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Speaker 1: Hi, Michael.

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Speaker 2: I was wondering if Operation ETPIC theory should have concentrated

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Speaker 2: on missile launchers instead of people.

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Speaker 1: What do you think we'll chase that squirrel tomorrow? Maybe?

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Speaker 3: And who's to say you can't do both at the

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Speaker 3: same time. Seven point two billion dollars, that's the answer,

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Speaker 3: according to the Google machine. What was the question? The

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Speaker 3: answer is seven point two billion dollars. And the answer is,

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Speaker 3: or the question is, mister redbeer.

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Speaker 1: How much we spend on politicians and their staff?

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Speaker 3: That's the I just googled total appropriations for the legislative brand. Yeah,

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Speaker 3: seven point two billion dollars, which by the way, include

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Speaker 3: some two hundred plus million dollars for enhanced security. You

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Speaker 3: know what that is, keep the ref raft away from

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Speaker 3: to keep you you know, remember six feet guess six

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Speaker 3: feet social distancing. They've got sixty feet social distancing. There's

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Speaker 3: a particular kind of political audacity, and it demands that

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Speaker 3: you you you sit and watch the arsonist call the

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Speaker 3: fire department and then complain that the hose isn't long enough.

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Speaker 3: That's what's happening out the Colorado.

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Speaker 1: Pollup BUAU right now.

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Speaker 3: Colorado has a budget shortfall that the nonpartisan analysts says

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Speaker 3: about one point five billion dollars.

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Speaker 1: Now, it's a little perspective.

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Speaker 3: That's a staggering number by itself, but it grew by

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Speaker 3: nearly six hundred and fifty million dollars, almost three quarters

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Speaker 3: of a billion dollars, in a matter of months. So

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Speaker 3: that's shocked even the you know, the veteran legislative budget

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Speaker 3: staff that sits out there now. When the news broke

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Speaker 3: before the Joint Budget Committee, State Rep. Kyle Brown, a

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Speaker 3: Louisville Democrat who sits on the Joint Budget Committee, just

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Speaker 3: said reflexively the word Jesus. That's quite a confession from

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Speaker 3: the party that built the problem. You see, Democrats want

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Speaker 3: you to believe that this is a story about global

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Speaker 3: uncertainty that is because of federal fiscal policy, and it's

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Speaker 3: because of that evil taxpayer Bill of Rights TABOR, because

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Speaker 3: all of those things are constraining the Democrats' ability to

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Speaker 3: spend your money. Don't buy it, because the record tells

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Speaker 3: in a different, an entirely different story, and I don't

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Speaker 3: think the record lies. Colorado's nonpartisan Joint Budget Committee staff

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Speaker 3: director may I Divert. For just a moment, I know

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Speaker 3: that his position is Nonpartisan's the he's the staffer for

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Speaker 3: the he's the staff director for the Joint Budget Committee.

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Speaker 3: But when you have one party rule and one party rules,

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Speaker 3: it's like eighty twenty eighty percent Democrats, twenty percent Republicans.

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Speaker 3: Who do you think you take your marching orders from?

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Speaker 3: Who do you think you kind of lean into the most?

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Speaker 3: That's right, the Democrats. So I use that term loosely,

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Speaker 3: very loosely. He says this, this Craig Harper does. I'm

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Speaker 3: starting to get a little bit of a groundhog day

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Speaker 3: feel because it seems like each year, in each presentation

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Speaker 3: I come in and there's a shortfall of about one

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Speaker 3: billion dollars to talk about.

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Speaker 1: And he called that trend alarming.

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Speaker 3: Wow, let that think in a minute, our own non

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Speaker 3: partisan budget director. Again, I use the term loosely. Somebody

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Speaker 3: whose job is to count the beans, not grind the

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Speaker 3: axes is calling it alarming and projecting it will repeat

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Speaker 3: year after year after year. Now, the shortfall was one

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Speaker 3: point two billion in the fiscal year that began July one,

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Speaker 3: twenty twenty five. It is nearly one point five billion

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Speaker 3: for the twenty twenty six to twenty twenty seven fiscal year,

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Speaker 3: and the Budget Director's preliminary calculations show the state budget

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Speaker 3: will be in a one billion dollar hole again for

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Speaker 3: fiscal year twenty seven twenty eight. A crisis that repeat

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Speaker 3: every single year at roughly the same magnitude. That is

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Speaker 3: not a crisis that you can blame external economic forces.

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Speaker 1: It is a structural deficit.

