In an unusual move, Colorado’s 8th Congressional District U.S. Rep. Gabe Evans chided his state’s governor and legislature for enacting a wave of regulations that has caused “ever‑growing hardships” for Colorado’s small businesses.

As reported in The Gazette, Evans sent a letter to Colorado Gov. Jared Polis his week noting how small-business owners and local chambers of commerce blame those hardships on legislation enacted by Polis and his fellow ruling Democrats in the legislature.

“Under the direction of your administration and Denver’s Democrats, Colorado has become the sixth most heavily regulated state in the country, and small-business owners and their employees in my district are feeling it every day,” Evans wrote. 

He cited some of the bills Polis has signed in recent years that have served to knock Colorado out of the running as a place to do business. One levied state taxes on overtime; another imposed fees on diesel fuel, deliveries and transportation services. There’s a 10-cent fee for plastic bags. The list goes on.

“These laws have harmed small-business owners and prevented regional economic growth,” Evans wrote. “Many employers are now being forced to operate with smaller staff and tighter margins because they simply cannot keep up with the rising costs imposed by your state government.”

Sure, it’s an election year, and the Republican congressman, whom The Gazette’s editorial board has endorsed for reelection in November, can be expected to fire some shots at the Democratic regime running our state.

But Evans’ shots are well-aimed and richly deserved. The lame duck Polis as well as the legislature’s Democratic majority have earned the criticism.

And at this point, none of it should come as a surprise.

Once a regular among the top 10 states for business investors seeking to locate or expand operations, Colorado’s standing has been falling precipitously for some time. Statistics and studies charting the state’s declining business climate during the Polis administration have become a staple of news headlines.

For example, Colorado’s Common Sense Institute found in a 2023 study that a mountain of mandates piled on the private sector through legislation and ballot proposals was costing our state’s economy about $2 billion a year.

A review of the state’s regulatory landscape in 2025 by the Colorado Chamber of Commerce found Colorado had the sixth-highest number of business restrictions in the United States — with over 205,000 state-level restrictions.

And just a couple of months ago, an in-depth report by The Wall Street Journal bore the headline, “Entrepreneurs flocked to Colorado. Now, red tape is driving some away.”

The Journal report’s opening line pretty much said it all: “A vocal band of Colorado software engineers and venture capitalists are increasingly grumbling that their tech haven in the Rocky Mountains is devolving into the place of their nightmares: California.”

Naturally, the Polis administration resists Colorado’s bad-for-business label. The administration points to efforts such as a measure the governor signed into law, sponsored by bipartisan leadership in the House and Senate, that aims to reduce “administrative burdens” through additional reviews of agency rules. Of course, it’s a case of too little, too late.

The sustained, regulatory assault on business — heaping layer upon layer of suffocating regulations — is ultimately an attack on job creation. Which sets off a vicious cycle: Fewer jobs mean fewer workers pumping fewer dollars back into the state’s economy.

Will the new governor elected next fall attempt to throttle back on overregulation?

Until then, kudos to Evans for keeping the issue on the public’s radar. We all have a stake.