If you follow my blog, you know I’ve been pointing out how Republicans are falsely blaming Colorado budget problems on healthcare costs for the elderly, disabled, and other poor people.

What’s worse, after scapegoating Medicaid spending on healthcare for the poor, Republicans haven’t said how they’d cut it. Or do something else to ease the budget pressure. And reporters are letting them slide.

But one state Republican recently said she’s ready to cut Medicaid. That’s State Sen. Laura Woods of Westminster.

During a radio interview in January, Woods said Medicaid used to be “for the truly needy,” but it’s not anymore. So she wants families to be poorer to qualify for Medicaid. Currently, a family of four qualifies if it earns less than around $34,000 per year–or 138 percent of the federal poverty level.

Woods agreed with KNUS 710-AM radio hosts, who suggested reducing the earnings threshold for qualifying for Medicaid.

Host Chuck Bonniwell: Well, you can change the 137 percent back to 100 percent [of the federal poverty level], I suppose.

Co-Host Julie Hayden: Right. I mean, it can’t stay the way it is, right?

WOODS: Right.

Woods told Bonniwell that “this rolling back [the] 137 percent is exactly the kind of compromise and agreement that we would push to the government, and say, ‘You know what? You want compromise, let’s talk.'”

But Woods said a healthcare cut must be done with “a lot of forethought” because “you’re sort of taking away their birthday. You’re taking away Santa Claus.”

It’s a “very difficult thing to do,” said Woods. It’s unclear whether Woods, who doesn’t return my calls, was thinking it would be tough politically to cut Medicaid or humanity-wise. The Christmas line, popular among conservatives discussing government excess, usually signals their belief that the poor are exploiting safety-net programs.

The reference to Christmas and birthdays makes it sound as if Woods thinks when poor people save money on heathcare, they turn around and spend it on nonessentials. GOP Sen. Greg Brophy, who alleged that Medicaid recipients spend their money on air conditioning, cigarettes, and Lotto, made the same allegation, which is not supportable, as far as I can tell, not to mention gross. (Or does everything come back to the War on Christmas?)

In any case, Woods incorrectly stated on air that the imperative to chop Medicaid is clear, since it is “this driver of our state budget pushing our budget over a cliff, and it’s simply not sustainable.”

During her radio interview, Woods mistakenly said a family of four “making between $70,000 and $90,000 a year qualify for Medicaid.” As you can see here, she is wrong. She may have been thinking of the threshold for a family of four to receive health-insurance tax credits under Obamacare. (Plus, Medicaid expansion under Obamacare has been paid by the feds, and many of the people covered by Obamacare in Colorado are adults without children.)

So next time Republicans are bashing Medicaid, but they aren’t saying what part of Medicaid they want to cut, reporters can turn to Woods. Hopefully, she’ll have her facts that allegedly support her opinion straightened out by then.

Weekend Wakeup with Chuck & Julie, Laura Woods, January 16, 2016

WOODS: Medicaid started out where a family of four making $20,000 a year — there’s no way they could afford healthcare. And that’s what Medicaid was for. It was for the truly needy. But when we’ve raised the poverty level so that 137 percent of the federal poverty level, I think now families of four that make somewhere between $70,000 and $90,000 a year qualify for Medicaid.

HAYDEN: What?!

BONNIWELL: Wow!

WOODS: So you look around and you say, — exactly your question: “Why is anybody uninsured under Obamacare? And yet we’ve got this this driver of our state budget pushing our budget over a cliff, and it’s simply not sustainable.

HAYDEN: No. That’s what it seems to me. And it’s not – I mean, there’s really not much you guys can do about – I mean,

BONNIWELL: Well, you can change the 137% back to 100%, I suppose.

HAYDEN: Right. I mean, it can’t stay the way it is, right?

WOODS: Right.

HAYDEN: You know, because I think what we saw– and maybe I’m wrong, but this whole – Connect for Colorado, when that major insurer just went, like, bankrupt and dropped all of those people, from what I gather only a fraction of those people actually signed up the new health care because it’s such a disaster. It’s it’s so expensive. So, am I right, then? Then all of those people – they’re going to go back in to the Medicaid, right?

WOODS: Yes. And –

HAYDEN: S0, it’s going to get even worse.

