HUD SECRETARY SCOTT TURNER AT 2P TODAY He's in town talking about housing affordability and making home ownership possible, and I'm going to ask about HUD's official stance on Housing First, something that has been a colossal failure in my view.
ASK ME ANYTHING It's been a heavy week of news so let's mix it up a bit. You're on deck!
IT'S WINE FESTIVAL TIME! And The Wine Yogi has a whole column on wine festivals around the state if you're the sort who enjoys such things.
DEMOCRAT POLICIES HAVE KILLED COLORADO'S ECONOMIC BOOM And you need look no further than the latest job numbers in Colorado. Colorado LOST JOBS in 2025. Our unemployment rate dropped, but only because so many people have left the workforce that our labor force participation rate, which has always been a strong stat for Colorado, also dropped. Read this from the Denver Gazette:
The state also had one of the lowest job opening rates in 2025, the economist added. Over the last year, the largest job gains have mostly been in the educational and health services sector. It gained 14,200 jobs from January 2025 to 2026. But many private sectors reported losses across the board. The largest declines were in trade, transportation and utilities with jobs down by 4,500 over the year, leisure and hospitality saw 4,400 jobs lost, manufacturing declined by 4,200 jobs and financial activities fell by 4,000. Professional and business services and mining and logging also recorded losses.
Government jobs also fell by 4,000.
We are not alone, 27 states showed a job loss in 2025. Even the left leaning Colorado Sun took notice and asked why this is happening. This is from their story on it.
“This is the seventh time since 1980 that there has been negative job growth,” Broomfield economist Gary Horvath said in an email. “The change in employment for 2025 was not associated with a recession — the others were. Assuming that NBER (National Bureau of Economic Research) does not call a recession, I think something is happening in Colorado that is different than other states.”
He pointed to unsustainable spending by the state that has led to a $1.5 billion budget shortfall, he said. The state legislature approved $4 million last year to support lawsuits against President Donald Trump’s policies (“I’m not suggesting he is right, but 60+ lawsuits is excessive,” Horvath said).
And there continues to be a large number of new policies proposed.
“I think there are about 600 bills in front of the legislature now,” he said. “Our legislation could be more effective if we allowed fewer bills to be introduced.”
In other words, he said, “I think the state has lost its focus on taking advantage of its assets. As a result, our success is hit and miss.”
Ya think? Colorado recovered better and faster from the 2008 recession because TABOR kept spending in check. Since the Democrats found out they could call a tax a fee and get away with it, (thanks useless Colorado Supreme Court) they have jacked up fees on everything. Now we have a stagnating economy.
THE CO CHAMBER OF COMMERCE SAYS IT'S OVER REGULATION DRIVING BUSINESS OUT Or keeping them from coming here. They have a business tracker report that is bad news for Colorado. See it here. So what does it say? Here is the summary:
Since 2019, the Chamber found reports of 98 company relocations or lost opportunities from Colorado to other states – 27 of those were last year alone.
When jobs data was available, the report directly links over 13,600 lost Colorado jobs to these company decisions.
Texas is by far the biggest winner when it comes to attracting Colorado businesses. Overall, 21 companies chose Texas to expand or relocate to.
California was second with 10 companies, North Carolina and Arizona tied for third and fourth with six companies, and Florida was fifth with five companies.
In an analysis of federal SEC filings, the report found that since 2022, Colorado has experienced a net loss of 34 public company headquarters (which includes a total gain of 36 headquarters, but a loss of 70 in that same period).
2024 alone experienced a net loss of 20 headquarters from the prior year (a gain of 9 headquarters with a loss of 29).
2025 has seen the lowest number of total public company headquarters based in Colorado in the years covered in the report (2019 to 2025).
Are we going to wait until we're New York? Trying to beg companies to move here? Or will the legislature get the hint? HAHAHAHA, they won't. CBS Denver's Shaun Boyd covered this brilliantly, as usual.
Watch Governor Jared Polis BLAME THE PEOPLE for the problem. Did you not hear him say, "goes to the fact that people can put things on the ballot and sometimes they can pass". WHAT THE ACTUAL YOU KNOW WHAT IS THIS???? What a crappy thing for him to say. He hates us. He hates any of us who don't want to live in a way he prescribes.
