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DOJ Challenges Colorado Law Granting In-State Tuition to Undocumented Students
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DENVER7, Approved, State

DOJ Challenges Colorado Law Granting In-State Tuition to Undocumented Students

By: Robert Garrison | Denver7 DENVER — The U.S. Department of Justice is suing Colorado, arguing that the state’s laws granting in-state tuition and certain financial aid benefits to undocumented students violate the Constitution. The complaint was filed Thursday in U.S. District Court in Denver. President Donald Trump’s DOJ claims in the suit that federal law prohibits states from giving postsecondary education benefits to people “not lawfully present” based on state residency unless the same benefits are available to all U.S. citizens regardless of where they live. “An alien who is not lawfully present in the United States shall not be eligible based on residence within a State (or a political subdivision) for any postsecondary education benefit unless a ...
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New Wolf Pack Confirmed in Eagle County as Colorado Monitors Population Growth
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Colorado Politics, Approved, Local

New Wolf Pack Confirmed in Eagle County as Colorado Monitors Population Growth

By Marissa Ventrelli | Colorado Politics A new gray wolf pack has formed in Eagle County, Colorado Parks and Wildlife announced on Wednesday. Known as the Piney Ridge Pack, it is the fourth pack of gray wolves in the state to have produced pups this year. According to CPW, the average litter size for wolves is four to six pups. More information about the packs will be included in the agency’s annual report next spring. “Detection of pups in late spring or early summer is inherently challenging, because of their use of remote habitats in dense cover, secretive nature of very young animals and time potentially underground,” said CPW’s Wolf Conservation Program Manager Eric Odell. “We are continuing to monitor the four reproducing packs in Colorado and will include...
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Town of Hudson Sued Over Approval Process for Planned ICE Detention Center
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The Denver Gazette, Approved, Local

Town of Hudson Sued Over Approval Process for Planned ICE Detention Center

By: Nicole C. Brambila | The Denver Gazette A nonprofit organization filed a lawsuit against the Town of Hudson Wednesday, challenging plans to reopen a former federal prison in the town as a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention facility. Together Colorado, along with Janet E. Carlson, filed the case in Colorado District Court in Weld County, alleging the town is not “powerless to act” and that the proposed detention facility violates the town’s zoning laws. “Under Colorado law, Hudson has not only the authority but the obligation and the duty to treat the proposed facility the way it would treat any other new facility proposed within the Town: by applying and enforcing its own Land Development Code,” the lawsuit says. In addition to the ...
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Colorado sues over Trump election rules tied to homeland security grants
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Rocky Mountain Voice, State, Top Stories

Colorado sues over Trump election rules tied to homeland security grants

By Jen Schumann | Rocky Mountain Voice Colorado joined 24 other states and the District of Columbia on Thursday in suing the Trump administration over new rules that withhold a fifth of the state's counterterrorism grant money unless Colorado shows it meets five federal election requirements. One of the five requirements asks Colorado to plan a change state rules already require. The lawsuit was filed in U.S. District Court in Rhode Island, where judges ruled against DHS in two similar grant disputes last year. One of those decisions is on appeal.  Colorado sued DHS, FEMA, Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin and Robert J. Fenton, the senior official performing the duties of FEMA administrator. "We're suing again, and we'll win again, because the administrat...
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Colorado cut some kinship payments July 1 and told families to get certified. Some can’t.
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Rocky Mountain Voice, State, Top Stories

Colorado cut some kinship payments July 1 and told families to get certified. Some can’t.

By Shaina Cole | Contributing Writer, Rocky Mountain Voice Jody Fountain testified before the Colorado Senate Appropriations Committee on April 14 with a story about a two-year-old boy. The boy had been placed with his mother's boyfriend. It was a kinship placement, the arrangement the state prefers when a child cannot stay with a parent. The boyfriend could not get certified as a foster parent. Something in his distant past disqualified him. Years later, after Fountain adopted the boy, she read the disclosure file. Two weeks before the child was removed and put into foster care, the grandmother had called. The family had no money for food. "I can't help but think about all the children that are going to be placed in this situation as the support disappears for non-certifie...
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Southwest Colorado needs affordability, accountability and balanced representation
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Rocky Mountain Voice, Commentary, State, Top Stories