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Speaker 3: It is a deficit that is banked into the architecture

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Speaker 3: of the spending out of the state capitol that's being

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Speaker 3: made by deliberate choices, choices made by the Democrats that

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Speaker 3: control every lever of Colorado government. They have to trifecta

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Speaker 3: in Colorado the Governor of the House and the Senate

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Speaker 3: for years, and the spending decisions that created the structural

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Speaker 3: disaster is theirs and theirs alone.

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Speaker 1: So what is the structural problem?

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Speaker 3: I'm gonna tell you that the first is the spending

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Speaker 3: problem that they will not name. I'm really I'm really

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Speaker 3: curious if you understand what it is. What do you

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Speaker 3: think the number one problem is? But they will never

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Speaker 3: admit it.

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Speaker 1: Do you know what it is? Think?

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Speaker 3: I want you to think about it for a moment. Okay,

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Speaker 3: you've had your moment. The Medicaid explosion. The primary driver

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Speaker 3: of our budget crisis has a name, and it is

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Speaker 3: not the taxpayer Bill of Rights. It is not Donald Trump,

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Speaker 3: It is not the US Congress. It is not global uncertainty.

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Speaker 3: It is Medicaid. Since the twenty eighteen twenty nineteen fiscal year,

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Speaker 3: state spending a Medicaid has grown by forty three percent

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Speaker 3: one zo point seven billion dollars, much faster than inflation,

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Speaker 3: and the main driver of that annual shortfall is rising

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Speaker 3: state spending on Medicaid, a problem that's been compounding since

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Speaker 3: the recess, the Great Recession of two thousand and eight.

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Speaker 3: It got worse during COVID, at which point, according to

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Speaker 3: this non partisan Joint Budget Director, mister Harper said, the

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Speaker 3: growth in Medicaid spending was explosive, kind of like explosive

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Speaker 3: diarrhea in my opinion, same thing right now. At a

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Speaker 3: distant second, higher education spending grew by twenty nine percent,

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Speaker 3: forty three percent for medicaid, twenty nine percent for higher end.

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Speaker 3: Everything else in state government has roughly kept place with inflation.

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Speaker 3: Medicaid hasn't. Medicaid is nothing more than a runaway train.

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Speaker 3: It's it's it's a eighteen wheeler. Coming down High seventy,

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Speaker 3: completely missing the runaway truck rams because the drivers, the Democrats,

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Speaker 3: refused to take the runaway truck ramp to stop the spending.

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Speaker 3: Here's the critical distinction. The Medicaid problems not merely the

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Speaker 3: result of enrollment growing organically as it would with you know,

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Speaker 3: the economy, or as people age, specific deliberate legislative decisions

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Speaker 3: expanded eligibility, expanded benefits, increase provider reimbursement rates, all of

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Speaker 3: which are choices made primarily by one party Democrats.

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Speaker 2: Michael Squirrel, why are we funding NGOs their non government organizations?

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Speaker 3: You must be new here. We fund USAID was nothing

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Speaker 3: but a laundry, money laundering machine to take tax dowar

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Speaker 3: appropriated by Congress to give to USAID so they can

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Speaker 3: make grants to all sorts of not just NGOs, but nonprofits,

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Speaker 3: any kind of organization. You can imagine if you're if

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Speaker 3: you're really serious about that, Squirrel, I have utterly failed

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Speaker 3: because you think about all of the money that gets

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Speaker 3: sent down to say the state of Colorado. They get

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Speaker 3: they get a block grant. That block grant goes to

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Speaker 3: a county or goes to a municipality, and It may

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Speaker 3: go to an NGO, It may go to a nonprofit,

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Speaker 3: it may go to a private charity, it may go

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Speaker 3: to some private organization. People get government grants.

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Speaker 1: All the time.

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Speaker 3: Don't get hung up on NGO non government organization. It

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Speaker 3: just means that it's a not a government organization. It's

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Speaker 3: that simple. It's an mng O.

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Speaker 1: Oh wow.

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Speaker 3: That me back to the Corondo budget deficit. The nonpartisan

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Speaker 3: which I use loosely, Joint Budget Committee staff laid out

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Speaker 3: specific decisions that they say contributed to what their memo

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Speaker 3: calls a death by a thousand cuts.

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Speaker 1: First, a twenty.

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Speaker 3: Twenty two bill that extended Medicaid coverage to children and

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Speaker 3: pregnant people who would otherwise be eligible for the program

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Speaker 3: but for their immigration status. In other words, Oh, you're

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Speaker 3: here illegally, uh, and you wouldn't have gotten it. Well,

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Speaker 3: we're gonna give it to you anyway. That's first and

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Speaker 3: foremost right there. So, yes, we pay medical bills for

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Speaker 3: illegal aliens right here in little low Colorado. And they

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Speaker 3: want to know how they could cut spending. Stop it,

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Speaker 3: just stop it.

