In the suit, which is led by Neguse, the two Colorado representatives join 10 other Democratic lawmakers in alleging that ICE is violating a federal law that allows members of Congress to enter detention centers for unannounced visits. As lawmakers have made more of those visits amid ICE’s mass-deportation program, several — including Crow — have been denied access under a new policy requiring seven days’ notice.

That policy runs counter to a federal law first adopted in 2019, the lawmakers argue.

“Blocking members of Congress from oversight visits to ICE facilities that house or otherwise detain immigrants clearly violates federal law — and the Trump administration knows it,” Neguse, the fourth-ranking member of the House Democratic caucus, said in a statement. “Such blatant disregard for both the law and the constitutional order by the Trump administration warrants a serious and decisive response, which is why I’m proud to lead the lawsuit we proceeded with earlier today.”

The suit was filed in federal court in Washington, D.C. It names ICE and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, which oversees ICE, as well as Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and ICE’s acting director.

An email sent to ICE spokespeople was not immediately returned Wednesday.

Crow, who supported the legal requirement that congressional members get uninhibited access to the facilities, attempted to visit the privately run ICE detention center in Aurora earlier this month. He told The Denver Post last week that he wasn’t allowed in, and he said he and other lawmakers were exploring legal options.

In a statement Wednesday, he wrote that “oversight is a fundamental responsibility of Congress.”

The suit alleges that all 12 lawmakers involved had sought and were denied access to facilities, either in person or through advanced notification. The House members argued that oversight was more important now, as ICE’s arrests have increased significantly and the agency has sought to open additional facilities, including in Colorado.

“Concerns regarding poor conditions in ICE facilities predate the current administration, but recent news reports suggest that detention conditions have drastically deteriorated as the number of individuals in ICE custody has risen,” the lawsuit says.

“In some cases, detainees are being denied medical care, forced to sleep on the floor in overcrowded cells, and severely underfed, with potentially deadly consequences.”

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“It is significant, and every day we wait, the deeper the cuts we will have to make as we go through this,” said Mark Ferrandino, Gov. Jared Polis’ budget director.

Because of how Congress wrote the tax bill, the new projected $955 million shortfall is already being felt — meaning the annual state budget that came into effect on July 1 is now significantly out of balance, Ferrandino said. Trump signed the federal bill into law on July 4.

The shortfall is from the legislature’s general fund, which this year was roughly $16.7 billion in a total budget of $44 billion. Lawmakers had already been bracing to return to the Capitol in mid-August, and Wednesday morning’s leadership meeting at the Capitol appeared to erase any doubt that Polis will call legislators back for a special session to solve the budgetary sinkhole that’s opened beneath the state’s feet.

If lawmakers wait until their scheduled return in January, Ferrandino warned, the cuts will be steeper and may top $2 billion. Already, state officials have asked departments to stop any maintenance they’ve scheduled but haven’t yet paid for. Polis’ office earlier had told state agencies to prepare for 2.5% cuts next year, and his team has now asked how much of that savings they can realize immediately.

For taxpayers, the projections include that TABOR refunds expected for the 2026 tax year now won’t materialize, though 2025 tax year refunds are locked in. According to an analysis by legislative staff, $143.9 million in the state’s lost revenue comes from temporary deductions for taxes on tips and overtime for Coloradans, plus $243.2 million from changes to standard and itemized deductions and personal exemptions.

Assuming lawmakers gather next month, they will have few options to fill the hole, none of which are particularly easy or appealing.

Rebalancing the budget will require significant cuts, and it’ll also likely mean dipping into the state’s reserve fund. Lawmakers will also probably discuss raising revenue, too, though options on that front are limited by requirements for voter approval under the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights.

Still, lawmakers could eliminate certain tax loopholes.

“Pain. What’s coming is pain,” Sen. Jeff Bridges, a Greenwood Village Democrat who chairs the powerful Joint Budget Committee, said outside the committee meeting room. “… Even my colleagues don’t realize how brutal it’ll be to cut a billion dollars from a budget that we already cut by a billion dollars.”

Backed by congressional Republicans — including all four of Colorado’s Republican U.S. House members — the tax bill slashed $4.5 trillion in taxes nationally, cut Medicaid funding and shifted new costs onto states. The changes will trickle down to state budgets, since state income taxes are influenced heavily by the federal tax code — and Colorado is one of four states that immediately implement federal tax changes, Ferrandino said.

$1.2 billion hit to revenue

In all, the moves are expected to strip $1.2 billion in revenue from Colorado in the current fiscal year, state budget officials said, followed in years to come by lesser amounts that still run into the hundreds of millions of dollars. According to the state economists’ analysis, much of that revenue loss — nearly $770 million — is because of corporation-related tax changes.

This year’s $955 million shortfall is slightly smaller than the total revenue loss because the state had expected to deliver taxpayer refunds under TABOR. Now the state will fall below the TABOR cap, which ate up some of the revenue loss. (Wednesday’s $1.2 billion revenue loss projection was worse than an initial estimate, issued earlier this month, that the hit could reach as high as $800 million.)

Two tax credits aimed at lower-income families — a higher state match of the Earned Income Tax Credit and the family affordability tax credit — won’t be available in the 2026 and 2027 tax years, Ferrandino said.

At the same time, the state will have to pay more than $237 million in property tax rebates to local governments in the 2026 tax year, too. Normally, that would be pulled from money that’s above the TABOR cap. Because the tax bill wiped out TABOR refunds for the 2026 tax year, though, it will have to come from the legislature’s primary spending account, the general fund.