ARTEMIS SPLASHES DOWN TONIGHT And the mission that went further than any other seems to have been a success, even with the toilet malfunctions. You can watch the splash down tonight starting at 7pm.
CHERRY CREEK SCHOOLS IS A MESS And they are having to slash their budget this year. Read more here.
COLORADO COUNTIES LOSE SANCTUARY LAW APPEAL And the Colorado Appeals court sided with the lower court in ruling that counties who want to cooperate with ICE do NOT have the ability to do so under current law. We are stuck with the sanctuary laws Democrats have passed.
LET'S GO PIOS! The University of Denver Pioneer Hockey team is once again in the championship game after beating Michigan in spectacular fashion. DU will face Wisconsin in the National Championship game Saturday at 3pm.
DEMOCRACY HATING DEMS PASS REMAKE OF RTD BOARD Jon Caldara was talking about his earlier in the week. The RTD board, which is currently an elected by the people (DEMOCRACY) board is being re imagined as an appointed by the King Governor Board. There will still be some elected members, but they are also making it harder to qualify for the ballot, which seems counterintuitive. But what do I know.
COLORADO HATES FREE SPEECH And this column by our pal Jimmy Sengenberger revisits the many ways the state keeps losing in court but they still keep trying to limit speech because our legislators genuinely don't care about the US Constitution. Read it all here.
TRANS ACTIVISTS BROUGHT THE FIGHT THEY ARE LOSING ON THEMSELVES This is a GREAT column about the tipping point on trans activism that has led to the huge backlash we are now seeing. Yes, making sure trans people are not discriminated against and are able to live safely and freely is a noble cause. But it went WAY beyond that when the Genderbread person was being shoved into the faces of kindergartens and men with penises demanded access to locker rooms because they said they were female. They pushed to hard, and now they are not happy about being pushed back. Typical male behavior.
RED STATES ARE MORE MARRIED WITH CHILDREN THAN RED And this doesn't bode well for states like ours, where we are already seeing declines in school enrollment and a stagnating economy. This study breaks the numbers down, but married families are fleeing blue states to set up shop in red ones. This is why the red states need illegal immigrants. They don't want to lose political power as their populations decline.
IS A ONE DOLLAR STAMP COMING? The US Postal Service is once again in dire straits and has announced they will stop sending their monthly contributions to the pension system that its retirees rely on. They are in a major cash crunch, and instead of doing what should have been done years ago (mail five or even four times a week for instance) they are probably looking for another cash bailout. The biggest problem the USPS has is that Congress limits a lot of what they need to do to remain competitive. Of course.
ANTI GUN MAYOR WALKS HOME SURROUNDED BY ARMED GUARDS This is just too rich.
SOUTHWEST LOVES THE NEW BAG FEES So much they are raising them. Watch below or click here.
DON'T DROWN, GET PIZZA INSTEAD Papa Giuseppe's is at it again. Watch below or click here.
GOLF'S BUG CAM Watch below or click here.
NEED PHOTOGRAPHY OR VIDEO WORK? Arod and his wife do an AMAZING job.
A BOARD GAME ROOM LOOKS VERY COOL But I am not that devoted to my board games.
MELANIA DOES A PRE EMPTIVE DENIAL And no one is sure why, but I think its clear there is some kind of story about to break and by doing this, she proves malice. Why does that matter? Because before you can prove libel or slander you have to prove the person saying it reasonably knew it was false. That's my theory but you can read this for more.
THE NFL IS BEING INVESTIGATED And this could be very interesting. The NFL anti-trust exemption was given so the game would remain affordable for the fans. Does it feel affordable now? Read it here.
PRE DIGITAL LIFE THAT WOULD DRIVE GEN Z CRAZY I had forgotten about some of these massive inconveniences. Read them all here.
WHAT FOREIGNERS THINK IS WEIRD THAT AMERICANS DON'T This made me laugh this morning because they are kind of weird. Read it here.