ICYMI: Hickenlooper Op-Ed: Trump’s Agenda Is Punishing Colorado

Hickenlooper has called for an investigation into the Administration's targeting of CO

WASHINGTON - Yesterday, U.S. Senator John Hickenlooper penned an op-ed in The Denver Post highlighting how President Trump's agenda is punishing Colorado. The piece comes after an email revealed that officials at the highest levels of the White House were directed to orchestrate a political retribution campaign against Colorado. Hickenlooper has called for an investigation into the administration's targeting of Colorado, arguing that we need a complete understanding of how federal resources were manipulated to punish innocent Coloradans.

"Government resources belong to the American people. They are not weapons to wield against the president's enemies," Hickenlooper wrote. "Coloradans shouldn't pay the price for the petty grievances and failed policies that make their lives harder. We need to continue holding this administration accountable, fighting back against the president's attacks on Colorado, and lowering costs for working families."

Read the op-ed in full here or below:

Since my first day in office, Trump's agenda has been to punish Colorado (Opinion)

Hickenlooper called for an investigation into the administration's targeting of our state

In January 2021, President Donald Trump was fuming. Staggered by his election defeat, he spent the dwindling days of his first term hellbent on rewriting the results and settling scores with his political adversaries.

My first full day at work as a United States Senator was January 6th. A few days later, we unexpectedly learned that after a secretive Oval Office meeting, Trump had decided to move U.S. Space Command from its historical headquarters in Republican-leaning Colorado Springs to Alabama.

That was just the beginning.

In the years that followed, President Trump's anger toward Colorado only grew. After the Colorado Supreme Court determined in 2023 that he had engaged in insurrection and was therefore disqualified from the ballot under the 14th Amendment, he lashed out at the ruling.

Then, after former Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters was rightfully convicted by a jury of her peers for undermining Colorado's free and fair election system, President Trump embraced her. To most Coloradans, Peters was and is a disgrace. To Trump, she was a martyr.

Upon taking office again, President Trump reversed the Biden administration's permanent basing decision, ordering the fully operational Space Command to relocate to Alabama, threatening thousands of jobs and our military readiness. His administration denied disaster assistance to Colorado communities rebuilding from wildfires and floods. He even vetoed bipartisan legislation to bring clean drinking water to 39 southeastern Colorado communities.

His administration has also moved to dismantle the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) in Boulder, and canceled more than $100 million in transportation grants and hundreds of millions in clean energy investments. They froze funding for child care, food assistance, and other services for vulnerable families. The EPA overrode Colorado's regional haze plan, undermining years of state-led work to reduce pollution. The list goes on and on.

We now know that these relentless attacks weren't merely coincidence. Last week, an email disclosed in court revealed that officials at the highest levels of the White House were directed to orchestrate political retribution against Coloradans.

I've called for an investigation into the administration's targeting of our state. Our country needs to fully understand how federal resources were manipulated to punish innocent Coloradans, both Republicans and Democrats. Government resources belong to the American people. They are not weapons to wield against the president's enemies.

Coloradans are already struggling with the cost of groceries, housing, health care, and other essentials. All across Colorado, families, farmers, and small business owners are struggling to stay afloat. But instead of lowering prices, President Trump and his allies are misusing federal power and putting political priorities ahead of the public interest. We're fighting back.

When President Trump proposed a Department of Justice fund to compensate election criminals like Tina Peters and those who attacked the Capitol on January 6, we led the opposition against it. When Republicans proposed selling up to three million acres of public lands across Colorado and ten other Western states to the highest bidder, we rallied lawmakers from across the aisle to defeat it. When critical weather and climate science was under attack, we held up an appropriations package for weeks over efforts to close NCAR and worked with Democrats and Republicans to protect the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's (NOAA) access to critical weather data.

There's no shortage of pressing problems to fix: the cost-of-living emergency, runaway healthcare costs, and mass deportations that are inflicting terror. These challenges require pragmatic solutions, not grinding political axes. The White House's continued fixation on the 2020 election, Tina Peters, and indeed the state of Colorado, isn't getting us any closer to addressing them.

Coloradans shouldn't pay the price for the petty grievances and failed policies that make their lives harder. We need to continue holding this administration accountable, fighting back against the president's attacks on Colorado, and lowering costs for working families.

John Hickenlooper is a U.S. Senator representing Colorado.

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