What’s more, the immediate budgetary challenges described Wednesday don’t include other looming impacts on the state from the tax bill.

Colorado will have to shoulder hundreds of millions of dollars in new spending to cover Medicaid and food assistance because of the tax bill’s cuts, though those impacts generally won’t take effect until 2027. That’s a separate — but still thorny — issue that lawmakers will have to plan for and solve, likely starting in the next regular legislative term in January.

A difficult special session

The looming special session is likely to be bruising, given the depth of the budget hole facing lawmakers and the interplay of a legislature controlled by Democrats responding to a tax-cutting bill passed by the Republican Congress.

Conservative groups have already started criticizing Democrats for continuing to tax overtime starting next year — rather than adopting the tax bill’s changes — while Democrats have blasted Republicans for passing the tax bill in the first place.

“I am particularly shocked that our congressional delegation would have voted for a bill that has this kind of impact to us,” House Speaker Julie McCluskie said.

On Wednesday, the legislative leadership began laying the groundwork for the policy — and rhetorical — fights to come: The two top Republicans, minority leaders Rep. Rose Pugliese and Sen. Cleave Simpson, questioned why lawmakers needed to return now and referenced Republican complaints that the state has overspent its wallet.

“Is (the tax bill), overall, just compounding a structural deficit that this body has been aware of for several years — that Colorado is on a pattern of spending that could not be supported by revenue stream?” asked Simpson, of Alamosa. “And now we’re going to overlay, again, potentially a $1.2 billion impact in that structural deficit.”

But the executive committee’s Democrats, along with Ferrandino, said the tax bill was a separate and unrelated issue that had been levied upon the state by Congress.

“Right now, we don’t have the cash to pay our bills,” Ferrandino said. “That’s different than where we are long term within the structural issues. Just to be clear, those structural issues will get worse because of” the tax bill.

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Amy Parks asked Weinberg about allegations she had heard about him sexually harassing women at a prominent conservative leadership event earlier that year, Parks told The Denver Post. Weinberg denied the allegations, Parks said, and the two talked about the Loveland-based House seat that Weinberg had been appointed to fulfill as the successor to McKean, the late House minority leader.

Weinberg had beat three candidates for the vacancy committee’s appointment earlier that month. Parks had nominated one of the other contenders, Kristy Hall, and she said that she told Weinberg in the call that he needed to improve his behavior or he risked losing his next election.

According to Parks, Weinberg replied that if Hall challenged him again, he would “kick her in the pussy.”

Taken aback, Parks told him that sounded “Trumpy.”

“Trump uses his hands,” Weinberg replied, according to Parks. “I use my feet.”

Parks said she took the comment not as a physical threat but as a crass warning that he would easily defeat Hall. It was part of a pattern of inappropriate comments and behavior that Weinberg exhibited during his time as the chair of the Larimer County Republican Party, according to nearly a dozen people who experienced or witnessed interactions with Weinberg.

Those accounts have come to light a few weeks after three women publicly accused Weinberg of making sexually inappropriate comments at Leadership Program of the Rockies events in 2021 and 2022. While Weinberg has denied those allegations and questioned why they were being raised now, The Post found that officials — both at the leadership program and in Larimer County — were aware of his alleged behavior before he entered the legislature.

Weinberg declined to comment when reached by phone. He did not respond to questions sent by email Monday morning. An email sent to his attorney last week was not returned.

Several people, including former party officials and volunteers, alleged to The Post that Weinberg frequently berated board members and volunteers for minor slights, like arriving late or disagreeing with him. A Republican colleague in the House, Rep. Brandi Bradley, said Weinberg has made inappropriate remarks as a legislator.

She filed a complaint with House Speaker Julie McCluskie on Friday accusing Weinberg of copying a master key to doors in the Capitol. In January, McCluskie wrote to the House’s top Republican that House staff had investigated Weinberg for accessing another lawmaker’s office without her permission, according to a copy of the letter obtained by The Post.

Four women who have known or worked with Weinberg in Larimer County — Tasha Carr, Nancy Rumfelt, Kristin Grazier and another woman who requested anonymity out of fear of retaliation — told The Post that they’d blocked his phone number or knew not to pick up if he called late at night, when they suspected he had been drinking and was more likely to yell. Several people approached the Larimer County GOP to raise concerns about the lawmaker in summer 2023, a few months after he’d joined the legislature and departed his local party post.

Grazier, who succeeded Weinberg as county party chair, said: “It would be fair to say I’ve experienced bullying (and) abusive, offensive and disrespectful behavior.”

“It was more than once,” she said. “It was many times, and it was to varying degrees.”

After a reporter reached out to Weinberg last week, eight people who worked with or volunteered for the party under him then contacted The Post. All praised his leadership and said they’d never seen him act inappropriately or yell at anyone.

Several questioned the political motives of those alleging otherwise.

“I’ve never seen him ever do anything, say anything, to a person that was bad,” said Kathy Nelson, who said she met Weinberg in 2020 and then volunteered for the party. “He does have a leadership personality — he’s not a shrinking violet. But as far as anything mean or too forceful or nasty — no, nothing like that.”

Cyndi Fronapfel, who worked for the party under Weinberg, said he would at times raise his voice in excitement or call people out. But she said none of his behavior struck her as inappropriate, and she defended him as a motivated and passionate leader.

Others, though, described being berated by Weinberg at meetings and on phone calls. Former volunteer Kristi Smiley said Weinberg called her after a meeting at Colorado State University and yelled at her, as her husband listened on.