WOODS: It is going to get even worse, and this rolling back 137% is exactly the kind of compromise and agreement that we would push to the government, and say, “You know what? You want compromise, let’s talk about –.” But you know, you’re sort of taking away their birthday. You’re taking away Santa Claus. I mean, I don’t know, this a very difficult thing to do, and it has to be done with a lot of forethought and –

HAYDEN: But, I would say, that you want to be careful because you’re right – you don’t want to hurt families. If a family is making $90,000 a year, there’s a good chance that they probably have some other way to get insurance rather than free from the rest of us.

WOODS: You know, I agree with that. And I think that even if it’s not $90,000. You know, $50,000 a year, you can afford something on –.

BONNIWELL: Well Obamacare gives you subsidies.

HAYDEN: Right! Exactly! I mean, you have the whole–.

WOODS: At that level, right. Obamacare would give you subsidies.

HAYDEN: And you can’t be – so, then the other thing is when the governor and all that group that’s going– that’s pushed by the Denver Post – going around trying to convince people to get rid of TABOR, which isn’t going very well, I don’t think.

BONNIWELL: I haven’t heard much from them. I want to ask Laura Woods about that. I mean, you know, we heard Dan Ritchie, who is, you know The Denver Post’s favorite Republican because he is not really a Republican and therefore you can – he can front whatever left wing agenda they’ve got going, around on a listening tour, and they picled that out from my guess, probably […]–what’s her name? The famous listening tour lady. But once you go, you know, you already know what you want, and you go on a listening tour and, “Hey! They want exactly what we wanted!” But what has happened to those guys?

WOODS: Well, I actually don’t know what has happened to those guys, but I do think it has morphed into ideas like let’s rob the hospital provider fee –

BONNIWELL: Yeah.

WOODS: –to further fund our programs because there aren’t general fund dollars to do that.

BONNIWELL: Right.

WOODS: I think, you know, TABOR is the one piece of legislation that Colorado can lean on and depend on and stand behind as a bulwark to prevent us from becoming what California has become.

BONNIWELL: Right.

WOODS: And the conservatives in our state get that. And you know, I battle this every at every town hall I go to, every meet-and-that greet I go to where I’ve got one of my counterparts from the other side of the aisle on the stage with me and we’re back and forth over, you know, I’m standing to defend Tabor – they’re just saying we have just got to get rid of Tabor. So, it comes up. We had Andy Kerr, the senator from Littleton –or Lakewood–try to sue the state over TABOR to say is unconstitutional. That lawsuit was thrown out. So, –.

HAYDEN: […] Chuck and I talk all the time about ways to generate more revenue, but in the meantime, we’re stuck with the budget that we have. And–.

WOODS: Well, that’s what businesses and families are faced with right now.

HAYDEN: Exactly! And the government should do the same thing.

In a Facebook post last week, State Sen. Laura Woods (R-Westminster) came out against birthright citizenship, the U.S. policy granting citizenship to people born on American soil, even if their parents are not citizens.

The debate about birthright citizen was largely confined to hard-right conservative circles, until Donald Trump came out against it in August, as part of his immigration platform, sparking high-profile debate among Republican presidential candidates and pundits.

Woods, who has said Trump is her second favorite presidential candidate, “liked” a Facebok post, sponsored by Numbers USA, which read:

LIKE if you agree with Trump. Illegal aliens should not be awarded birthright citizenship!

A graphic shows a photo of Trump with the text, “End Birthright Citizenship.”

Trump’s immigration platform also calls for the rounding up and deportation of  America’s estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants to their country of origin. From there, they’d be free to apply to become U.S. citizens.

Woods’ office did not immediately return a call for comment on whether she agrees with Trump’s immigration policy in its entirety–or whether she’d want to rescind citizenship from millions of immigratns who’ve become U.S. citizens under America’s birthright-citizenship law.

Most other Colorado politicians have been silent on birthright citizenship, but as recently as 2013, Rep. Mike Coffman confirmed his opposition to the policy, in an interview with The Denver Post, saying “sure” he’d like to abolish birthright citizenship.

Back in 2011, Coffman cosponsored a bill that would have abolished birthright citizenship.

Both Woods and Coffman represent swing districts where anti-immigration positions could turn off immigrant voters. About 20 percent of Coffman’s district is Latino.

