NEDERLAND - On February 18, Congressman Joe Neguse addressed the Nederland community during a Town Hall meeting that focused on the Democrats’ strategies for fighting against the Trump Administration’s unconstitutional executive orders.

Neguse reinforced the importance of remaining hopeful that at least a small number of his Republican colleagues could be persuaded to vote against the budget resolution. Unfortunately, the budget, which includes deep cuts to federal spending while supplying a large tax break to the billionaire class, was passed late on Tuesday, February 25. 

House Democrats were unified in opposition, but, despite a furor of disgruntled constituents flooding conservative Town Hall meetings with their complaints, every Republican, except Thomas Massie of Kentucky, voted to approve the resolution, which passed by a vote of 217-215.

Murphy on Budget Resolution

Democratic leaders were diligent in attempting to curtail, and condemn, their Republican colleagues’ efforts to pass the resolution without acknowledging their true intentions.

Senator Chris Murphy of Connecticut released a statement informing the public of the Republicans’ attempt to steamroll the budget resolution through to approval. 

“Republicans forced us to debate their billionaire bailout budget framework. We started voting at 6 p.m. because they knew doing it in the dark of night would minimize media coverage. And they do not want the American people to see how blatant their handover of our government to the billionaire class is,” Murphy wrote.

“The apex of Republicans’ plan to turn over our government to their wealthy cronies is a giant tax cut for billionaires and corporations. And they plan to pay for it with cuts to programs that working people rely on. Popular and necessary programs like Medicaid, Medicare, and SNAP, are all being targeted.

“They took the first step which requires them to pass an outline of their plan, but with it, any senator can offer as many amendments as we want. So my Democratic colleagues and I did just that.

“Republicans were forced to put their opinion on record—many for the first time—on the most corrupt parts of Trump and Musk’s agenda.

“We proposed no tax cuts for anyone who makes a billion dollars a year. We made them vote on whether or not Elon Musk and DOGE should have limitless access to Americans’ personal data. We made them vote on whether to protect IVF and require insurers to cover it.

“Every single amendment Democrats proposed was shot down. On almost every single amendment, Republicans universally opposed it. Every Republican voted against our proposal to prevent more tax cuts for billionaires.

“The corruption and theft is happening in the open here. It’s a fundamental injustice,” Murphy concluded.

Administration’s Executive Summary 

The Executive Summary of the Budget Resolution for Fiscal Years 2025 to 2034 reads: “Today, America’s unprecedented $34 trillion national debt has eclipsed the size of our economy—the largest in the world.

“Our nation’s fiscal state has only worsened under Biden’s failed economic policies and Democrats’ reckless spending. This fiscally regressive combination has added more than $6 trillion to the national debt in just three years.

“House Budget Committee’s budget resolution will rein-in spending and inflation; reignite economic growth and ‘Reverse the Curse’ of a looming debt crisis.”

The summary states that the Republicans’ budget plans would balance the federal budget within 10 years while reducing deficits by $14 trillion, and would grow the economy by 3% a year, creating a $44 billion budget surplus in the year 2034. 

The White House’s official summary of the resolution also reiterates that the budget does not cut Social Security, Medicaid, or Medicare benefits, or cut funding for veterans, for agriculture, or for defense. 

What to cut?

While the budget resolution calls for a $4.5 trillion limit on tax cuts and for a $2 trillion cut from spending over the next decade, it does not specify which taxes or which federal programs should be cut to achieve those goals.   

However, the resolution does dictate that the Energy and Commerce Committee must cut $880 billion from their broad coverage. That committee manages matters of science and technology, communications, consumer affairs, food and drug safety, and public health, including Medicaid and Medicare. 

As the budget resolution is just a blueprint, Democratic leaders fear that the cuts to Medicaid and Medicare will come through any legislation to be drafted by House Republicans.

Congresswoman Diana DeGette, who represents Colorado’s 1st Congressional District and serves on the Energy and Commerce Committee, released a statement on Tuesday, after the budget had passed.