The gist of the call, she said, was that she was worthless and could either back Weinberg 100% or leave.

Carr said Weinberg yelled at her after she questioned him in a meeting, prompting her to get up and leave. She provided emails sent to or about Weinberg in 2021 and 2022. In one, she said his texts were inappropriate. He replied, saying they weren’t.

In another, he apologized for an interaction the previous night and for his “blunt approach.” In a third, from January 2022, Carr wrote a lengthy email to other party officials about Weinberg’s “bullying, abusive and controlling behavior, as well as embarrassing or sexually inappropriate remarks.” She wrote that the board needed to get involved.

Challenging ‘style of communication’

More than year later, in summer 2023, Carr, Smiley and at least four other people approached the Larimer County GOP about Weinberg. Though most of the public testimony was about his behavior, some also criticized his decision to sign a letter supporting a transgender legislator in Montana, who had been barred from that state’s House floor after a tense debate about gender-affirming care. Weinberg’s signature on the letter earned him a reprimand from the Colorado Republican Party.

The concerns about his behavior prompted the county party’s board to adopt a new policy setting conduct expectations for its members, Grazier, the board chair at the time, said. It also required them to treat each other with respect and directed them not to use “force, threat, humiliation” or other inappropriate means to try to persuade or influence someone, according to a copy reviewed by The Post.

The board briefly debated taking a vote to distance itself from Weinberg but decided against it, Grazier said.

Hall, Weinberg’s onetime opponent who was serving on the board then, said the board took a vote of no confidence in him. Grazier demurred when asked about that, citing the confidentiality of executive session meetings. She said the board’s deliberations could be interpreted as a no-confidence discussion, though she denied that such a vote took place.

Weinberg was repeatedly asked to speak to the board, Grazier said, but declined. Hall said the board wrote him a letter.

“We communicated to Mr. Weinberg that we in no way supported his style of communication and the inappropriate language that was being used with women,” Hall said. “And we expected things to change.”

The new allegations come after three women accused Weinberg earlier this month of sexually harassing them at a conservative organization’s events in 2021 and 2022. Two women — Jacqueline Anderson and Heather Booth — publicly accused Weinberg of making sexually inappropriate comments to them at Leadership Program of the Rockies events.

A third woman released an anonymous statement making a similar accusation. All three accounts included allegations from the same Leadership Program event.

The third woman, who spoke to The Post on condition of anonymity, said Weinberg seemed intoxicated and pressured her to steal a flag and leave a hotel bar with him in February 2022. The woman repeatedly refused and grew increasingly uncomfortable with Weinberg’s persistence, she said, until a bystander intervened and walked the woman to her room.

The bystander, a man who also requested anonymity out of fear of retaliation, confirmed the woman’s account to The Post.

The woman said she woke up the next morning “totally disgusted” and reported the allegations to Luzon Kahler, the vice president of the Leadership Program of the Rockies’ 2022 class. The woman said she later spoke with the program’s president, Shari Williams, and that she was told that Weinberg would be banned from future events and that organizers were aware of other concerns raised about him.

In a brief phone call last week, Kahler said she didn’t have time to talk and then hung up. Williams did not return messages seeking comment.

Lawmaker disputes ‘false accusations’

Weinberg has denied those allegations of harassment.

“False accusations have been made against me and they are simply not true,” he said in a social media post earlier this month, prior to being contacted for this story. “These claims, nearly four years old, were never mentioned when I ran for office. Now, the moment I announce my run for Republican leadership, they suddenly surface. I will not be intimidated by political smear tactics.”

On Facebook, he’s also shared several letters signed by legislative staffers praising him.

Sandra Aste, the current chair of the Larimer County Republican Party, did not return an email seeking comment for this story. After the harassment allegations were reported publicly this month, the party wrote on social media that the accusations were “deeply concerning on multiple levels.”

“We understand the seriousness of this situation and the impact it may have on the parties involved and our community,” the party wrote.

All three of the sexual harassment allegations were sent to Weinberg’s House Republican colleagues earlier this month, after Weinberg announced that he would pursue a legislative leadership position.

He later dropped his candidacy for minority whip. The harassment allegations were forwarded to the House’s Workplace Harassment Committee, and Minority Leader Rose Pugliese, the chamber’s top Republican, said on social media that legislative leaders “take these allegations seriously.”

In an interview Friday, Bradley, a Littleton Republican who had also vied for the same leadership position, accused Weinberg of making inappropriate comments to her.

Bradley said she’d previously raised concerns to House leadership about Weinberg’s behavior. Later Friday, she filed an ethics complaint with McCluskie, a Democrat who is the House’s top official, accusing Weinberg of “belligerent” behavior while under the influence of alcohol.

She also accused him of copying a master key to unlock doors in the Capitol. She provided emails to The Post between Bradley and the Colorado State Patrol, which provides security for the building, referencing a January investigation into the matter.

In her January letter to Pugliese, McCluskie wrote that Weinberg had entered another lawmaker’s office without that legislator’s permission. He told leadership he did not have his own master key but had taken a key from a senior House staffer. McCluskie wrote that if Weinberg had a master key, he must turn it over. She called the matter “very serious,” warned that Weinberg might face disciplinary action and said it was “imperative that Rep. Weinberg never does this again.”

Weinberg didn’t respond to a separate email about Bradley’s allegations sent Monday afternoon. Earlier, Bradley accused leadership of not doing enough in response to her concerns.