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Speaker 1: Then you had.

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Speaker 3: Increases in Medicaid provider reimbursement rates. In other words, we're

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Speaker 3: going to pay the doctor some more because you know

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Speaker 3: there are three because now they get all these illegal

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Speaker 3: aliens coming into their clinics. Well, well we'll increase your

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Speaker 3: will increase your rates, and increases in the share of

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Speaker 3: the budget allocated to higher education. Now, let's be precise

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Speaker 3: about the first item. Calido Democrats voted without one single

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Speaker 3: Republican vote to extend Medicaid to illegal aliens. They made

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Speaker 3: that choice, They own that cost, they own that. So

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Speaker 3: when they're out there, you know, wringing their hands, gnashing

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Speaker 3: their teeth and moaning and groaning about the taxpayer bill, right,

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Speaker 3: screw you. You're the ones that did this, own up

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Speaker 3: to it. At the current medicag spending trajectory, nonpartisan analysts

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Speaker 3: project that the FY twenty nine to thirty budget would

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Speaker 3: see not a one and a half billion dollar deficit,

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Speaker 3: but a three point five billion dollar budget deficit. Three

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Speaker 3: and a half billion dollars. That's the road we're on,

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Speaker 3: and that's where we're headed if nothing changes, and the

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Speaker 3: waste problem compounds.

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Speaker 1: The cost problem.

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Speaker 3: A Congressional panel sighted reports showing this spending on non

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Speaker 3: emergency Medicaid transport services jumped almost five hundred percent between

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Speaker 3: twenty nineteen to n twenty twenty five. Why because the

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Speaker 3: Colorado Department of health Care Policy and Financing provided the

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Speaker 3: wrong guidance to non emergency providers. Reports of fraudulent billing

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Speaker 3: move over Minnesota. Reports of fraudulent billing totally. More than

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Speaker 3: twenty five million dollars has already been identified in that

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Speaker 3: non emergency transport program alone, more than twenty five million

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Speaker 3: dollars in confirmed Medicaid fraud. And yet the response from

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Speaker 3: the Democrats is to complaining, we don't love enough money.

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Speaker 3: We need some more money, so let's just call a

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Speaker 3: spade to space. Democrats made a conscious decision to cover

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Speaker 3: illegal aliens in this state and that contributes to our

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Speaker 3: budget deficit. But they'll never admit that. They'll never admit it.

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Speaker 3: Number two. I remember when this money came out during COVID.

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Speaker 1: I may.

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Speaker 3: I don't know whether I've told this audience or not,

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Speaker 3: but I was approached by a big consulting firm about

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Speaker 3: what I help in Colorado with how to spend this money,

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Speaker 3: and my ultimate decision was no, I'm not because the

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Speaker 3: money came without any strings attached. Whatsoever is? I tried

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Speaker 3: to explain to the consulting firm. There's never anything such

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Speaker 3: as although I may be wrong about this, there's never

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Speaker 3: anything called money from the federal government that doesn't have

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Speaker 3: a string attached to it. But apparently this money might

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Speaker 3: be the exception.

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Speaker 2: Weamo electric vehicles in Austin, Texas were caught being charged

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Speaker 2: by huge diesel power generators. This completely defeats the purpose

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Speaker 2: of these electric vehicles being creating an environmental friendly but hey,

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Speaker 2: at least they look like they're environmental friendly, right, that's

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Speaker 2: what matters.

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Speaker 3: Let's talk about the COVID money with regard to the

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Speaker 3: one point five billion dollar deficit that Colorado faces in

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Speaker 3: this budget.

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Speaker 1: Listen to this.

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Speaker 3: Key statement from the Joint Budget Committee Staff report, and

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Speaker 3: I'm quoting verbatim. If all one time revenue had been

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Speaker 3: spent on one time activities and Colorado had otherwise managed to

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Speaker 3: keep spending commitments within available revenue on going general fund

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Speaker 3: revenue and spending should have come back into alignment, it

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Speaker 3: did not close quote what's the translation of that Colorado

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Speaker 3: had an enormous historic influx of COVID era federal money.