Woods won her Westminster seat by about 650 votes in 2014, while Coffman has been seen as vulnerable since his district was re-drawn after the 2010 census. Coffman narrowly defeated a Democrat in 2012 and won by a larger margin in 2014.

The latest Republican to stand in front of a camera and complain about state spending on health care for the elderly, disabled, and other poor people, without offering any alternatives, is former state Sen. Greg Brophy, who’s freshly back from a job with Rep. Ken Buck in Washington DC.

Brophy appeared on Politics Unplugged, 7News’ interview show, last month to say that Colorado is being forced, under TABOR rules, to refund taxes to citizens due to the hospital provider fee.

“The hospital provider fee and the other expansions of, well, it amounts to Obamacare, have committed spending on that area at the expense of every other area in state government,” said Brophy.

In 2009, Colorado tapped federal funds, used to match a “hospital provider fee” collected by hospitals, to expand Medicaid coverage to around 300,000 low-income people and children. It allowed kids, for example, from families of four making $45,000 annually to qualify for state Medicaid coverage. Later, Obamacare kicked in, reimbursing the state to cover more poor people in Colorado.

So yes, Colorado has expanded its Medicaid program. It’s one of the major functions of the state government, along with k-12 education, higher education, transportation, and prisons.

Brophy thinks the state has gone too far in helping the elderly, disabled, kids, and other poor people get medical coverage. If we weren’t covering more uninsured people, we could prioritize spending “on education and transportation where the people, I think, want it.”

So, reporters should ask how he wants to cut Medicaid. Knock off some of the disabled people? Keep in mind that the state isn’t paying for coverage of the newly added people anyway, since the feds pick up the tab for Obamacare and the hospital provider fee. So what would Brophy have us do? Charge poor people co-pays, which Brophy advocated in the past, saying poor people aready spend their money on, Lotto, cigarettes, and air conditioning? Would he have Colorado lower eligibility thresholds? Are we too generous?

Brophy didn’t return a call to explain.

“I really think we want to force the state of Colorado to find efficiencies in what they spend money on,” Brophy told 7News’ Marshall Zellinger, sounding a lot like Donald Trump.

Where are these efficiencies? Where’s reality? Or is it like, I’ll force Mexico to build the wall. Trust me, they will.

On Facebook this week, Republican State Sen. Laura Woods signaled that she will vote for Donald Trump, if he is the GOP nominee.

Woods “liked” a Facebook post by The Conservative Update, which stated:

‘Like’ if you would vote for Donald Trump if he were the 2016 GOP nominee.

Woods’ name appears among over 500,000 others.

Woods has made no secret of her leanings toward Trump. She told KNUS 710-AM radio in January that Trump is one of her two favorite prez candidates (listen here at 25 min 50 sec), but she’s backing Ted Cruz.

Woods is the only elected official in Colorado who actively likes Trump, though three others have said they’ll support the reality-TV star if he wins the GOP nomination.

Woods has yet to explain why she likes Trump, but both Woods and Trump have taken extreme anti-choice and anti-immigrant positions.

Woods told KNUS that she  “narrowed the field” after October’s Republican debate in Boulder.

Control of Colorado state government likely rests on the outcome of the race between Woods and her Democratic challenger, Rachel Zenzinger. Republicans hold the senate chamber by a one-vote margin, and Woods won the seat over Zenzinger in 2014, which was a GOP wave year, by a slim 650 vote margin. To be sure, a few other state senate races may be close, but none has the potential to fall as easily toward Democrats as this one. And with it would end divided government in Colorado.

The Denver Post is an outfit that likes to think of itself as standing up for everyday people, who rightfully worry about the ways the rich take advantage of government loopholes to get richer, while most people are left treading water and wishing politicians would stand up for them.

Yet, when Democrats in the state House pass a bill that moves the fairness needle toward working families, The Post decides to misrepresent their efforts so egregiously you wonder whose gold-plated spoon is feeding the newspaper’s editorial board such nonsense.

The Democrats’ bill, which passed the House along party lines Monday, would simply stop Colorado companies from hiding profits in well-known overseas tax havens, like the Cayman Islands. And the millions of dollars of tax revenue recovered would go to schools–which are the starting point for economic opportunity in America.

