January 12, 2026 03:11 PM UTC

Fact-Checking Trump's Lies About Colorado's Growing Population

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• by: Colorado Pols

Responding to questions about his veto of unanimously-approved funding for the Arkansas Valley Conduit water project in southeast Colorado, President Donald Trump claimed his action was in response to Colorado’s “bad governor,” and questioned the need for the water project serving a mostly-rural conservative area of the state by claiming that residents are “leaving the state in droves.” While in line with the gloom and doom regularly voiced by local Republicans about the direction of our state under Democratic political dominance, the question is worth asking, especially given the source: is any of this talk about people “fleeing” Colorado true?

As FactCheck.org explains and you already know from your morning commute, the answer is a flat unequivocal no:

We asked the White House for clarification on the president’s reasoning for vetoing the bill and for evidence to support the claim that people are leaving Colorado “in droves.” We were directed to the president’s official explanation to Congress and got no response to the question about population shifts.

Based on Trump’s social media post, it appears that the claim comes from the annual roundup provided by the moving company United Van Lines. It reported making a total of 6,633 moves into and out of Colorado in 2025 — 2,986 were for people moving into the state and 3,647 were for people moving out of the state. That put Colorado — with 55% of its moving traffic leaving the state — among the “top outbound states for 2025.”

According to the report, the largest portion of those who left — about 31% — did so because of family obligations, and the second largest — about 23% — did so for a job.

But that’s not the only moving company that operates in Colorado, and, as NBC’s Denver affiliate, 9NEWS, noted, several other moving companies — including U-Haul, Atlas Van Lines, North American Moving Services and Allied Van Lines — reported either a slight influx, a slight outflow or neutral moving trends for the state in 2025.

Back in reality, 9NEWS reports:

“Colorado has, and is projected to continue to, grow faster than the rest of the United States,” said Colorado State Demographer Kate Watkins in a statement to 9NEWS in July 2025.

Although a range of factors including an aging population and the COVID-19 pandemic slowed the rapid population growth that Colorado experienced in the first part of this century, the state is still estimated to reach between 7 and 9 million residents by the year 2050 from the currently estimated 6 million people who call Colorado home today. A single non-scientific report from one moving company whose numbers are contradicted by others is not a substitute for the hard data that policymakers use.

Trump’s value for accurate information is coincidental at best, with accuracy only having value to Trump if it confirms his pre-existing biases or helps him make whatever point he is trying to make at that moment. When it doesn’t, Trump just makes up whatever he wants and belittles anyone foolish enough to attempt to correct him.

But no matter how determined Trump is to believe fiction and have it believed by everyone around him, thousands of people still make the choice every year to move to Colorado and remain here when they have a choice to move elsewhere. Despite the ongoing attempts by local minority Republicans to portray Colorado as a crime-ridden liberal hellhole for political advantage, locals know better. That’s why Colorado consistently ranks as one of the best states to live in.

Trump’s daily firehose of falsehoods leaves many of these absurd statements uncorrected in the record, or at least insufficiently corrected as Trump’s lies travel farther and faster than their debunking. But here’s one falsehood that anyone can easily disprove with numbers that, unlike Trump, do not lie. And though tiresome as it may become, not letting Trump’s lies about our state go unchallenged is important as a matter of principle.

As for the 30% of Americans who will believe whatever Trump says no matter how ridiculous? There’s an argument that Colorado doesn’t need them.