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Speaker 3: The Democrats knew that was one time money. It wasn't

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Speaker 3: coming back one time. But what did they do. They

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Speaker 3: spend it on programs that required ongoing funding. So if

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Speaker 3: they received the money in twenty twenty two and they

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Speaker 3: use it for a program that goes all the way

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Speaker 3: out to you know, infinity, the mine's going to run

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Speaker 3: out in the first year.

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Speaker 1: And it did.

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Speaker 3: Colorado had that enormous historic influx of COVID era federal money,

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Speaker 3: and they knew it was one time, and instead of

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Speaker 3: just spending it on one time expenditure projects or just

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Speaker 3: one time appropriations, they put it in programs are required

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Speaker 3: funding into the future. And then when the money disappeared, huh,

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Speaker 3: imagine that a structural gap emerged and that gap is

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Speaker 3: not closing on its own. The Julian Budget Committee staff

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Speaker 3: had described the one time federal money as allowing the

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Speaker 3: legislature to tackle issues that they had funded on for years,

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Speaker 3: and they even said what it was increasing medicaid costs

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Speaker 3: K twelve at higher education funding and then at the

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Speaker 3: same time they launched new initiatives like universal preschool. The

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Speaker 3: availability of that one time money, as the memo noted,

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Speaker 3: may have helped mask the underlying status of the general

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Speaker 3: Fund at the height of the one time federal funds,

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Speaker 3: which was fisically year twenty two, twenty twenty three, the

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Speaker 3: legislature was spending eight hundred and twenty nine million dollars

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Speaker 3: more than it's ongoing available revenue. They're fraudsters, They're absolute fraudsters.

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Speaker 3: And now they're screaming body more body hell out there,

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Speaker 3: and they went to watch abolished taxpayer Bill of Rights.

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Speaker 3: They want to increase their taxes, they don't want to

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Speaker 3: cut the programs. Spending eight hundred and twenty nine million

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Speaker 3: dollars above any semblance of a sustainable level, and then

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Speaker 3: they kept spending those elevated levels even as the federal

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Speaker 3: money just disappeared. That is not misfortune, that is utter mismanagement.

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Speaker 3: Republican Senator Barbara Kurkmeyer, Yes, she's a candidate for governor.

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Speaker 3: She said this in a legislative preview session. A lot

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Speaker 3: of programs. She said, we're supposed to be one time funded,

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Speaker 3: and we continued the funding. We got ourselves into this mess. Well,

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Speaker 3: if she was speaking to all of them, yes, but

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Speaker 3: remember Republicans didn't vote for this, Democrats did. Democrats on

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Speaker 3: the Joint Budget Committee had been notably quiet about directly

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Speaker 3: disputing that Instead they've pivoted to a different argument. Well,

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Speaker 3: even if we made those choices, even if we did

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Speaker 3: mismanage TABOR, the taxpayer Bill Rights is still the villain.

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Speaker 3: So now they're going to attack TABOR on three different flanks,

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Speaker 3: but one goal. When we approved TABOR back in nineteen

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Speaker 3: ninety two, it kept annual government spending growth to the

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Speaker 3: rate of population increased plus inflation, and required voter approval

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Speaker 3: for any tax increases. Democrats, well, of course they detested

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Speaker 3: it from the from the day it passed. The current

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Speaker 3: budget crisis, the one that they created by mismanagement, has

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Speaker 3: given them their best political opportunity in decades to dismantle it,

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Speaker 3: and they're going to press every available advantage and they're

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Speaker 3: going to.

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Speaker 1: Do it at the same time.

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Speaker 3: So, as I said, I think there's three flanks that

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Speaker 3: they're going to attack a song. You need to be

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Speaker 3: aware of every single one of them and make sure

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Speaker 3: you fight every single one of them. The first one

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Speaker 3: the ballot measure sent it Bill one thirty five that

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Speaker 3: would refer a ballot question to voters in November that,

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Speaker 3: if approved, would allow the Democrats to retain the tax

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Speaker 3: revenue that would otherwise be refunded under Tabor. Now they

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Speaker 3: frame it conveniently as a mechanism to fund Cage welve education,

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Speaker 3: and of course the Democrat Caucus. Of course they sponsored.

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Speaker 3: They got thirty eight regular sponsors. It only needs a

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Speaker 3: simple majority vote to make it onto the ballot. But

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Speaker 3: don't be fooled by Oh, it's for the school children.

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Speaker 3: This is a Tabor refund confiscation dressed in a teacher's clothing.

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Speaker 3: And kirk Myer sees it for what it is, and

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Speaker 3: she says, everybody in this state, it's not just school teachers.