“These cuts can only come at the expense of our seniors, kids, and most vulnerable. When the bill comes to my committee I will fight to expose the danger these cuts pose to my constituents and all Americans. House Democrats will stand united against these extreme cuts,” DeGette said. 

While other Colorado representatives joined DeGette in decrying the outcome of the House vote, Colorado’s Republican leaders defended their positions, stating that the resolution will address fentanyl-trafficking concerns, promote domestic manufacturing, and protect the Child Tax Credit.

“It has been repeatedly stated the plan is to focus on waste, fraud, and abuse within Medicaid and not cut benefits. Medicaid cuts aren’t specifically listed in the resolution.” A press release from Congressman Gabe Evans’ office, released late Tuesday, reads. “Those who conflate the two are more interested in stoking fear amongst Colorado’s most vulnerable instead of telling the truth.”

Actual fraud and abuse?

According to an audit conducted by the Office of Inspector General, Colorado’s Medicaid program overcharged the federal government upwards of $6 million. More than 220,000 payments made from August 2021 to October 2024 were made to health care providers in error, reportedly for Medicaid enrollees who were deceased.

Colorado’s Medicaid officials are disputing the findings in this most recent audit, stating that the auditors used “questionable sources” to gather their data and did not sufficiently confirm that the enrollees in question were in fact dead. 

Previous audits conducted by the Office of Inspector General found that Colorado did not report and refund $637,686 in federal shares of Medicaid overpayment from 2014 to 2020, as well as failing to report another $8.5 million in Medicaid overpayments in “a timely manner.”

Additionally, Colorado failed to report $3.7 million in Medicaid overpayments that were determined by Colorado’s Medicaid Fraud Control Unit. The State did not dispute the findings from these previous audits. 

The 2025 budget resolution passing the House is the first step in the reconciliation process, which Republicans are enacting in an effort to expedite approval of their legislation. The next step involves the budget resolution going to the Republican-controlled Senate for an official vote on its adoption. 

Mass firings

During Congressman Neguse’s Town Hall meeting at the Nederland Community Center, there were several questions and statements from the crowd regarding the impact of the Trump Administration’s mass firing of federal employees.

The Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), which President Donald Trump has previously stated is led by Elon Musk, has been targeting government departments and agencies since its inception. Deferred resignations were first offered, which, the Office of Personnel Management reported, 75,000 federal employees had accepted by February 12.

On February 13, federal offices were ordered to fire a potential 220,000 probationary employees who had been employed only since March, 2024. 

In the following days, 1,000 employees of the Department of Veterans Affairs were ordered to leave their jobs. Only 39 employees of the Education Department were fired, though $900 million has been cut from that department’s Institute of Education Services, resulting in another 170 lost jobs. 

350 employees of the National Nuclear Security Administration were fired; 405 employees of the Department of Homeland Security were fired, with more than half of those coming directly from the Federal Emergency Management Agency; 130 employees of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency were fired; and 50 people were fired from the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services.

All employees of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, a watchdog agency created after the 2008 financial crisis, were ordered by DOGE and the White House to stop their work. 

Roughly 700 employees of the Center for Disease Control and Prevention were fired. The Department of Health and Human Services are refusing to release a final number of the staff fired from the National Institutes of Health, the Food and Drug Administration, and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.

Both the Internal Revenue Service and the Defense Department are poised to lay off thousands of employees, probationary and otherwise, starting next week. The Defense Department will also be instituting a hiring freeze.

Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins and the Agriculture Department expressed their fealty to DOGE and the Trump Administration by willingly firing 2,000 “probationary, non-firefighting employees” on February 14. Some of those workers were reportedly responsible for wildfire mitigation initiatives, including thinning trees and “raking” (removing combustible debris from) the forests. 

Five days after unceremoniously firing 2,000 of their staff, the Agriculture Department realized they had let go several employees who were working to mitigate the country’s bird flu epidemic. The department is now attempting to rehire those workers. 

Effects here at home

A total of 3,400 employees of the U.S. Forest Service, and 1,000 probationary employees of the National Park Service were also fired. This news hit Colorado residents hard, as our natural environment is one of the state’s greatest commodities, and many mountain communities have experienced the tragedy of wildfires firsthand. 