In a statement from earlier this month, Pugliese and Rep. Ty Winter, the assistant minority leader, said that Bradley’s assertions that they hadn’t responded to her were “patently false.” They indicated that Bradley needed to file a complaint with the harassment committee and that members “are only accountable to each other and their constituents.”

Pugliese declined to comment further Monday, pointing to the caucus’ previous statement. Through a spokesman, McCluskie declined to comment on Bradley’s complaint.

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The lawsuit, filed in Denver District Court, argues that House Bill 1296 violates the state’s Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights, or TABOR, which requires voter approval before the state can levy new taxes. HB-1296, which Polis signed into law in May, requires the state to continue taxing overtime starting next year — and it was passed in anticipation of a provision in Congress’ tax bill this month that will temporarily allow workers to deduct a large portion of overtime from their federal taxes.

Colorado’s law was drafted as federal debates about cutting taxes on overtime — a campaign promise by President Donald Trump — were developing. Now lawmakers are grappling with the potential for hundreds of millions of dollars in cuts to state funding resulting from the final tax bill.

The new suit, which Democrats dismissed as a political stunt, was filed by Advance Colorado and Republican Sen. Barbara Kirkmeyer, as well as by a Fremont County commissioner, Kevin Grantham — a former Senate president — and two Coloradans who receive overtime pay.

Income declared on earners’ state tax return is typically influenced by what is on their federal tax forms. The suit alleges that restarting the overtime taxation at the state level constitutes the creation of new revenue, which would require voter approval, and it asks a judge to invalidate the law.

The state legislation didn’t necessarily create a new tax, though it changed the collection mechanism to ensure that tax on overtime was still collected regardless of federal changes. Functionally, it continues a tax on overtime income that the federal government now allows to be deducted to a significant degree — up to $12,500 annually — for the next four years.

Michael Fields, the president of Advance Colorado, accused Democratic lawmakers of trying to sidestep TABOR and voter approval.

“It’s an add-on — they’ve added it back on,” Kirkmeyer said of the bill’s Democratic supporters. “So the federal government has eliminated it, even if it’s only for a couple of years,” and the state law “added it back in, which would’ve created a new tax.”

The Democratic sponsors of HB-1296 criticized the lawsuit as political posturing. Advance Colorado, which was heavily involved in last year’s property tax policy wars, is also pursuing a ballot initiative to block state taxation of overtime and tips, which also received a new deduction from Congress.

At the same time, lawmakers also bracing for a likely special session next month to grapple with the tax bill’s steep impacts, an emergency gathering that will likely include discussions around overtime taxation.

“The complaint contains errors of both fact and law,” Sen. Mike Weissman, an Aurora Democrat, said. “Advance Colorado is a political organization, and the complaint is a political document.”

Rep. Yara Zokaie, a Fort Collins Democrat, said the legislation “is not a new tax or a tax increase.” She dismissed the lawsuit as a “political stunt by far-right actors.”

The lawsuit — and the bill it seeks to invalidate — land at the intersection of TABOR and the seismic changes unfurling from Trump’s massive tax bill.

Policymakers are already wrestling with the bill’s impacts for the state: The legislation’s tax cuts are projected to cost the state’s already razor-thin budget as much as $800 million by the end of the fiscal year next June, and the suit represents a preview of the tense debates that are likely to unfold should lawmakers return to the Capitol next month to solve the shortfall.

The lawsuit alleges that continuing to tax overtime in 2026 — as required by HB-1296 — would generate $400 million to $600 million in additional revenue from taxpayers. While Fields and Kirkmeyer argue that represents money that should stay in Coloradans’ pockets, the lawsuit’s success would require lawmakers to make the same amount of cuts to state programs and services.

Shelby Wieman, a spokeswoman for Polis, declined to comment on the merits of the lawsuit.

But, she added in a statement, “one thing is for certain: the impacts of the President’s big, bad bill, which is backed by Senator Kirkmeyer, will kick people off their health care and raise costs on everyone. Just last week insurance companies announced premium increases of 28% because of non-renewal of credits in the big bad bill.”

Kirkmeyer acknowledged that the lawsuit’s success would require additional cuts. But she accused Democrats of overspending and failing to prepare during the well-moneyed days of the pandemic.

She castigated the continued tax on overtime as “shameful.”

“That’s why we have a structural deficit,” she said. “Not because of TABOR, not because of (the tax bill) and President Trump. It’s because of this continual overspending.”

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Polis’ office made the announcement late Tuesday afternoon after releasing the results of the online survey, which found that nearly 94% of its 87,686 respondents rejected the idea. Only 3,330 people said they wanted the bridge to proceed.

In a statement, Polis sought to embrace the public’s rejection of the project and pirouette away from a bridge that he and his office had championed for the past eight months, despite opposition from neighborhood groups and legislators. Though unscientific, the results since the survey was launched early last week showed intense opposition.

“Coloradans were clear, and I will stop the pedestrian walkway in its tracks,” he said.

Dropping the project means the state will absorb roughly $1.5 million in design costs for the meandering bridge, which would’ve connected the Capitol with Lincoln Veterans Memorial Park by crossing over Lincoln Street. Polis’ office had billed the project as part of a celebration of the state’s 150th birthday next year.

But even before the survey, Polis’ bridge proposal faced a tough road to approval.

A six-member panel of lawmakers that weighs in on capital projects was staunchly opposed. Several of the members rejoiced at the news that Polis backed off the proposal.

