My old pal Chris Richardson, who I first got to know when he was wrangling budgets and potholes as an Elbert County Commissioner, is the reason you’re getting this post today. Chris, now in the Colorado House of Representatives and still one of the sharpest people I know, posted this same basic idea on social media. The question he teed up: What does this order really let the legislature do in the special session? Can they cut spending, or are they locked into hunting for more money to paper over the hole? He’s the kind of guy you should follow on social media if you actually want to learn something instead of just doomscrolling.

TL, DR Version First

The executive order locks the special session to a tight menu of topics. Lawmakers can’t wander off and do across‑the‑board spending cuts or rewrite the whole budget. They’re limited to the subjects the Governor lists in Section III, and he explicitly says “the business…shall be limited to the matters stated in Section III.”

What’s on that menu?

• Tweak reserve/shortfall statutes (24-2-102; 24‑75‑201.5) tied to revenue shortfalls/insufficient revenue. That’s about rules and thresholds, not broad cuts.
• Raise money via the tax code: sell state tax credits (including insurance premium tax credits); “add back” (decouple from) the federal QBI deduction and FDII; trim the insurance “Home Office” rate break; expand “foreign listed jurisdictions” for corporate tax enforcement; and reduce vendor fee allowances for sales‑tax collectors. These all point to revenue increases/anti‑erosion, not program cuts.
• Health care: keep Medicaid flowing to providers H.R.1 knocked out of federal match by changing state law; pump up the state Health Insurance Affordability Enterprise to blunt premium spikes. That’s preserving/redirecting funding, not cutting programs.
• Food security: let the “Healthy School Meals for All” cash fund cover certain SNAP costs. That’s a fund‑use shift to backfill federal pullbacks.
• AI law cleanup: narrow/cheapify SB24‑205 and maybe delay it to reduce its fiscal hit. That’s a cost‑containment policy tweak, not a budget‑wide cut authority.

Also, the hiring freeze is something the Governor orders for executive agencies himself; it’s not asking the legislature to cut staff—he’s doing that via executive directive from Aug 27 to Dec 31.

So can they CUT? Not in the broad sense. The order does not authorize general spending cuts or a reopen‑everything budget rewrite. It corrals lawmakers into (a) revenue‑raisers/decoupling, (b) targeted policy changes to keep Medicaid/SNAP/insurance afloat, (c) reserve‑rule tweaks, and (d) trimming the costs of the AI law.

For context, the Governor frames the crisis as a $783M current‑year deficit after H.R.1, with $1.2B revenue hit this year and more in later years, heavy on corporate‑tax changes—and wants “TABOR‑compliant” actions. That’s his stated basis for the narrow call.

My More Detailed Bottom Line

Colorado’s having a “special session,” which is political code for: lights, cameras, and a very small sandbox. The Governor didn’t open the playpen—he roped it off with caution tape and a bouncer. By law, they can only touch the stuff he listed. He even says it: you’re limited to the list. No kitchen‑sink budget surgery, no grand “we fixed it” montage. Just…this list.

What’s on the list? Mostly revenue plug‑ins and policy duct tape. Lawmakers can slap extra state taxes back on businesses by decoupling from federal write‑offs (QBI, FDII), trim a few niche tax breaks (hello, insurance “Home Office” discount), shrink the sales‑tax vendor fee (sorry, shop owners), and expand the state’s list of tax‑haven jurisdictions so more profits get taxed here. Translation: turn the couch cushions upside‑down and shake out quarters from the business couch.

They can also sell state tax credits – the fiscal equivalent of pawning grandma’s brooch for one‑time cash. It balances a spreadsheet; it doesn’t build a savings habit.

Health care? They’re allowed to rewrite state law so Medicaid keeps paying certain providers (Planned Parenthood), H.R.1 iced out of the federal match, and they can funnel more money into the Health Insurance Affordability Enterprise to muffle premium spikes. That’s not slimming government; that’s sandbagging a flood.

Food security? They can let the school‑meals fund cover some SNAP costs now that D.C. moved the goalposts. Again: move the peas around the plate, don’t eat less.

AI law? They can make SB24‑205 cheaper and simpler (and maybe push the start date), because the current version would cost agencies real money to implement. That’s the rare “cut‑ish” item, policy cuts to avoid spending later, but it’s confined to that statute, not the whole budget.

Meanwhile, the Governor slapped a statewide hiring freeze on his own agencies from Aug 27 to Dec 31 – which is the only true “cut” move you’ll see here, and he didn’t need the legislature for it. Think of it as “we’re not buying new employees this year.”

Why the theater? The Governor says H.R.1 blew a $783 million hole this year (with $1.2B in lost revenue overall) and jammed extra costs onto Colorado, especially in SNAP and Medicaid. That’s a lie. While he screams “balanced budget, the truth be known: Colorado law only requires that the budget is balanced on one day – the day the Guv signs it. It’s like saying you have a lot of money, only it’s payday and you haven’t paid any of your bills yet. In reality, the state is in a structural deficit. The Guv wants “TABOR‑compliant” fixes, but the fixes on offer mostly raise or reallocate revenue and protect programs, not cut spending.

When the Guv screams about Medicaid, you don’t get the whole picture. In Colorado, the state legislature has approved a bunch of “expansive services,” which go above and beyond basic healthcare. Abortion until crowning, healthcare for illegal aliens, “gender affirming” care – all covered in Colorado by Medicaid. Federally, those dollars are being rolled back, so the State Legislature has a decision to make – do they continue to provide those services on Colorado’s dime or cut them? Yet the Guv screams that the Feds jammed extra costs onto Colorado. Wrong – Colorado has a decision to make. Cut the expanded services or continue to virtue signal on the Colorado taxpayers’ dime.

Bottom line, Neighbors: this special session isn’t a scalpel for government bloat; it’s a dustpan for a busted piggy bank. Lawmakers are boxed into tax‑code tweaks, fee trims (on collectors, not the state), program backstops, and one‑off cash moves. If you’re waiting for sweeping cuts? Wrong show. Same capitol, different channel.