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Tag: Jared Polis

Less Pay. Less Jobs. Businesses Blame Overregulation
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Rocky Mountain Voice, Red State, Top Stories

Less Pay. Less Jobs. Businesses Blame Overregulation

By Shaina Cole | Contributing Writer, Rocky Mountain Voice Colorado has spent five years building one of the most expansive labor regulatory environments in the country. Paid family leave. Wage transparency requirements. A lowered standard for harassment claims. Minimum wages that rise automatically every year, with several cities setting their own higher rates on top. Each law arrived with the same promise: this is good for workers. The workers' employers tell a different story. In late 2024, before federal tariffs became a headline and before trade policy gave anyone a convenient explanation for rising costs, the Colorado Chamber of Commerce commissioned an independent survey of 169 Colorado business leaders. Cole Hargrave Snodgrass & Associates, a nationally recognized ...
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Congress Challenges Colorado Court Rule Limiting Immigration Enforcement Access
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The Denver Gazette, Approved, State

Congress Challenges Colorado Court Rule Limiting Immigration Enforcement Access

By Nicole C. Brambila | The Denver Gazette The U.S. House Judiciary Committee is seeking information from Colorado’s court administrator regarding a new requirement that attorneys certify they will not use court data for immigration enforcement, arguing it unlawfully obstructs federal law and compels political speech tied to the state’s “sanctuary” policies. Colorado, a blue state that has passed “sanctuary” laws, has been in the crosshairs of the Trump administration, which has cracked down on illegal immigration. Colorado officials, meanwhile, have adopted a confrontational stance against both the administration and Trump’s policies, routinely criticizing the president and suing over an array of issues. Broadly speaking, “sanctuary” policies restrict or prohibit coop...
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Polis Joins Business Leaders Warning State Policies Driving Companies Out Of Colorado
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The Denver Gazette, Approved, State

Polis Joins Business Leaders Warning State Policies Driving Companies Out Of Colorado

By Mark Samuelson | The Denver Gazette Is Colorado scaring away corporate expansions and entrepreneurs that had once made the state a magnet for high-tech business growth? That’s the assertion of a letter signed by more than 200 business and technology leaders, addressed to Gov. Jared Polis, Denver Mayor Mike Johnston, Democratic senatorial candidates and other political leaders. Notably, one of the signers is Polis himself. Boulder entrepreneur Dan Caruso told The Denver Gazette that after he drove an effort to draft the missive, warning that political messaging is damaging the state’s business competitiveness, Polis had reached out. The governor offered to join in signing the letter and presenting it. “It wasn’t hard to get huge support,” Caruso ...
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While Colorado cuts care for its most vulnerable, it continues funding undocumented children in a $96 million program
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Rocky Mountain Voice, State, Top Stories

While Colorado cuts care for its most vulnerable, it continues funding undocumented children in a $96 million program

By Shaina Cole | Contributing Writer, Rocky Mountain Voice “This is selfish.” That’s how Jon Caldara opened his April 1 column, writing not about politics, but about his son. He leads Denver’s Independence Institute and has long been a free-market voice in Colorado. "My son, Chance, has Down syndrome," Caldara shared. "This 21-year-old man cannot consistently count to five, can't read and can't write his own name. He needs constant supervision for choking risks. He still needs help toileting. And that's just the start." Medicaid, Caldara wrote, "was designed for people like him, our most vulnerable. And I am grateful for it. This is the funding he requires to live." The Colorado legislature is in the process of cutting it — not because the state determined Chance and people...
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Federal lease sale brings $8 million boost as Colorado energy shifts to Washington-controlled land
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Complete Colorado, Approved, State

Federal lease sale brings $8 million boost as Colorado energy shifts to Washington-controlled land

By Savana Kascak | Complete Colorado DENVER–The Bureau of Land Management’s (BLM) quarterly oil and gas lease sale in Colorado generated over $8 million, the most successful such sale the federal lands agency has enjoyed in recent years. The BLM, as well as energy policy experts credit the successful lease sale in large part to the Trump administration’s pro-energy production policies. According to its recent press release, the BLM on March 31 leased 68 parcels of federal land for drilling in Colorado, generating $8.1 million. Over 42,000 acres were leased across Weld, Jackson, Routt, Arapahoe, Delta, Mesa, Rio Blanco, Gunnison, and Garfield counties. This sale was conducted with lower royalties embedded in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBB), which reduced th...
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Polis loses ground with Democrat base as cost-of-living fears rise
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Colorado Politics, Approved, State

