Free State Colorado

Colorado’s crime problems are largely due to policy decisions by our Democrat-controlled State Legislature. And a perfect example of that is Colorado State Senator Janice Marchman who seemed to be more worried about a criminal with a warrant who barricaded himself in a house and shot at law enforcement than the people suffering under her soft-on-crime policies. In a bizarre reply to the Loveland Police Department, Senator Marchman seemed to complain that this man was shot by law enforcement after firing at them. And to make matters worse, another Democrat candidate for the State House previously protested a “Back the Blue” Rally in Berthoud in 2020! Colorado families across the state are reeling from attacks by violent criminals and these same Democrat lawmakers are now inflicting us with anti-gun laws that make it more difficult to defend ourselves. In this video, Brandon explores these recent events and explains that it’s up to us to turn this State around!

Local Government Matters! https://youtu.be/MHafqPC-p50

Have a fantastic Friday Colorado! Politicians have NO right to steal money from your paycheck! And the Federal Government has destroyed the value of the dollar. Government is a system that serves the few at the expense of the many! You deserve to keep the money you earn! And consider precious metals as a store of wealth...

Liberty on the Rocks is back next Wednesday! Simon Walsh will be talking about the Digital Crackdown! See you all there!🔥 When: August 19th (Doors open from 6-9 event Starts at 7) Where: Independence Institute 727 East 16th Avenue Denver https://luma.com/2ud7b43r

Happy Thursday Colorado! I'm sure you've seen people on social media, or maybe even in the real world trivialize infringements on our rights... "It's only common-sense gun control..." "The cameras are only there to catch criminals..." "Digital ID to get online is only there to protect children..." "The tax is only for rich people..." "The new regulation only affects some rental properties..." "Stop overreacting! The new fee is small..." And so on and so on... Soon enough, our society has become a surveillance state, the government has too much power over our lives, and businesses are fleeing the state because it's less profitable to operate here... Almost every problem our government causes began as only a small step...

Colorado’s new limits on sports betting deposits — and credit card ban — to take effect Colorado gamblers will no longer be allowed to use credit cards to make deposits on sports betting apps, and their deposits will be limited to six per day, beginning Wednesday. The new rules are part of the bipartisan Senate Bill 26-131 passed in May by the Colorado General Assembly amid growing concerns over rising addiction, especially among young men and boys. The bill’s sponsors hope the new guardrails will slow bettors, who play frequently as they chase their financial losses. https://www.denverpost.com/2026/08/07/colorado-sports-betting-apps-deposit-limits/

Colorado police warn public to display front license plate to avoid getting car impounded Listen up, Colorado. That front license plate sitting in your glove box, your garage or that drawer where dreams go to die? It’s time to drill some holes and mount it, because police say they’re done asking nicely. The Colorado Springs Police Department issued a blunt warning this week after noticing a spike in vehicles cruising around without front plates, which is illegal under Colorado law. The state requires both a front and rear plate along with current registration, and officers say they will pull you over and, in some cases, impound your car on the spot. https://kygo.com/colorado-police-warn-the-public-to-put-on-a-front-license-plate-or-they-could-impound-your-car/

Colorado voters to decide whether ‘right to natural gas’ should be enshrined in constitution Colorado voters will be asked in November whether they want to enshrine their right to use natural gas in the state constitution. Initiative 177, brought forward by the conservative nonprofit Advance Colorado, qualified for the ballot after proponents submitted the required number of signatures, according to the Colorado Secretary of State’s Office. The “right to natural gas” initiative will be on the Nov. 3 general election ballot. Proponents needed to gather enough signatures from each state senate district to equal 2% of the total registered voters in those districts because the ballot initiative would change the Colorado Constitution. It also needed to meet the 124,238-signature threshold, the secretary of state’s office said in a Thursday news release. https://www.denverpost.com/2026/08/07/colorado-right-to-natural-gas-initiative-177/

Colorado’s Tax Bracket Compared to Other Teams; How It Affects the Avalanche One of the NHL's most debated topics in recent years has been the tax advantage enjoyed by certain teams. Franchises like the Florida Panthers, Tampa Bay Lightning, Vegas Golden Knights, and Dallas Stars, among others, play in states with no state income tax, allowing players to keep more of their salaries than they would in many other NHL markets. This wasn't necessarily viewed as a major competitive edge a decade ago. But during the salary cap's flat era from 2020-25, when every dollar of cap space became increasingly valuable, the discussion became more prevalent as several low-tax teams emerged as perennial Stanley Cup contenders. It's a complicated debate, and under the NHL's current collective bargaining agreement, there isn't an obvious solution, no matter how much the league wants to even the playing field. https://sports.yahoo.com/articles/colorado-tax-bracket-compared-other-222300094.html