The bill would actually help level the playing field for businesses that play by the rules, which is the vast majority of them, by making sure their competitors pay the same tax they do.

Yet, somehow, The Post found a way to turn legislation that’s about basic fairness into an albatross on Colorado business, even saying the legislation would threaten Colorado jobs.

The Post thumped it chest and declared that  “not even longtime Democratic strongholds like California and New York have such laws. Indeed, California held hearings on the idea a few years ago and declined to go further.”

That’s because the same special interests that want to kill the bill here in Colorado did so successfully in New York and California.

But what The Post didn’t tell you is that the bill actually factually passed in Montana and Oregon, with bipartisan support.

That’s bipartisan support from lawmakers who decided to do something about one of the most blatant tax loopholes enjoyed by businesses who line their pockets by flouting tax laws.

Maybe a taxpayer’s miracle will strike, and The Post will change its opinion. This might convince state senate Republicans to pass it. As of now, they’re expected to kill the Democrats’ proposed law, because, it seems, they’re listening to the same special interests who successfully pedaled their greed to The Post.

If you’re a journalist or even a blogger, you love to point out evolutionary explanations by politicians for taking a political stance. Inconsistencies, when one politician’s statement one day contradicts what she said previously, are better, but changing justifications for taking a political position are a close second on the hypocrisy scale, because they’re a likely indicator that politicians have ulterior motives, which they’re struggling to hide by trying to come up with a false explanation that makes sense.

So here’s a brief history of GOP lawmakers’ explanations for their opposition to the hospital-provider fee, first, and then, later, for their opposition to turning it into a Tabor-defined enterprise zone, which would free up about $370 million for highways, schools, and other government projects that lack funding.

It would increase the federal deficit. Back in 2009, when Democrats first proposed tapping federal funds to expand Medicaid to cover more low-income children and others, Republicans didn’t say they were opposed to helping the kids and the poor. They worried about increasing the federal deficit.

It would run up medical expenses that would be shifted to non-Medicaid patients. Back in 2009, in addition to the deficit, Republicans fretted about whether hospitals could pass on the Medicaid costs to upstanding insured people, despite a lack of evidence over how they could do this. If anything, the fee helped offset a shift that was burdening insured people.

It would burden working families. “It’s only to expand government and to expand an entitlement program one more time,” Rep. Frank McNulty, R-Highlands Ranch, told The Denver Post in 2009. “It’s simply a shell game where the governor is shifting cost to working families who are already struggling to pay their bills.” No evidence of how the alleged shift would affect working families emerged–other than the amorphous worry that the federal government might stop paying its share.

Between 209 and this year, after the hospital provider fee was in place and helping hundreds of thousands of actual factual poor people, Colorado Republicans continued to try to repeal it, but their venom toward the fee didn’t really emerge again until the last couple years, when Democrats tried to re-define the fee under TABOR, as a small step toward addressing the state’s budget woes.

First, they argued that the Democrats plan was unconstitutional. But GOP Attorney General Cynthia Coffman thought otherwise, ruling that the Dem plan meets constitutional muster.

Then they tried to destract reporters by saying Obamacare is the cause our budget problems, which it isn’t.

Then Republicans argued that the TABOR enterprise would require “rebasing” the budget, which would eliminate the availability of money for schools, roads, etc. But The Denver Post eviscerated this argument over the weekend, writing:

“The current TABOR threshold, which is adjusted every year based on population and inflation, was established in fiscal 2007-08, before the hospital fee was enacted. That fee came on in 2009.

In other words, the spending limit would be the same today if the hospital fee had never existed, or if it had been created as a separate enterprise right at the outset.”

So here we are on Monday, another new week and you wonder what’s next. Will the evolutionary explanations continue? You have to think Republicans will come up with something new, given the history, which points to an ideological opposition any growth in government spending, no matter how the spending is paid for.

That’s an honest position but it requires an explanation of how Colorado pays for roads, schools, medical care for the poor and disabled, and more. Should government stop funding these things or cut back. And if not, how to fund them?

Trump won in South Carolina because GOP primary voters were angry at establishment Republicans for “submitting to the leftist, racist political correctness and removing the confederate flag without discussion,” according to Anil Mathai, the chair of the Adams County Republican Party.

