Colorado Lawmakers Face Tough Choices As Medicaid Drives Increased Spending

By Marianne Goodland | Colorado Politics

This week, the state Senate is reviewing revisions to the 2025–26 state budget, which has been reduced by hundreds of millions of dollars in each round of cuts.

But the bottom line is that, because of Medicaid costs, the state will spend more in 2025-26 than lawmakers approved in the 2025 session.

Last week, the 29 bills in the supplemental package were approved by the House, with most passing with broad support.

That didn’t mean all of them did: bills changing the budgets for the departments of state, treasury, health care policy and financing, personnel, public health and environment and higher ed all passed largely along party lines.

A supplemental for the Department of Corrections, which increased its budget by $29 million to account for higher medical costs and more prison beds, got 17 “no” votes from Republicans and progressive Democrats.

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