Greeley officials search for new Catalyst partner after Weld County declines The city of Greeley will keep searching for a new partner on the Catalyst project after the Weld County commissioners officially declined to support the project Wednesday. The commissioners discussed the offer to partner at their regular meeting Wednesday. Despite their refusal to participate, they all said they want the project to succeed. “That whole project would be absolutely transformational for Weld County in terms of bringing tourism dollars,” Commissioner Perry Buck said. “I do hope they could make it happen on a regional basis, combining the municipalities of Johnstown and Windsor and Greeley, because it was a very, very hard decision not to support it.” Commissioner Chair Scott James reiterated that he believes the county government is meant to provide services to residents, not support large municipal projects — something he wrote in a letter to Greeley Mayor Dale Hall. Commissioner Jason Maxey added it would set a bad precedent for the county, potentially leading other municipalities to seek support for their big projects. https://www.greeleytribune.com/2026/08/06/catalyst-greeley-weld-county-partnership-declined/

EDITORIAL: ‘Progressive’ tax hike would fleece Colorado Voters beware: That petition you might have signed the other day for a pending ballot proposal to “lower your taxes” — actually would raise taxes statewide by over $2 billion. Read the fine print. The disingenuous pitch by some petition circulators — technically true in some cases — obscures the massive tax hike. And it would impose a new and much more complicated tax code on taxpayers. Initiative 195 would replace Colorado’s simple, 4.4% flat tax with a dizzying array of tax brackets ranging from 3.7% for the first $25,000 to 8.4% — nearly doubling the top rate. Coloradans in some lower tax brackets would pay marginally less while those in higher brackets would pay more — some, a lot more. The upshot of the measure overall is it would hand the state government a windfall — at taxpayers’ expense. A legislative analysis estimated the measure would siphon off another $2 billion to $2.7 billion a year of Coloradans’ tax dollars and funnel it into state coffers. That amounts to more play money for lawmakers to create more programs. It also amounts to another ball and chain shackling our state’s economy — which already is turning off new business investment. https://gazette.com/2026/08/05/editorial-progressive-tax-hike-would-fleece-colorado/

Study: Tax refunds gone for ‘foreseeable future’ under Prop NN DENVER–A measure referred to Colorado’s November ballot by the legislature would allow the state to keep and spend over $850 million in just the first two budget cycles after passage, revenue that otherwise would be refunded back to taxpayers. Majority Democrats passed Senate Bill 26-135 during the last legislative session, which placed Proposition NN on the ballot. The measure would allow the state to retain excess tax dollars collected over the current Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights (TABOR) revenue cap to spend on public education and cover homestead property tax exemption reimbursements. According to a new report by the Common Sense Institute, Prop NN would increase state spending by $329.9 million in fiscal year (FY) 2027 and $521 million in FY 2028, totaling $850.9 million over the two years. Those are funds that would otherwise be sent back to taxpayers under TABOR, the constitutional amendment that limits growth of a portion of the state budget to a formula of population growth plus inflation. TABOR also requires voter approval for tax increases, among other things. https://completecolorado.com/2026/08/11/study-tax-refunds-gone-for-foreseeable-future-under-prop-nn/

‘The industry is in the dumps’: Denver distillery announces closure after 10 years DENVER (KDVR) — A Denver distillery announced over the weekend that it will close this year after a decade in operation. The Block Distilling Co., located on Larimer Street in the River North Arts District, said in an Instagram post that it will close after a three-to-four-month “wind down” period, with discounted bottles, one-off releases and events. The distillery did not cite a specific reason for the closure but pointed to trends affecting much of the beverage industry. “The industry is in the dumps and unfortunately our timing sucked,” the post stated. “But let’s boogie together with discounted everything to go out in style.” https://kdvr.com/denver-guide/the-industry-is-in-the-dumps-denver-distillery-announces-closure-after-10-years/

Judge orders Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold to turn over public records A Denver District Court judge has given Secretary of State Jena Griswold until Thursday to comply with an open records request, or she could be held in contempt. The records involve consulting work, paid for with public funds. Griswold's office says it doesn't have the documents and it refuses to ask the consultant for them, claiming that would impose an undue "burden." Instead, the Secretary of State's office sent four employees and the Attorney General's Office sent three attorneys to court. The consultant was brought in two years after Griswold became Secretary of State. The office had become a revolving door. Griswold was on her second deputy secretary, third chief legal counsel and fourth chief of staff. An invoice in the court record shows the state paid Sage River Consulting nearly $25,000 to conduct "leadership development" and make "findings, conclusions, and recommendations." https://www.cbsnews.com/colorado/news/public-records-secretary-of-state-judge-order-colorado/