“It’s clear what the people of Colorado want us to focus on, and there’s no doubt they want us to focus on things that affect their everyday lives: affordability, good schools, good roads and public safety,” Sen. Kyle Mullica, a Thornton Democrat and the vice chair of the committee, said.

He added: “I don’t know that I’ve ever seen a poll that clear. Ninety-three, 94%. That’s just bananas.”

Polis sought to pay for the project with a mix of public money and private donations. His office estimated the walkway itself would cost up to $20 million, to be paid for with about $8 million from the governor’s discretionary fund and the remaining coming from private fundraising.

The project would take another $8.5 million for related work on the Capitol grounds. That would likely need to come from state coffers — all while the state is reeling from $1.2 billion in cuts to planned spending this year and preparing for another $700 million in cuts next year, along with the impacts of federal belt-tightening.

“I am glad that Coloradans came together to make their voices heard, and that the governor respected the overwhelming majority who do NOT want to see this pedestrian walkway advance,” Capital Development Committee chair Rep. Tammy Story, a Conifer Democrat, said in a statement. “Now, I hope we can come together, as a state, to focus on prioritizing the needs of everyday Coloradans in the face of unprecedented cuts to our vital safety net programs.”

Sen. Byron Pelton, a Sterling Republican who sits on the capital committee, said that with its four Democrats and two Republicans united in opposition to the proposal, his only surprise was that survey opposition wasn’t higher than 94%.

“The whole thing was completely out of touch,” Pelton said Tuesday. “We have a lot of other things to worry about with our budget — and not a special pet project of the governor.”

Sen. Matt Ball, a Denver Democrat whose district includes the Capitol, gave Polis kudos for backing off the project in the face of “overwhelming opposition.”

Ball had previously voted against advancing the plan in June as part of an advisory committee for Capitol projects. The survey confirmed what he thought and had been hearing from constituents and neighborhood organizations, such as Capitol Hill United Neighborhoods, opposing the project.

“I had yet to hear from someone who was in support,” Ball said. “It was all opposition.”

With the proposal in the dustbin, Polis’ office said it will “continue to work with the community on how to best celebrate” the anniversary of Colorado’s entry into the United States, as well as the country’s 250th birthday next year.

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The state Department of Labor and Employment provided records to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in response to three subpoenas from the agency this year, Polis’ office said. One of those was a request that state officials “erroneously” complied with. The Marijuana Enforcement Division provided records to ICE in response to another request.

That information, newly confirmed to The Denver Post, comes as state agencies have now acknowledged receiving nine immigration-related subpoenas this year from the Trump administration. Whether to comply has stoked political tension internally as well as with immigrant-rights advocates since state law generally prohibits government employees from turning over personal identifying information to ICE.

The exceptions are if the state is ordered to comply by a judge or if the information is sought as part of a criminal investigation.

The state did not turn over records in response to five of the ICE subpoenas received this year, including one that Polis had initially decided to comply with before he was ordered not to by a Denver judge.

One subpoena, sent to the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment, sought a list of all individuals born in Colorado on a specific date in February in 2004 and 2005. In an email to ICE agents in March, a state attorney said the agency couldn’t provide the records because the state didn’t keep lists of that nature.

Polis spokeswoman Shelby Wieman said in an email that one subpoena sent to the labor department shouldn’t have been complied with. That subpoena sought wage and employment records from an employer whose name was redacted from the document before it was provided to The Post.

“We are implementing procedures to ensure that erroneous sharing does not happen in the future, including elevating any potential responses to (Department of Homeland Security) subpoenas to the Governor’s Office for review and approval,” she wrote.

In a follow-up email, Wieman said a labor department employee “produced records in response to a subpoena request without first getting final approval from department leadership or the Governor’s Office.” The agency then reassigned “subpoena response duties to a higher authority.” She did not respond when asked if the employee had been disciplined.

The department also “critically analyzed its current subpoena process, implemented stricter protocols, and provided additional training to staff members involved in the subpoena process and how to elevate requests.”

Sen. Julie Gonzales, a Denver Democrat who sponsored legislation limiting data-sharing with ICE, said she wanted to know what processes the state had been following to ensure compliance with the law, and what processes officials will follow now.

“What is the process now? And when should we expect that in writing, so that everybody in the state is clear?” she said Tuesday.

The three subpoenas that Wieman said were correctly fulfilled all involved alleged criminal investigations. In emails to agency officials provided to reporters Tuesday, an ICE agent said one subpoena was related to “waste, fraud and abuse” investigations and not immigration.

Two were sent to the labor department in February. One involved an investigation into human trafficking, according to the document, and the other was an investigation related to human and drug trafficking. Both sought employment records from specific companies.

The narcotics subpoena stated that the investigation “includes numerous victims from other countries.”

The subpoena sent to the marijuana regulators also sought employment data.

Tuesday’s disclosure, provided by Wieman, is the first time that state officials have acknowledged complying with subpoenas from ICE. The labor department earlier told The Post that it had received four subpoenas; the Colorado Sun reported late last week that the agency had received seven subpoenas.

The marijuana regulatory division and the health department each received one such request.

Spokespeople for the state had previously refused to turn over the subpoenas or say if they’d complied with them, citing exemptions in state public records law allowing records related to criminal investigations to remain private.

Then, early Friday evening, the labor department released several of the subpoenas it had previously withheld. A spokeswoman for the marijuana enforcement division told The Post this week that it couldn’t turn over the records, shortly before Wieman released the document to The Post and other media outlets.