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Speaker 3: If everyone in this state for the most part, is

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Speaker 3: having an issue with trying to figure out how to

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Speaker 3: afford to live here, the answer isn't take more taxes

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Speaker 3: from them.

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Speaker 1: But that's what they want to do.

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Speaker 3: If you think the affordability crisis is bad, now, why

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Speaker 3: do they decide to start increases to fill a one

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Speaker 3: point five billion dollar budget shortfall. So that's the first flank.

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Speaker 3: Don't let it pass. The second one the enterprise scheme,

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Speaker 3: because TABOR requires voter approval for a tax increase. Of

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Speaker 3: course you know this. You see it every time you

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Speaker 3: go pay for your driver's license and you put pay

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Speaker 3: through your car or whatever it is, classify taxes as thieves,

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Speaker 3: and specifically by creating government enterprises which operate outside Tabor's limits.

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Speaker 3: So a growing share of our overall state spending now

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Speaker 3: completely escapes the Tabor limits through enterprise fees has served

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Speaker 3: well beyond what any honest reading of Tabor ever anticipated.

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Speaker 1: Give you an example.

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Speaker 3: In twenty twenty four, the Democrats proposed creating an Alcohol

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Speaker 3: Impact and Recovery Enterprise.

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Speaker 1: Got it, This is an enterprise.

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Speaker 3: It's going to be within the state's Behavioral Health administration.

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Speaker 3: So you've got to have some government entity. So they

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Speaker 3: found the Behavioral Health Administration. But within that, we'll create

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Speaker 3: a subset, a sub organization called the Alcohol Impact and

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Speaker 3: Recovery Enterprise. Now that would get funded through fees and

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Speaker 3: posed on alcohol manufacturers and distributors. What's that that's attacked

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Speaker 3: without a voter referendum. When a twenty twenty four survey

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Speaker 3: asked voters what they thought of that mechanism, after being

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Speaker 3: told that it was certain, Tabor disapproval jump to fifty

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Speaker 3: eight percent. You don't like it. Voters don't like it

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Speaker 3: when they understand it. So Democrats do everything they can

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Speaker 3: to make sure you can't understand it. They put it

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Speaker 3: in all this bullcrap language that is totally difficult to

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Speaker 3: understand by talking about something against an enterprise, and enterprise

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Speaker 3: is just like, oh, I am the government agency sitting

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Speaker 3: in the studio dragging back there. He's just the enterprise

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Speaker 3: that makes it run, so he's not subject to Tabor.

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Speaker 3: It's that kind of bull crap going on. That's the

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Speaker 3: second flank, the third flank the lawsuit. Of course, if

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Speaker 3: you can't beat Tabor at the ballot box, just go

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Speaker 3: sue it into oblivion. Joint House Joint Resolution twenty five

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Speaker 3: ten twenty three that would direct the Politburell's Leal Arm

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Speaker 3: to challenge Tabor's constitutiontionality in state court. Their argument, well,

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Speaker 3: Taber prevents Colorado from functioning as a republican form of

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Speaker 3: government as guaranteed by the state constitution. Their resolution sponsor

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Speaker 3: was absolutely direct.

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Speaker 1: Kenni state. She said, can a state.

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Speaker 3: Call itself a republican form of government if it's elected

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Speaker 3: representatives or the people who are constitutionally barred from governing. Well,

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Speaker 3: if you put the question that way, I would say, no,

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Speaker 3: it's not a republic. But that's not what Taber does.

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Speaker 3: Taber simply says, hey, you can't spend beyond this limit,

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Speaker 3: and you can't impose a new tax without the approval

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Speaker 3: of the people, because who's ultimately in charge in a

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Speaker 3: republican form of government, the people. Now, I think that

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Speaker 3: argue might be a little more compelling if the people

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Speaker 3: asking it hadn't just confessed through their own budget staff

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Speaker 3: that the decisions that created the fiscal crisis was the

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Speaker 3: making of the Democrats. Taber didn't force them to extend

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Speaker 3: Medicaid to illegal aliens. Taber certainly did not force them

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Speaker 3: to launch universal preschool with one time money and then

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Speaker 3: make it a permanent expenditure. Taper didn't force them to

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Speaker 3: grow Medicaid spending by forty three percent over six years.

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Speaker 3: So the Democrats at the polit Bureau and their allies,

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Speaker 3: all the special interests, have advanced a bunch of talking

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Speaker 3: points to try to deflect responsibility. The first one is

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Speaker 3: the stupidest. It's Tabor's fault all You'll hear it from

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Speaker 3: them all the time. It's Taber's fault. Tabor limits revenue growth.