A Colorado police informant helped kill 2 men after an ‘extraordinary’ plea bargain set him free. The DA kept the deal quiet for years. On a cold February night in the Colorado mountains, assailants kidnapped two men from their Fremont County homes, bound their wrists with zip ties, forced them into a vehicle at gunpoint and drove up an isolated canyon road. Some 10 miles in, the attackers pulled over and forced the men, Rodolfo “Rudy” Santillan-Reyes, 36, and Ryan Roth, 25, out of the vehicle. They shot Santillan-Reyes three times and Roth once, then kicked the men off a ravine, sending them tumbling down the steep slope. Santillan-Reyes fell all the way to the bottom, surviving just long enough to drag himself under a bush. It was an attempt, investigators thought, to hide from the shooters — people he knew. One of the killers in those 2022 slayings was no stranger to the Fremont County Sheriff’s Office. He was a confidential informant who was only out of jail because of a deal he had struck four months earlier with Detective Stephen Krueger and Jeff Lindsey, then a senior prosecutor in the 11th Judicial District Attorney’s Office and now the elected DA. https://www.denverpost.com/2026/08/12/confidential-informant-murders-fremont-county-da-jeff-lindsey/

Denver's homicide surge among highest in the U.S. Denver's homicide spike during the first half of the year is among the highest in the country for major cities, according to preliminary data reviewed by Axios. Why it matters: Deadly crime in Denver is bucking a national trend among the largest cities in the country, which are mostly recording dips in homicides. State of play: An Axios analysis of the Major Cities Chiefs Association's (MCCA) survey of 66 large U.S. communities found drops in violent crime in the first six months of 2026 compared to the same period last year. https://www.axios.com/local/denver/2026/08/11/denver-homicides-among-nations-highest

Colorado police department had access to Flock camera distress detection feature https://www.wandtv.com/news/videos/colorado-police-department-had-access-to-flock-camera-distress-detection-feature/video_648f8bf4-83cd-52e6-aba8-afd17f3f791a.html

New Polis executive order aims to speed up permitting for “strategic industries” Saying that faster permitting and siting is needed for Colorado to stay competitive for national job expansions, Gov. Jared Polis issued an executive order Thursday creating a pilot project to speed government reviews of permit applications in strategic industries. The order establishes a single statewide online portal into which applicants can submit materials to be considered simultaneously by multiple state agencies that are working in conjunction with each other. The portal would share documents between the relevant state agencies, would allow centralized tracking of permit status and ensure that a staffer with visibility into the entire permitting workflow for each program in each responsible agency will prioritize and assign work on the application. While the order envisions that the portal would be used for air-quality, water-quality, hazardous-materials and Energy and Carbon Management Commission permits needed by applicants in seven different sectors, state leaders will choose just one of those sectors by Aug. 15 for implementation of the pilot program. The options include advanced manufacturing, aerospace, bioscience, energy and natural resources, technology and information, electronics and infrastructure engineering. https://tsscolorado.com/new-polis-executive-order-aims-to-speed-up-permitting-for-strategic-industries/

Without enough members, Firestone Town Board can’t conduct business Firestone’s elected government has been at a standstill for nearly three months. Trustee Frank Jimenez has not attended a regular Firestone Board of Trustees meeting since May 20, and his extended, unexplained absence has left the town’s elected government unable to conduct official business. Jimenez notified Mayor Don Conyac in July that he would be unavailable to attend meetings for the foreseeable future but would not resign his seat. Around the same time, according to public records, he listed his Firestone home for sale, further raising questions about when, or whether, he will return. Jimenez did not agree to go on the record with the Times-Call, and Conyac said privacy laws prevent him from disclosing why the trustee has been absent, insisting the circumstances are legitimate. “I know what’s going on, and we should give the guy a break. I’m praying for him. How’s that?” the mayor said. The paralysis is the latest chapter in a political quarrel that began with April’s recall election, when voters removed Trustees Raymond Byrd and Lorna Morton. Only one replacement candidate, Bobby Matthews, filed for the two recalled seats, leaving one vacancy on the six-member board. The mayor is the seventh person on the dais and votes only in the event of a tie. https://www.timescall.com/2026/08/09/firestone-town-board/

TONIGHT: Mash Lab Brewing in Windsor! 6 PM to 9 PM! We have the Upstairs Mezzanine reserved! Please join Liberty on the Rocks NoCo for great networking, community and conversations! This is a great place to make friends and meet new people! If you believe in Liberty, you are invited!