A spokeswoman for the labor department did not immediately respond when asked why the state chose not to respond to the other subpoenas they’ve received from ICE so far this year. Wieman said that the “state makes determinations about which subpoenas to respond to based on state and federal law.”

The disclosure came shortly after Attorney General Phil Weiser’s office announced Tuesday morning that it had filed a lawsuit against a Mesa County sheriff’s deputy who had flagged a University of Utah student to ICE. That was an apparent violation of state law prohibiting such conduct.

Gonzales, the Denver senator, said the AG’s lawsuit showed that state law was clear about acceptable and prohibited data-sharing with immigration authorities.

“What I’m unclear about is whether or not the governor of the state of Colorado is following the law as we clearly sought to (write it), and as we worked with his team to craft,” she said.

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Weiser filed a civil complaint against Investigator Alexander Zwinck alleging the deputy knowingly assisted in federal immigration enforcement by sharing information about 19-year-old Caroline Dias Goncalves in a Signal group chat, which is prohibited by state law.

The attorney general’s office is also launching a wider pattern-and-practice investigation into the Signal group chat, which included a number of Colorado law enforcement agencies, to find out whether other state departments also assisted in federal immigration enforcement, Weiser said.

The deputy purposely stalled Dias Goncalves so federal immigration officers could get into position to arrest her, and passed on details about the make and model of her car, her license plate and her direction and timing of travel to the federal officers, knowing it would be used for immigration enforcement, Weiser said during a news conference.

Zwinck later congratulated the federal officers when they detained the student, Weiser said.

“These actions by the sheriff’s deputy were for the sole purpose of immigration enforcement,” Weiser said.

Zwinck could not be reached for comment Tuesday.

Colorado law prohibits local law enforcement officers from carrying out civil immigration enforcement and largely blocks local police agencies from working with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

The state’s investigation into Zwinck also found at least one other instance in which he unlawfully participated in federal immigration enforcement, Weiser said, noting that one officer commented that the deputy would be named “ERO interdictor of the year,” a reference to ICE’s Enforcement and Removal Operations division.

Weiser brought the civil complaint — a lawsuit — against Zwinck individually because that is the path established for violations of this particular state law, he said. The violation is not a criminal offense.

Zwinck can contest the attorney general’s allegations — in which case the state would pursue a court order prohibiting Zwinck from continuing to help with federal immigration enforcement — or he can admit the law violation and voluntarily agree to stop such enforcement in a court-enforced agreement known as a consent decree, Weiser said. The office could also pursue fines against Zwinck.

“The problem here is this deputy did the job of federal immigration enforcement, stepped outside of the role he should have been following,” Weiser said. “And that was the line he should have been following.”

Dias Goncalves, who attends the University of Utah, came to the U.S. from Brazil with her family when she was 7 and overstayed a tourist visa. She has a pending asylum application, according to the Salt Lake Tribune.

Zwinck pulled her over on June 5 on Interstate 70 near Loma because she was following a semitrailer too closely. At about 1:40 p.m., he shared a picture of her driver’s license in the Signal group chat so that federal agents could run her information through a number of databases that are only accessible to them, Weiser alleged in the lawsuit.

“Not seeing crim history, but I believe she has immigration issues,” a federal officer responded. “We are confirming.”

Zwinck at that point should have ended the traffic stop, Weiser said. Instead, he questioned Dias Goncalves about her accent and where she was from — she said she was born in Brazil. He shared his location with the federal agents, who responded that they were en route. He kept Dias Goncalves for about 15 minutes, then let her go with a warning at about 1:55 p.m.

He told the federal officers they could turn around, because “she’s gone,” the complaint alleges. He then told the officers her direction of travel, described her vehicle and provided a license plate number. The officers responded that they would “give it a shot,” the complaint says.

They pulled Dias Goncalves over near Grand Junction a few moments later and detained her for civil immigration enforcement.

“Rgr, nice work,” Zwinck responded.

Dias Goncalves was held in custody in Aurora for more than two weeks before she was released on bail.

The Signal group chat included a mix of local and federal officers and was used for regional drug-smuggling enforcement, according to the Mesa County Sheriff’s Office. A spokeswoman previously said deputies did not know the information shared in the chat was used for immigration enforcement and said the sheriff’s office pulled out of the chat after Dias Goncalves’ detainment.

Weiser alleged that Zwinck provided information to federal immigration authorities multiple times between May and June. On June 10, he sent a photo of another person’s driver’s license to the group chat, the complaint alleges.

“After being told that the individual had overstayed a visa and that the federal immigration officers ‘would want him,’ Deputy Zwinck responded, ‘Oh my gosh. We better get some bitchin (sic) Christmas baskets from you guys,'” the complaint alleges.

Zwinck was placed on administrative leave after the incident. Molly Casey, a spokeswoman for the sheriff’s office, said in a statement Tuesday that the internal investigation into Zwinck is expected to be finished within a week.

“We are committed to transparency in this process,” she said, adding that the sheriff’s office would comment further once the investigation is complete.

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Sonya Jaquez Lewis was charged with the felony by the Denver District Attorney’s Office on July 2, according to Denver District Court records. The filing came nearly four months after prosecutors in Boulder and Denver said they were investigating the Longmont Democrat.

Jaquez Lewis turned herself in to Denver police on July 6, spent a night in jail and was released the next morning, said her attorney, Craig Truman, on Tuesday morning. She will be arraigned in early August.

Truman declined to comment on the charges, other than to say that he was “sure when all the facts are known in this difficult and complicated case, justice will be done for both sides.”

