Donald Trump’s recently passed Big Ugly Contemptible Act is making an early stop in Colorado.
If you’re looking for good news about the new law — and I doubt you could be, when the law adds a projected $4 trillion to the deficit — you can stop reading now.
Otherwise:
The law, as you must know, is awful in so many ways — starting with large tax cuts for the wealthy, massive cuts to Medicaid, massive cuts to the SNAP program that helps feed children in less-advantaged families, the projected millions who will lose their health insurance, etc., etc. — but, as we’re learning, it’s hitting Colorado in a particular way.
Right in the wallet.
As you must be excited to hear, a special session of the legislature — which has become sort of an annual event — has been called to address a budget shortfall for the next fiscal year caused by the new bill.
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It begins Aug. 21 and legislators, who already made massive cuts to the budget in the regular session, will have to cut something like $800 million more in the special session while also doing as much as it can to preserve funding lost to federal cuts for Medicaid and SNAP.
The governor has blamed the contemptible bill, which is being forced upon Coloradans, for the shortfall.
As Jared Polis put it, “Because of a single stroke of a pen — with a big bill and President Trump’s signature — it costs the state $1.2 billion. And that’s the entire reason. That’s 100% of the reason that we now have this deficit that we need to address.”
Which is right, but only mostly right.
What makes Colorado different/unique is that TABOR, forced upon Coloradans by Coloradans, makes it almost impossible for the legislature to raise revenue (OK, by raising taxes) to address the shortfall.
And in a fascinating piece — to fiscal policy nerds anyway — the Sun’s Unaffiliated newsletter points out that Colorado is one of only four states to use a particular formula, called “rolling conformity,” for calculating state income taxes. I won’t get very deep into the details — please read the newsletter, which is a must-read for anyone who cares about Colorado politics — but what it means is that tax cuts in the federal law are reflected almost immediately in our state tax law.
Some of the uglier provisions of Trump’s bill, passed with the help of Colorado’s four Republican U.S. House members, won’t hit right away. In fact, and I’m sure this is purely coincidence, some of the cuts — including those that would affect not a small number of those in the MAGA base — won’t come until after the 2026 midterms.
But much of the contemptible bill — which, according to the Colorado Fiscal Institute, will provide the top 1% of Colorado earners with 21% of the tax cuts— is already upon us. And in the special session, we’ll get an early look at what that means to Colorado.
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So, what will the legislators do?
House Minority Leader Rose Pugliese, R-Colorado Springs, says the session “is a waste of taxpayer dollars and state resources,” designed, she added, “to stir fear about the Big Beautiful Bill…” She didn’t say what the legislators should do.
But at least one Republican legislator complained that Polis called the special session to be held at the same time as the Colorado State Fair. If I weren’t allergic to puns, I’d call it unfair commentary.
For Democrats, who have nearly a supermajority in both houses, it’s going to be a little bit tougher. It was their budget, which totaled $43.9 billion. And now they have to deal with the shortfall. As House Speaker Julie McCluskie has said, “All Coloradans are now the collateral damage from the GOP’s cruel bill.”
A lot of what must be done is fairly technical. Polis calls it a math problem. He has started the math wars by putting in place a state government hiring freeze, which is a smallish start.
There’s more, of course. As outlined by Mark Ferrandino, Polis’ budget director, some of the governor’s suggestions to the legislators include:
* Cutting as much as $300 million from existing programs, which will almost certainly set off some fireworks in the special session. All existing programs are not, of course, created equal.
* Dipping into the state’s budget reserve — which is in place to mitigate the effects of a serious economic downturn, which may be coming our way thanks to Trump’s delusional tariff regime — by as much as $300 million, which should make everyone nervous.
* Raising revenue, and here’s where the real technical stuff comes in. The legislature can apparently continue to decouple from the federal qualified business income deduction. If you want to see the IRS’s explanation of the pass-through, you can read it here, but I’d advise some strong coffee or maybe something even stronger before you tackle it. More money can be raised by adjusting tax shelters and by reducing certain tax breaks to insurance companies. There’s more, including a way for companies to prepay taxes, but that’s a starter list anyway.
But then it gets even harder. Can all this be done without cuts to K-12 education, as Polis demands? (Let’s hope so.) What will the legislature do to address the 28% rise in health insurance rates that companies are asking for? That 28%, by the way, doesn’t include the cuts in health care subsidies that many Coloradans will lose thanks to the Big Ugly Contemptible Act’s assault on Obamacare. Polis wants to diminish the effects on those Medicaid recipients who can no longer use Planned Parenthood for care, even if the care has nothing to do with abortions. How much will that cost?
The list of needs caused by Trump’s horrific cuts — which you could call a war on the remnants of the war on poverty — goes on. And on. And on.
By law, the special session has to last at least three days. What are the odds that it, too, goes on…and on… and on…
Mike Littwin has been a columnist for too many years to count. He has covered Dr. J, four presidential inaugurations, six national conventions and countless brain-numbing speeches in the New Hampshire and Iowa snow. Sign up for Mike’s newsletter.
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