Mathai: “People are totally missing what happened tonight in South Carolina,” wrote Mathai in an analysis on Facebook. “It doesn’t make sense at all but, wait, it does. It wasn’t about Trump. The Republicans of South Carolina rejected Nikki Haley, Sen. Tim Scott, Sen. Lindsay Graham, and Congressman Trey Gowdy. Why? Because they all endorsed the establishment candidate Rubio, but what’s worse? A few months ago they sold the people of South Carolina out by immediately submitting  to the leftist, racist political correctness and removing the confederate flag without discussion. They cursed out the conservative base in South Carolina by listening to the leftists and tonight the base returned the favor. This wasn’t about Trump. It was about establishment Republican control of once popular but now loser politicians in South Carolina. Tonight, Haley, Scott, Graham, and Gowdy (with Rubio) are urinating in their pants as their time in office is coming to a close really soon! You turn on your constitution loving, Republican platform supporting base, and you will pay a price. Trump and Cruz rode the wave.”

Gov. Nikki Haley signed a law in July, 2015, removing the confederate flag from the SC state capitol, after a massacre at nine black churches in Charleston. The flag’s presence had obviously long been a source of conflict there and nationally prior to last year.

Mathai did not return a call for comment on the Feb. 20 post on the Colorado Tea Party page. He also discussed on conservative talk radio in less stark language.

But by referring to arguments for the removal of the confederate flag as “leftist, racist political correctness,” it appears that Mathai himself sides with those in South Carolina who opposed the removal of the confederate flag.

The Colorado Republican Party has apparently not taken a position one way or the other on the confederate flag, but county chairs like Mathai, elected by fellow Republicans, are free to take positions on issues as long as they don’t endorse candidates in a primary. In his radio interview and Facebook post, Mathai did not endorse a presidential candidate.

Last year, liberals accused Adams County Republican Vice Chair John Sampson of posting racist comments on Facebook, but Sampson said he judges people based on their character, not skin color or anything else.

Key swing state races will take place in Adams country in November.

Choice issues will continue to impregnate political discourse as we head toward November for the simple reason that women, a huge swing voting bloc in Colorado, care about candidates’ positions on abortion. Of course they do. That’s common sense.

Yet, you still hear anti-choice conservatives saying how insulted they are by progressives who talk about choice, because somehow they think it means progressives don’t think women care about the economy, the environment, etc. Women obviously care about those things too. But also, choice–which is often less muddled, in terms of where candidates stand, and therefore defines a candidate more than other issues.

And choice issues could prove decisive in the senate district that will likely determine if Democrats control Colorado’s government after November. That would be the seat held by anti-choice state Sen. Laura Woods (R-Westminster).

You can read more details in RH Reality Check, but, briefly, Woods isn’t following the mold of Colorado Sen. Cory Gardner. He completely denied his co-sponsorship of a personhood abortion-ban bill in an effort to win over state-wide voters, who pretty much mirror the voters in Woods’ swing district, evenly divided among Democrats, Republicans, and unaffiliateds.

Woods is sticking to her conservative principles, as she puts it. After openly embracing Dudley Brown’s vision of America, including personhood, 1) during her 2014 primary, 2) during her 2014 general election campaign, and 3) during her first year in office, Woods is 4) again sponsoring a personhood bill this election year–along with a bill requiring women to be offered an ultrasound prior to having an abortion (and also to wait 24 hours).

Last week, Woods’ Democratic opponent, Rachel Zenzinger, wrote on Facebook that after last year’s Planned Parenthood massacre, Woods was, in Zenzinger’s words, “advocating for this kind of [clinic] violence.” Woods responded on Twitter by condemning the clinic attack and all violence, but, as someone pointed out on Twitter, it took Woods 83 days to do this. And to this day, she’s never explained the timing or meaning of her Facebook post, which was supportive terrorism to fight injustice. No one would argue that war or revolution are sometimes justified, but in the wake of the clinic shooting, Woods’ post made it appear like she supported the shooter–especially because she didn’t comment on the attack.

Political junkies agree that the odds are against Woods winning the Jeffco seat during a presidential election year, in a district she won by only about 650 votes in the 2014 GOP wave year. And, you’d also have to think that the women who didn’t vote in 2014, but turn out this year, will likely to pay attention to Woods’ positions on abortion and birth control.

