Founded in 1946, the Fulbright Program was built on a simple idea: cultural exchange as a tool to build mutual understanding between countries. On June 17, Colorado U.S. Rep. Lauren Boebert introduced Amendment 110 to the 2027 State Department funding bill, moving to eliminate $287.8 million in federal funding.
In 2023 alone, the program supported 155 Colorado participants: 79 Coloradans going abroad and 76 international participants coming here. As one of the Coloradans whose life was changed by Fulbright, I have experienced firsthand the critical impact and effectiveness of this program when I needed it most.
On a sunny June afternoon in 2023, I watched firefighters battle massive flames inside my Centennial condominium building until the roof collapsed, destroying everything I owned. My personal tragedy was broadcast live on FOX31 News. That same evening, as my family drove me back to my childhood home in Elizabeth, an email arrived: I had been selected for the Fulbright Program to teach in Mongolia, and I had just two weeks to decide whether to accept or decline the offer. Suddenly, I had a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to live and teach halfway across the world.
The path to that moment was not a coincidence. As a fourth-generation Coloradan, I grew up in the rural community of Elizabeth, spending summers on my grandparents’ cattle ranch in Fowler. In 2018, I graduated as one of Elizabeth High School’s valedictorians. Scholarships from my hometown, including one poetically awarded by the Elizabeth Firefighters Community Foundation, made it possible for me to pursue my undergraduate degree in business, teaching English, and later, an MBA.
I soon discovered that bridges between my home and Mongolia were already built. Denver and Ulaanbaatar have been official sister cities since 2001, anchoring a vibrant Mongolian diaspora right here in Colorado. Members of this community tutored me in the Mongolian language and gave me the confidence to take the leap abroad.
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In August 2023, I arrived in Ulaanbaatar with two suitcases. Fulbright provided my flight, a stipend for necessities and connected me to a cohort in Mongolia of fellows from across the United States. My host university prepared a furnished apartment, which became my first stable home after the fire.
Over the next 10 months, alongside teaching English at the Mongolian University of Science and Technology, I traveled across a country that reminded me of my home in Colorado. I visited nomadic families, whose relationship with land and livestock resembled my grandparents’ ranch. In the classroom, I watched students who had never met an American grow confident enough to debate and present in English.
On Thanksgiving, I shared U.S. history and what gratitude means in my culture. I eventually opened up about my own experience of loss. The Mongolian people responded with overwhelming compassion. Many of them understood what it means to lose stability and start over.
That winter, temperatures dropped below negative 40 degrees in what the United Nations recorded as the country’s most severe winter in 49 years. Mongolians called it a “dzud,” a type of extreme weather where pastures are buried under ice and livestock slowly starve. Neighbors, aid organizations and the U.S. Embassy responded together. That American soft power, that goodwill, is exactly what programs like Fulbright help sustain.
When locals learned I was from the U.S., they responded with gratitude for U.S. support of their young democracy. Sandwiched between Russia and China, Mongolia has formally designated the United States as its “Third Neighbor” and in 2023 made English its official foreign language. In a geopolitically delicate region, the ripple effect is real. As the Fulbright Association argued in its Senate testimony, academic exchanges make America safer, stronger and more prosperous. Cutting Fulbright erodes our influence and gives another neighbor the opportunity to step in.
The recently introduced amendment by Boebert follows years of budget pressure, including a 2025 funding freeze that left thousands of active Fulbright grantees without their stipends. The math shows this program is cost effective: $287.8 million spread across an average 163 million American taxpayers costs less than $2 per taxpayer a year to fund the entire global program.
Additionally, global partners chip in an average of $100 million every year. During my program in 2023, the government of Mongolia doubled its contribution to $1.2 million to keep the partnership strong. Cutting U.S. funding wouldn’t just reduce our share; it would put the entire funding partnership at risk.
My story, from surviving a fire in Centennial to a classroom on the Mongolian steppe, was made possible by public investment, from a local fire department’s scholarship to a national diplomatic initiative. Amendment 110 would close that door for the next Coloradan who earns the opportunity.
I urge Colorado’s congressional delegation to reject Amendment 110. I urge Coloradans to make their voices heard because the vast world is closer to our home than you may imagine.
Peyton Baldwin, of Elizabeth, is a fourth-generation Coloradan and served from 2023-2024 as a Fulbright English teaching assistant in Mongolia.
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