As surely as there is concern surrounding the impact these mass layoffs will have on U.S. National Parks, particularly to their general upkeep during tourist season, the greater concern is to the increased risk of wildfires that these layoffs have created. 

In addition to the fired workers, the Trump Administration’s attempted federal funding freeze has also greatly affected wildfire prevention programs, including the Community Wildfire Defense Grant program, established by former President Joe Biden as part of the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law.

“We are hanging our communities out to dry all over the American West,” Colorado Senator Michael Bennet told the press. Bennet stated that the firing of Forest Service staff will cause many Colorado communities to be at greater risk come spring. 

Despite U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper’s decision last week to allow DOGE and the Trump Administration’s mass layoffs to continue, dismissing the lawsuit against the administration by labor unions, there has been pushback against Musk and Trump’s attempted second round of firings. 

Five bullet points

On Saturday, February 22, Musk issued a threatening email en masse to more than two million federal workers, ordering them to justify their jobs by itemizing their performance over the last work week in five bullet points. Musk stated in the email that a failure to respond would be considered resignation. 

Some government departments acquiesced to Musk’s demands, including the Social Security Administration, the Department of Health and Human Services, and the Department of Transportation. Other agencies, including the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Department of Defense, advised their staff to ignore DOGE’s missive.  

The Office of Personnel Management, who were responsible for the first round of federal firings, and for using its resources to deliver DOGE’s email to the federal workforce, stated on Monday, February 24, that a response to the email was not mandatory and that a lack of response would not result in termination. 

The back-and-forth continued that Monday, however, as Musk doubled down on his original threat to federal employees, while Trump confused the situation by declaring that failing to respond would leave the employee perhaps “semi-fired.” 

But despite DOGE and the Trump Administration “cleaning house,” Democratic lawmakers are still working to ensure that states across the country do not lose critical services, as American voters on both sides of the aisle continue voicing their concerns loudly and directly to their representatives.

Reducing wildfire risk

For Colorado voters, nothing hits so close to home as an increased risk of wildfires. In response to the public outcry after the National Parks Service lost over 1,000 employees, the Department of Interior announced that a freeze on hiring for the parks service had been lifted, and that 7,700 positions were made available for seasonal workers for the entire year.

On Thursday, February 20, U.S. Senators Bennet, (Ranking Member of the U.S. Senate Committee on Agriculture’s Subcommittee on Conservation, Forestry, Natural Resources, and Biotechnology), Ron Wyden of Oregon, John Hickenlooper, Ruben Gallego of Arizona, Jacky Rosen of Nevada, and U.S. Representative Jason Crow reintroduced the Protect the West Act.

The bill garnered support from the National Wildlife Federation, the Southern Ute Indian Tribe, National Association of State Foresters, The Freshwater Trust, National Audubon Society, and Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership, among many others.  

The Protect the West Act is slated to invest $60 billion into reducing wildfire risk, restoring watersheds, and protecting vulnerable communities.

An official press release from Senator Bennet’s office states that the Act will establish an Outdoor Restoration & Watershed Fund, as well as an Advisory Council; make $20 billion directly available to state and local governments; partner with states and Tribes to put $40 billion into mitigation projects that have been backlogged; create, or sustain, over two million quality jobs; and will ultimately save landowners and local governments money in the long run.

“Colorado’s forests, grasslands, and waterways are the bedrock of our outdoor economy. Every effort we make to prevent wildfires and mitigate the impact of climate change is an investment in Colorado’s future,” Hickenlooper stated in the press release.

“As we face a 1,200-year megadrought and wildfire season that never seems to end, we need to break from the status quo and invest in the restoration of our forests and public lands to meet this challenge,” Bennet said. “We have no time to waste.”

If you or someone you know has been affected by the Trump Administration’s mass layoffs of federal employees, The Mountain-Ear wants to share your story. Whether or not you wish to remain anonymous, we want to hear from you, and more importantly, we want the community to hear you.

Please reach out to CKelley@themountainear.com or info@themountainear.com to share your experience and your concerns.