly 40 percent on the Western Slope. Coloradans are now the collateral damage of the GOP’s cruel bill, which could have been stopped by just a single Republican in Congress. The consequences for our state are devastating, and Republicans can’t hide the damage their party has caused.”

“Coloradans didn’t choose this. Congressional Republicans – including Lauren Boebert, Jeff Hurd, and Gabe Evans – chose tax giveaways for billionaires and blind loyalty to President Trump over the needs of their own constituents,” said Senate Majority Leader Robert Rodriguez, D-Denver. “In addition to cuts to Medicaid and food assistance, their bill will make life more expensive for all Coloradans, increasing utility bills and health insurance costs and killing jobs. They knew the damage this bill would cause and voted for it anyway, leaving us to deal with the consequences.”

“Plain and simple: Coloradans cannot afford the GOP’s budget,” said House Majority Leader Monica Duran, D-Wheat Ridge. “Due to the Congressional Republicans’ reckless slashing of core services like Medicaid and SNAP, Colorado is in a far worse budget situation than we were when we adjourned session three months ago. As a result, hardworking families, domestic violence survivors, veterans, and others who rely on critical services might be forced to do without. We’ll work hard to minimize the fallout in our communities, but this new $1 billion hole in our state budget will require difficult decisions.”

The expected pain goes well beyond the Medicaid and food assistance recipients who have been the subject of so much attention. This sudden budget gap will eliminate refunds to taxpayers under the 1992 Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights that Republicans have championed for decades. Beginning in 2027, the state will no longer have the money to fund the generous property tax reduction afforded to senior citizens. The state’s expanded Earned Income Tax Credit gets zeroed out. And in addition to the new incoming Medicaid and SNAP restrictions, the loss of tax credits for Coloradans buying health insurance on the individual marketplace are jacking premiums up by 28% next year.

When the Congressional Budget Office warned that the Republican budget bill would result in devastating reductions that the states would be left to sort out, Rep. Gabe Evans’ response was to suggest the CBO’s numbers were flawed. Now we have the Colorado Office of State Planning and Budgeting confirming those impacts at the state level.

As desperately as local Republicans want someone else to take the blame for what their colleagues in Washington voted for, their millions in anecdotal “waste and abuse” do not justify the billions being cut. The numbers have never added up.

Now, with the hard data coming into view, who to blame could not be more obvious.