“If you’ve looked at my voting record at all, what you will know is, I’m an independent thinker,” Woods told The Post Jan. 10. “…I bucked my leadership, I bucked the party, I bucked the caucus … if it didn’t line up with my principles or my district.”

But repeated polls, and common sense, say the swing voters in her district disagree with her on choice.

As Trump surges, reporters should tell us about the support, or lack thereof, the magnate gets from local Republican muckety mucks.

We’ve seen coverage of politicos lining up for Clinton (Hick), Cruz (Buck), Rubio (Gardner), Sanders (Salazar), and others. And the Colorado Statesman has reported that top U.S. Senate and congressional candidates in Colorado will support their party’s nominee.

But there’s one Colorado Republican who’s openly saying Trump is one of her two top presidential candidates.

That would be State Sen. Laura Woods (R-Westminster), whose November election will likely determine whether Democrats control Colorado state government next year.

On the radio last month, Woods named Trump as one of her two favorite candidates.

Here’s what Woods had to say about Trump on KNUS 710-AM’s Saturday morning show, hosted by Chuck Bonniwell and Fox 31 Denver’s Julie Hayden:

BONNIWELL:  Well, have you decided who you like in the primaries – the Republican primaries for president?

WOODS:  For president. I have narrowed the field –.  You know, I attended the debate in Boulder, and it really helped me to see that anyone of these up on that stage would be better than the 3 running on the other side of the ticket.   […]  So, I at least wrapped my mind around the fact that, you know, — whichever Republican gets the nod, I will vote for that Republican. But my favorites are Ted Cruz and Donald Trump.

BONNIWELL:  Yeah! Those are mine to.  That’s who I like, too.

HAYDEN: That’s everybody’s favorites when you get right down to it. Well, not everybody’s, but….

Let’s be clear that Trump has vocal supporters in Colorado, like KNUS 710-AM’s Peter Boyles, and other notorious vocalists on conservative talk radio. But Woods stands out among folks who can be held accountable by voters for what they do or say.

Listen here to Woods on KNUS Jan. 16.

Colorado Springs’ Republican Mayor John Suthers told the Colorado Springs Gazette Tuesday that turning the hospital provider fee into a TABOR-defined enterprise would be “by far the easiest, least painful solution for the taxpayers” to address Colorado’s budget woes.

But in his interview with Schrader, Suthers repeats the misinformation that Obamacare’s expansion of Colorado’s Medicaid program, which provides health care to the poor, is eating up state money now.

Suthers: “A lot of the animosity surrounding this goes back to the fact that they are saying look if we didn’t participate in the Medicaid expansion we wouldn’t need all this money, and the provider fee was basically a means to pay for the expansion. I understand all of that, but having the provider fee in the TABOR calculation is going to create immense problems going forward. It’s just going to get bigger and bigger and bigger and if you don’t take it out I don’t know what’s going to happen.”

The animosity-filled people who told Suthers that Colorado “wouldn’t need all this money” if it weren’t for Obamacare’s Medicaid expansion are actually factually wrong.

Colorado’s Medicaid expansion has so far cost Colorado nothing (Here at page 26). It’s been 100 percent paid for by the federal government, which will slide down to paying 90 percent of the costs by 2020.

Next year, Colorado will contribute about $41 million toward covering Obamacare’s new Medicaid enrollees. If Colorado were paying the full 1o percent now, the state would contribute $142 million. And Suthers is correct that the Hospital Provider Fee, which is used to cover various health care services for poor people who can’t afford them, is earmarked to pay for this.

But $41 million is a fraction of the $768 million projected to be collected by the Hospital provider fee next year. Next year’s state contribution to covering Obamacare’s Medicaid enrollees, which looks to be on the order of $75 million, is still a fraction of the HPF money collected. So the HPF appears to be a solid source of funds for covering Colorado’s contibution to Obamacare’s Medicaid expansion.

The people, mentioned by Suthers, who have all the animosity about the hospital provider fee should explain how they’d fund basic health care programs for elderly, disabled, and other poor people without it. And, for that matter, how they’d pay for state government with it, if it’s not removed from the TABOR framework and $370 million in tax dollars is refunded to you and me.

CLARIFICATION: I updated this post to clarify that the HPF funds health care in Colorado, not other government programs.