Matt Jablow, a spokesman for Denver District Attorney John Walsh, confirmed the charges Monday night. Jaquez Lewis’ case, which wasn’t publicized at the time it was filed, was first reported by Colorado Politics.

Jaquez Lewis resigned from the legislature in February amid an ethics probe into her treatment of her legislative aides. Her resignation came just before the ethics committee learned that Jaquez Lewis had faked a letter of support from a former legislative staffer.

The then-state senator had sent the committee, made up of her colleagues, five letters as part of her defense against allegations that she required aides to do work around her house and had resisted signing off on a staffer’s timecard.

Of five people who submitted letters purportedly on Jaquez Lewis’ behalf, two told investigators they did not author them, according to court records. Another person said she thought a letter submitted under her name wasn’t the letter she’d written, and a fourth alleged author laughed as a Denver investigator read her letter aloud, according to charging documents. The fifth letter was submitted to the legislative committee anonymously.

The Boulder and Denver district attorneys’ offices began investigating Jaquez Lewis in March. Sen. Julie Gonzales, a Democrat who chaired the ethics committee, told The Post then that she contacted prosecutors “about the materials we received from (Jaquez Lewis) as part of the Senate Ethics Committee process.”

At the time, Jaquez Lewis said the letter had been “accidentally submitted.” The alleged author of that letter told investigators that Jaquez Lewis had contacted her repeatedly in January, including by mentioning a potential job lead, according to court records. The woman then learned of the ethics investigation and ignored the then-senator’s calls and texts because “she did not have great things to say about Ms. Jaquez Lewis.”

The Denver Post later confirmed that a second letter of support given to the committee had also apparently been faked. In March, Jaquez Lewis declined to comment about the second letter. Investigators spoke with that purported author, too, and she confirmed she did not write it.

An investigator with the DA’s office also spoke with someone — the name is redacted — who said Jaquez Lewis had asked her to “copy and paste language from an attorney” into a letter that the senator wanted the person to submit to the Secretary of State’s Office on behalf of Jaquez Lewis.

According to court records, the alleged author of another letter said she had written a letter to the ethics committee on the senator’s behalf. But “she believed the letter submitted by Ms. Jaquez Lewis was not the letter she wrote.”

When an investigator called a fourth purported author, the person laughed as the investigator read the letter aloud. The person declined to speak further, according to court records.

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The move for reform of the immigration system comes just after Congress voted to significantly increase detention funding and step up enforcement. Introduced in the U.S. House last week, the “Dignity Act” seeks to expedite America’s asylum system while allowing people without proper legal status who have been in the United States at least since the first Trump administration to apply for temporary residency.

Qualifying immigrants could apply to renew their temporary residency every seven years, but they would not be eligible for citizenship like previous versions of the legislation had provided. They would also be required to meet several requirements, including paying $7,000 in total “restitution” payments, registering with federal authorities and passing regular background checks.

The bill is sponsored by Rep. Maria Elvira Salazar, a Republican from Florida. As of Monday, it had 10 Republican and 11 Democratic co-sponsors in the House. They include freshman U.S. Rep. Gabe Evans, a Republican whose swing district extends from the northern Denver suburbs to Greeley.

Evans championed the bill in a call with reporters last week.

“This is a bill for people who want the accountability of earning a path to some sort of legal status,” said Evans, thus far the only Colorado lawmaker to sign on to the bill. “This is what the Dignity Act delivers to the United States, but specifically to the Hispanic community, to the business owners, to the ag producers, to the hospitality folks in my district and across the state of Colorado.”

The legislation aims to address longstanding and more recent challenges faced by the U.S. immigration system.

The bill would also allow “Dreamers” — people who were brought to the U.S. as children and later received protections under Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals — to stay in the country for up to 10 years. If they met certain eligibility requirements, they could then apply for permanent legal residency, according to Salazar’s office.

In recent years, a growing number of migrants crossed the U.S. southern border and sought asylum, allowing them to stay in the country while they awaited asylum hearings that were often scheduled years out. Under the bill, the federal government would be tasked with building at least three “humanitarian campuses” near the southern border where asylum-seekers would wait for background screening and the application process. The bill seeks to expedite asylum applications and vetting.

The legislation comes as President Donald Trump’s administration is set to ramp up its mass-deportation efforts.

Republicans — including Evans — voted earlier this month to direct $45 billion more to Immigration and Customs Enforcement for detentions, plus tens of billions more for the border wall, for increased deportations and for hiring of more ICE agents. Those provisions were part of the massive tax bill passed by Congress.

Immigration arrests in Colorado have already nearly quadrupled since Trump returned to office in January, ICE data shows.

Enforcement, reform interplay

The new proposal isn’t the first time that a bipartisan group of lawmakers has tried to pass immigration reform. An attempt by the so-called “gang of eight” — which included Colorado Sen. Michael Bennet, a Democrat — stalled during the Obama administration. It’s unclear if legislation seeking to reform one of Trump’s core priorities will find enough support this time around.

Last week, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters that the White House hadn’t read through the legislation but that Trump did not support any “amnesty” efforts.

Evans told reporters that reform negotiations could now advance because illegal border crossings have been reduced and because “criminals and the drug dealers and the violent gang-bangers” have been arrested. He denied that the bill offered amnesty.

ICE data shows that a majority of the people arrested by ICE in Colorado and in the U.S. this year have never been convicted of a crime. That trend has increased as arrests have accelerated in recent weeks.