Southwest Colorado needs affordability, accountability and balanced representation

By Naomi Riess | Guest Commentary, Rocky Mountain Voice For more than three decades, I have worked with families, farmers, ranchers, property  owners, small businesses and local governments across Southwest Colorado. I have  helped people navigate land-use rules, permitting requirements, water issues and  development approvals. Through that work, I have seen how government decisions  made far from our communities can affect whether a family can build a home, whether a  business can expand and whether a landowner can continue using property responsibly.  That is why I am concerned about the direction Colorado is heading.  Families and seniors are watching the cost of housing, insurance, property taxes,  utilities, food and health care con...
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When judges become lawmakers: Brazil’s warning for America’s constitutional balance
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Undercurrent, Approved, Commentary, National

When judges become lawmakers: Brazil’s warning for America’s constitutional balance

By Michael Hancock | Commentary, Undercurrent Substack Brazil Did Not Lose Its Democracy Overnight. It Allowed One Institution to Rise Above the Rest. The greatest threats to constitutional government rarely arrive as revolutions. More often, they arrive as evolutions, unfolding quietly rather than all at once. No tanks roll through the streets. No constitution is suspended. Elections continue. Congress still meets. Presidents still campaign. Courts remain open. Everything appears normal. Until one day it isn’t. What changes is not the existence of democratic institutions but the balance among them. Liberty depends less upon the existence of government than upon the careful distribution of governmental power. The Founders understood this better than mos...
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Colorado’s Medicaid debate: Should lawmakers fix spending before seeking more federal dollars?
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Colorado Accountability Project, Approved, Commentary, State

Colorado’s Medicaid debate: Should lawmakers fix spending before seeking more federal dollars?

By Cory Gaines | Commentary, Colorado Accountability Project Drawing down more Federal money as the solution to Colorado’s Medicaid problem? Have you ever heard the saying, “the first step is admitting you have a problem”? Nash Herman’s piece on the Colorado Medicaid Commission (linked first below) made me think of that. The reason being that, per what he writes about their first meeting, the commission seems to largely be focused on wringing more money out of the Feds than dealing with the bloat that Colorado lawmakers have heaped upon the program since 2014 and Obamacare. Quoting from the piece with embedded links left intact: “The most recent Commission meeting raised questions about the government’s priorities in addressing Medicaid and the state budget. A re...
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Denver Mayor Defends City Policies While Mapping Out Housing Expansion Plan and Universal Childcare Goal
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The Denver Gazette, Approved, Local

Denver Mayor Defends City Policies While Mapping Out Housing Expansion Plan and Universal Childcare Goal

By: Deborah Grigsby | The Denver Gazette Nearly a year after Denver cut city jobs to close a $250 million budget gap, Mayor Mike Johnston used his third State of the City address to promise universal childcare and 20,000 homes as part of a new redevelopment vision connecting seven major sites by transit, bicycle and pedestrian routes. Johnston took center stage on Tuesday at the National Western Center, replacing his 2025 city theme “Capital of the New West” with “the open frontier,” as he laid out an ambitious plan for Denver’s future. Among the guests attending Johnston’s address were Gov. Jared Polis, Attorney General and Democratic gubernatorial nominee Phil Weiser, former Denver mayors Michael Hancock and Federico Peña, and Melat Kiros, the Democratic socialist wh...
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Months of Power Outages Leave Littleton Neighborhood Looking for Solutions
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CBS Colorado, Approved, Local

Months of Power Outages Leave Littleton Neighborhood Looking for Solutions

By: Kelly Werthmann | CBS Colorado It's been a tough week in Colorado if you struggle with the heat, especially if you don't have access to any sort of cooling measures. Residents say that's what happened in the Columbine Hills neighborhood in Littleton when the power went out for hours at a time. And they say this has been happening since last summer. "We feel like prisoners in our own neighborhood," said resident Brandon Darnell. Darnell s ays he's pretty sick of losing power at his Littleton home. He says it's never a brief outage. "It's a while. It's like, I think at minimum usually four hours," said Darnell. He says it has cost him money. "I've had to throw a lot of money worth of meat away," said Darnell. And it's affected his job. ...
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