State Lawmakers Must Make Tough Choices to Protect What Coloradans Need to Thrive

August 13, 2025

Governor Polis has called the state legislature into a special session, starting August 21, to deal with a $1.2 - 1.4 billion budget shortfall caused by a federal law called H.R.1, also known as the “One Big Beautiful Bill Act” (OBBBA).

This federal law cut corporate taxes and gave more tax breaks to the richest 1% of Americans. As a result, Colorado is losing a huge amount of revenue, enough to completely wipe out our higher education budget, cut Medicaid for hundreds of thousands of people, and end food assistance for tens of thousands of families.

The law also pushed more costs onto the state by:

Making Colorado pay a portion of the cost for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits and more of the administrative costs,
Cutting funding for Medicaid, which is known as Health First Colorado, and,
Ending health insurance subsidies that made healthcare more affordable for thousands of Coloradans.

Colorado faces an extra challenge because of the Taxpayer Bill of Rights (TABOR), a state constitutional rule that limits how much money the state can raise and spend. While other states can use “rainy day” funds or adjust taxes to fill budget gaps, Colorado’s TABOR restrictions make that nearly impossible.

During this special session, lawmakers will have to make tough choices to protect vital programs like food assistance and healthcare so that people who need them can still get them.