While Evans said the bill should advance now because of the success of ICE’s efforts, a prominent immigration advocacy group said it’s willing to support the proposal because it represents a path for many immigrants to avoid escalating arrests and deportations.

“(ICE) just got an infusion of funding that is absolutely shocking by historical terms. So what we have experienced so far likely pales in comparison to what we’re going to see in the near future, next year, the year after — and beyond. So the calculus is different,” said Jorge Loweree, the managing director of the Washington, D.C.-based American Immigration Council. ” … We have no choice but to seriously consider any and all options that shield a significant portion of the population that has been here for a very long time.”

In a statement on its website, the American Immigration Lawyers Association said that though it doesn’t “endorse every provision” of the bill, “this initial proposal begins the vital dialogue on reform, and we will work with these leaders to achieve the best possible compromise.” FWD.us, a national immigrant-rights group, called the bill a “much-needed step forward,” though the group added that it still wanted a pathway to citizenship.

Already, ICE’s dragnet has led to protests, riots and military intervention in Los Angeles, as well as a significant shift in public opinion about immigration and deportations, trending toward more support for immigrants. Evans previously signed a letter expressing concern about ICE’s enforcement strategies, and Trump briefly said the administration would pause raids focused on workers after that practice came under fire.

But that guidance was abruptly reversed by Trump and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security last month. Shortly after, Congress increased ICE’s budget, giving it more financial resources than most of the world’s militaries.

Rules of temporary residency

The Dignity Act comes in the wake of that upheaval. The bill would provide a path to more stable legal status for as many as three million Dreamers, Loweree said, and shield millions more from immediate deportation.

Only those immigrants who arrived in the country prior to Jan. 1, 2021, would be eligible for the temporary, seven-year residency allowances. Evans said that limitation is because of the “chaos” that came during the Biden administration, when border crossings increased.

“This is only for individuals that have been in the United States for a long time — causing no problems, not taking federal welfare, willing to pay their back taxes, and then, on top of that, willing to pay that $1,000 a year for seven years,” he said. (Undocumented immigrants are generally ineligible for federal benefits like Medicaid or food assistance, though some states have expanded their programs using state money.)

Loweree said he was concerned about how the proposed program would be implemented and whether people given temporary residency would face shifting requirements in the future, as immigration authorities’ priorities change.

Still, he said, the bill provides cover where little currently exists.

“I think if you were to ask directly impacted folks, by and large, people would say they’d much prefer something that allows them to live and work and potentially travel abroad with some level of peace — and without the stress that currently exists,” he said. “There’s a tremendous amount of value in that.”

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Crow, a Democrat who represents Aurora, attempted to make an unannounced visit to the facility on Sunday. Doing so is allowed by a federal law that the congressman helped champion in 2019. But he was “denied access in violation of federal law,” Crow said in a video taken outside of the facility and posted on the social platform X.

Crow’s office has conducted regular inspections of the facility and posted reports about it on Crow’s website. But though members of Congress are legally allowed to make unannounced visits, their staff members must give 24 hours’ notice before they can tour a facility.

Crow told The Denver Post on Monday that he wanted to make sure that the conditions his staff sees on announced visits match the facility’s reality.

“When ICE has days to plan, things are cleaned up, dressed up — there’s a bit of a dog and pony show” that makes it harder to gauge the facility’s true condition, he said.

As Democratic lawmakers have increasingly shown up at detention centers to inspect their conditions, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement recently enacted its own policy requiring congressional members to give at least 72 hours’ notice before arriving at a facility.

Federal law does not require the type of notice that ICE has now sought to implement. Crow said he was “assessing legal options” in response to ICE’s refusal to allow him entry, though he declined to elaborate on what that meant. He said this was his first attempt to personally enter the facility since Trump returned to office.

Steve Kotecki, a spokesman for Denver’s ICE office, did not immediately respond to an email seeking comment.

The Aurora facility is a privately run detention center operated by the GEO Group and is capable of holding more than 1,500 people. As of late June, its average daily population was 1,159, according to a Syracuse University watchdog group.

Crow said he wanted to check that the facility still displayed public postings about access to legal counsel, and he wanted to see its medical units and food facility.

On Sunday, John Fabbricatore, a former ICE field office director — and Crow’s unsuccessful Republican challenger in last year’s election — responded to Crow’s X post: “You went there on a Sunday, knowing no one from ICE was there and that GEO was working with a weekend crew.” He called the attempted visit “100% performative.”

Crow declined to respond to Fabbricatore’s comments, other than to say that his former opponent was “wrong, repeatedly and habitually.”

Advocates and attorneys have long raised concerns about the conditions at the facility. The American Civil Liberties Union described the facility’s conditions as “atrocious” in 2019, after an Iranian man died there. In 2023, the Colorado Immigrant Rights Coalition released a report from detainees and their family members describing staff aggression and mistreatment.

Last month, a University of Utah student detained at the facility said she was served soggy bread and food and said she was treated better once the staff realized she spoke English.

Crow was repeatedly denied access to the facility in 2019, amid a disease outbreak. He later sponsored legislation allowing unannounced visits from members of Congress; the bill was passed as part of a broader spending bill, Crow’s office said in a statement.

His office now regularly publishes reports about the population and conditions within the facility. His office has also said that the Trump administration has stopped providing regular written updates about the facility to Crow.

Sunday was the first time he or his staff had been denied access to the facility since 2019, the congressman said.

According to records obtained by the ACLU, the GEO Group has proposed opening another ICE detention facility in Colorado Springs as the agency and the Trump administration seek to ramp up detentions and deportations.

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