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Speaker 3: Taper does not challenge limit or any way put a

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Speaker 3: box around spending choices. TABOR is a limit on revenue growth,

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Speaker 3: not spending choices within the TABOR cap. Guess what the

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Speaker 3: y'all who that the Polar Bureau can still allocate about

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Speaker 3: eighteen billion dollars annually, they get to choose how to

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Speaker 3: spend eighteen billion dollars. So the structural deficit exists because

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Speaker 3: they chose to expand permanent spending obligations beyond what available

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Speaker 3: revenue even at the TABOR cap, could possibly sustain. TABOR

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Speaker 3: is a ceiling, not a floor. The legislature built a

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Speaker 3: spending structure that would exceed any realistic spending. If I

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Speaker 3: tell you that I'm going to give you twenty dollars

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Speaker 3: a month for the next twelve months, and then after

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Speaker 3: that it goes away, so that's two hundred forty dollars

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Speaker 3: a year, And you say, oh, well, I think I'm

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Speaker 3: going to start spending that on a program that costs

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Speaker 3: me two hundred and forty dollars to two hundred fifty

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Speaker 3: dollars a year.

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Speaker 1: I'll find in a little extra money somewhere else.

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Speaker 3: And then at the end of twelve months the twenty

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Speaker 3: dollars a month goes away, You're still spending two hundred

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Speaker 3: and forty dollars a month. That's what they did. Am

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Speaker 3: I trying to blame Tabor? No, then they try to

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Speaker 3: blame who do you think, of course, Donald Trump? The

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Speaker 3: federal tax bill, the one big beautiful bill, the will BBVA,

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Speaker 3: or whatever the hell it's called. Colorado's revenue Now, Colorado

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Speaker 3: state income tax code is tied to the federal code,

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Speaker 3: and when federal taxes fall, state revenues fall proportionately. That

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Speaker 3: is true, But the structural predicate, the structural deficit, predates

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Speaker 3: the federal bill's revenue impact as different from the pre

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Speaker 3: existing shortfall. It's a separate, additional problem layered on top

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Speaker 3: of a crisis that was already in progress, that was

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Speaker 3: caused by you know, the medicaid spending on illegal aliens

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Speaker 3: and the spending growth. Using the federal bill to try

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Speaker 3: to explain a structural deficit that has been building since

379
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Speaker 3: twenty nineteen is like blaming the weather for your car

380
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Speaker 3: breaking down and opens and hoping that nobody notices that, Oh,

381
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Speaker 3: I haven't changed the oil, fixed the transmission fluid, and

382
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Speaker 3: I don't know six yourself years. Then they make this argument,

383
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Speaker 3: we don't have enough money because of Tabor Emily Saroda.

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Speaker 3: That name sound familiar. That's the wife of David Serota,

385
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Speaker 3: probably the most progressive Marxist YAHOO in the entire state

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Speaker 3: of Colorado. Yeah, I used to have to share a

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Speaker 3: studio with me. She's the difference she is. I don't

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Speaker 3: know for a fact that she's a member of the

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Speaker 3: Democrats Socialists of America, but it wouldn't surprise me. She's

390
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Speaker 3: the one that leads the committee and she says this quote,

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Speaker 3: I did not run for office to slash essential programs

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Speaker 3: that hard working Colorados depend on. There's only so much

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Speaker 3: money we can spend under the physical constraints of TABOR. Translation, Oh,

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Speaker 3: we want to spend more money than us taxpayers authorized

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Speaker 3: us to spend, and TABOR is stopping us from taking

396
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Speaker 3: your money away from you. That's not a budget compla.

397
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Speaker 3: That's the complaint about democracy. That's the complaint about you're

398
00:27:06,080 --> 00:27:10,960
Speaker 3: not giving us enough of your money. Between rising prices,

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Speaker 3: federal cuts to essential programs, global uncertainty, the state budget

400
00:27:16,440 --> 00:27:21,000
Speaker 3: is indeed getting squeezed. From all sides who said that

401
00:27:21,880 --> 00:27:27,280
Speaker 3: between rising prices, federal cuts to essential programs, and global uncertainty,

402
00:27:27,520 --> 00:27:29,919
Speaker 3: the state budget is getting squeezed from all sides.

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Speaker 1: What's not in that?

404
00:27:33,280 --> 00:27:38,600
Speaker 3: Oh, Colorado is losing population, We're losing jobs, We're losing employment.