Polis loses ground with Democrat base as cost-of-living fears rise

By Marissa Ventrelli | Colorado Politics Gov. Jared Polis is losing steam among members of his party, particularly progressive Democrats, according to a recent poll. Other statewide Democrats also saw their favorability ratings drop, though relatively stable compared to the governor’s numbers, the poll conducted by the Colorado Polling Institute in late March said. Forty-four percent of respondents said they view Polis favorably, down seven percentage points from last March. Nearly 50% of respondents said they had a negative view of the governor, whose final term ends this year. Polis’ favorability was strong within the Democratic Party last year, with 84% of members saying they viewed him favorably. That number has dropped to 72%, while Polis’ approval among Democrats...
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Colorado loses jobs as nearly 100 companies exit, business leaders demand change
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CBS Colorado, Approved, State

Colorado loses jobs as nearly 100 companies exit, business leaders demand change

By Shaun Boyd | CBS Colorado Colorado is losing businesses and jobs at an alarming rate. Now, the ones who've stuck around are calling on state leaders to make changes before things get even worse. The Colorado Chamber of Commerce has been sounding an alarm for years about excessive regulation and, last year, more people moved out of Colorado than into the state. The chamber says companies are also relocating out-of-state. It released data showing, since 2019, 98 companies have either left the state, expanded elsewhere, or scrapped plans to move here. That's resulted in more than 13,000 lost jobs. Since 2022, Colorado has also had a net loss of 34 public company headquarters. Some of the states seeing gains from Colorado's losses included Texas, California a...
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Lawmakers Debate Fee Based Plan To Cut Insurance Costs With Hail Resistant Roof Grants
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The Colorado Sun, Approved, State

Lawmakers Debate Fee Based Plan To Cut Insurance Costs With Hail Resistant Roof Grants

By Bente Birkeland | The Colorado Sun Colorado insurance premiums have risen 65% in 5 years. Hail storms are mostly to blame. Colorado lawmakers want to impose a per-policy fee on home insurance providers to raise $20 million a year for a program that would provide grants to homeowners to protect their properties against hail. The hope is that the program will protect enough Colorado homes against hail that insurance rates will drop across the state. A similar effort failed last session. In the last five years the average premium in the state has gone up 65%, according to the National Association of Insurance Commissioners. That makes Colorado one of the top-10 most expensive states in the country for homeowners insurance.   Climate exp...
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Colorado lawmakers move to sidestep Supreme Court ruling on therapy speech
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Sey Anything, Approved, Commentary, State

Colorado lawmakers move to sidestep Supreme Court ruling on therapy speech

By Jennifer Sey | Commentary, Sey Everything The Colorado legislature is attempting to sidestep the Supreme Court ruling with a new "conversion therapy" lawsuit bill The U.S. Supreme Court ruled on March 31, 2026, in Chiles v. Salazar (8-1 decision, with Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson dissenting) that Colorado’s 2019 ban on “conversion therapy” for minors violates the First Amendment’s free-speech protections as applied to talk therapy. (I wrote about it here.) The Supreme Court’s ruling said the Colorado law was unconstitutional because it constituted “viewpoint discrimination.” The Supreme Court made it clear that talk therapy is protected speech, not “conduct.” But Colorado refuses to accept the Supreme Court’s ruling. Instead, the insane state that I l...
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First In The Nation Reform Bill Limiting Unreliable Drug Test Arrests Signed By Polis
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Complete Colorado, Approved, State

First In The Nation Reform Bill Limiting Unreliable Drug Test Arrests Signed By Polis

By C.J. Ciaramella | Complete Colorado DENVER–Colorado recently enacted a law protecting criminal defendants arrested due to roadside tests for drugs, becoming the first state in the country to recognize widespread instances of wrongful arrests due to police departments’ use of often unreliable field drug kits. Both chambers of the Colorado legislature unanimously passed House Bill 26-1020, and Gov. Jared Polis signed it into law on March 26. Under the new statute, police can no longer make arrests solely for misdemeanor drug possession based on the results of what are know as “colorimetric” field drug tests and instead must issue suspects a summons to appear in court. The act also requires courts, before a defendant enters a plea in a case where a field test was used, t...
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