405
00:27:38,680 --> 00:27:42,280
Speaker 3: Taxes are too high, the affordability crisis is real. Well,

406
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Speaker 3: that is the Vice chair of the Joint Budget Committee,

407
00:27:45,359 --> 00:27:50,800
Speaker 3: Jeff Bridges, blaming everyone and everything except the six years

408
00:27:50,800 --> 00:27:55,040
Speaker 3: of spending decisions made by his own Democrat majority. Yes,

409
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Speaker 3: rising prices are real. Federal Medicaid changes, they are real.

410
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Speaker 3: Neither of those facts changes the documented record showing that

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Speaker 3: our structural deficit was already baked in before any of

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Speaker 3: those external factors arrived. So that's what they are saying.

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Speaker 3: And that's the response to what they are saying. But

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Speaker 3: what are they not saying? Lawyers always want to know,

415
00:28:20,920 --> 00:28:26,560
Speaker 3: what would you not say? Here's what the Democrats in

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00:28:26,560 --> 00:28:30,160
Speaker 3: the Capitol are not saying out loud, but what any

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Speaker 3: honest budget analyst understands, and that is the model the

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00:28:33,920 --> 00:28:40,080
Speaker 3: Democrats built is mathematically unsustainable. The taper cap grows at

419
00:28:40,080 --> 00:28:43,920
Speaker 3: the rate of inflation plus population. That would be roughly

420
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Speaker 3: three point six percent in a recent year, but Medicaid

421
00:28:48,000 --> 00:28:51,479
Speaker 3: premiums were up five point seven percent to cover rising

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Speaker 3: long term care costs in the same period. And to

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Speaker 3: cover the cost of covering illegal aliens the child health

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Speaker 3: plan plus so a twenty percent cost increase. You can't

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Speaker 3: build a permanent spending architecture that grows anywhere between five

426
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Speaker 3: and twenty percent annually and then fund that with the

427
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Speaker 3: revenue base that's capped at somewhere between three three to

428
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Speaker 3: four percent growth. That gap will widen every single year.

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Speaker 3: That is what I call the structural deficit. And the

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Speaker 3: Democrats knew it. And then even though they knew it,

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00:29:23,640 --> 00:29:26,680
Speaker 3: they still used the COVID money windfall to pretend that

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Speaker 3: the math worked out when the math really didn't. The

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Speaker 3: math worked. You know what, the math did work out.

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Speaker 3: Let me change my notes. The math did work out

435
00:29:36,000 --> 00:29:39,240
Speaker 3: for one year, the one year that the COVID money

436
00:29:39,280 --> 00:29:42,560
Speaker 3: was here. And then when the money disappeared, as everybody

437
00:29:42,560 --> 00:29:46,080
Speaker 3: and their dog knew that it would, the math quit working.

438
00:29:47,760 --> 00:29:52,640
Speaker 3: They launched programs, they expanded eligibility, they increased rates, and

439
00:29:52,680 --> 00:29:55,440
Speaker 3: they create a new entitlements, and then the money ran

440
00:29:55,480 --> 00:29:59,840
Speaker 3: out and suddenly everything as its typical Democrats with so

441
00:30:00,000 --> 00:30:06,080
Speaker 3: somebody else's fault. The bottom line is pretty simple. Colorado

442
00:30:06,080 --> 00:30:11,320
Speaker 3: Democrats built a spending edifice, edifice that they simply cannot

443
00:30:11,640 --> 00:30:16,040
Speaker 3: maintain papered over the structural cracks with one time COVID

444
00:30:16,080 --> 00:30:19,560
Speaker 3: money and are now pursuing a multi front campaign to

445
00:30:19,600 --> 00:30:24,040
Speaker 3: confiscate more of your money through ballot measures, enterprise.

446
00:30:23,720 --> 00:30:26,080
Speaker 1: Fee schemes, even lawsuits.

447
00:30:27,040 --> 00:30:31,680
Speaker 3: They've never honestly acknowledged that the whole they're standing is

448
00:30:32,280 --> 00:30:35,120
Speaker 3: that they're standing in right now is a hole that

449
00:30:35,200 --> 00:30:40,400
Speaker 3: they dug and you, you're the Colorado taxpayer, You're going

450
00:30:40,440 --> 00:30:43,760
Speaker 3: to be presented with carefully crafted ballot language this November,

451
00:30:44,440 --> 00:30:50,080
Speaker 3: all designed the heart to tuget your heartstrings for the children, oh,

452
00:30:50,160 --> 00:30:56,000
Speaker 3: for the teachers, for essential services, while the mechanism quietly

453
00:30:56,000 --> 00:30:59,200
Speaker 3: strips away your right to a tabor refund and your

454
00:30:59,200 --> 00:31:04,280
Speaker 3: protection against tax increases imposed without your approval. So the

455
00:31:04,360 --> 00:31:08,400
Speaker 3: question is not whether Colorad's budget is in crisis. Color

456
00:31:08,440 --> 00:31:11,920
Speaker 3: Hill's budget is in crisis. We are no better than California. Oh,

457
00:31:11,960 --> 00:31:13,560
Speaker 3: we might be at a different level, but it's the

458
00:31:13,560 --> 00:31:16,480
Speaker 3: same thing as California. It's the same as the Illinois,

459
00:31:16,520 --> 00:31:18,280
Speaker 3: it's the same as New York, it's the same as

460
00:31:18,320 --> 00:31:21,600
Speaker 3: every other blue state in the freaking country. The question

461
00:31:21,800 --> 00:31:24,720
Speaker 3: is how it got here, And now the question is

462
00:31:25,600 --> 00:31:29,000
Speaker 3: who's going to decide how to fix it. The answer

463
00:31:29,040 --> 00:31:33,440
Speaker 3: the first question is decisions made deliberately by people who

464
00:31:33,440 --> 00:31:37,280
Speaker 3: are now hoping that you won't connect the dots. I

465
00:31:37,560 --> 00:31:40,640
Speaker 3: just connected the dots for you. The answer to the

466
00:31:40,640 --> 00:31:45,440
Speaker 3: second question should be you. You're the one that they're after.

467
00:31:45,920 --> 00:31:49,520
Speaker 3: They're after your money and they'll do anything to get it.

468
00:31:50,520 --> 00:31:56,320
Speaker 3: This one point five billion dollar budget shortfall, the TLDR

469
00:31:56,560 --> 00:32:00,320
Speaker 3: is the Democrats built this, and now they will your

470
00:32:00,400 --> 00:32:06,880
Speaker 3: wallet to fill it. It's that political audacity that demands

471
00:32:06,920 --> 00:32:09,520
Speaker 3: that you do. You're you're watching the arsonals called the

472
00:32:09,520 --> 00:32:12,160
Speaker 3: fire department and complaining if the hose isn't long enough,

473
00:32:12,240 --> 00:32:14,360
Speaker 3: And that is exactly what's happening at the state.

474
00:32:14,160 --> 00:32:15,080
Speaker 1: Capitol right now.

475
00:32:15,440 --> 00:32:19,120
Speaker 3: One point five billion dollars, a number that grew by

476
00:32:19,240 --> 00:32:21,800
Speaker 3: nearly six hundred and fifty million dollars in a matter

477
00:32:21,840 --> 00:32:24,800
Speaker 3: of months. And now they're all saying ay throats out

478
00:32:24,800 --> 00:32:29,480
Speaker 3: there standing now, oh my gosh, why we've done this. Well,

479
00:32:29,480 --> 00:32:31,920
Speaker 3: there's no way we can we can't roll this back,

480
00:32:32,440 --> 00:32:36,200
Speaker 3: we can't draw this back in Why people depend on this?

481
00:32:37,160 --> 00:32:41,120
Speaker 3: Oh so you're proving the other point. Once the Democrats

482
00:32:41,600 --> 00:32:47,520
Speaker 3: implement a policy or a program. It never goes away.

483
00:32:48,320 --> 00:32:53,240
Speaker 3: Go back to what I said about State Representative Kyle Brown,

484
00:32:53,560 --> 00:32:57,840
Speaker 3: the Democrat from Louisville, who sits on the Joint Budget Committee,

485
00:32:58,280 --> 00:33:00,680
Speaker 3: that when he was told the number of re flexively

486
00:33:00,880 --> 00:33:06,720
Speaker 3: just shouted out, Jesus, Yeah. It is a confession. It's

487
00:33:06,760 --> 00:33:11,360
Speaker 3: a confession that it is a confession from the party

488
00:33:12,120 --> 00:33:15,320
Speaker 3: that actually built this problem. And they still want you

489
00:33:15,400 --> 00:33:18,400
Speaker 3: to believe that this is a story about global uncertainty

490
00:33:18,560 --> 00:33:23,640
Speaker 3: or federal policy, and most particular Tabor don't buy it.

491
00:33:24,440 --> 00:33:25,920
Speaker 1: The record tells

492
00:33:25,960 --> 00:33:29,960
Speaker 3: An entirely different story, and that record doesn't lie one

493
00:33:30,000 --> 00:33:30,480
Speaker 3: iota