On December 17, White House budget director Russ Vought announced the National Science Foundation would dismantle the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, eliminating 830 jobs and shuttering the nation’s premier weather and climate research facility. Colorado had refused to release Tina Peters from state prison six days earlier. Forty-nine other governors received the message: defy Trump on anything, watch federal infrastructure in your state disappear.
December 11: Trump announced a symbolic pardon for Peters, the former Mesa County clerk serving nine years for illegally accessing voting equipment in her 2020 election denial scheme. December 15: Trump called Governor Jared Polis “incompetent” and a “weak and pathetic man” during an Oval Office ceremony. December 16: A senior White House official told multiple news outlets that Colorado would be better served if Polis “actually wanted to work with President Trump.” December 17: Vought announced NCAR’s dismantling, calling it “one of the largest sources of climate alarmism in the country.”
The National Science Foundation provided $123 million to NCAR in fiscal 2025. That represented half the center’s total budget. The facility manages research aircraft, operates supercomputers modeling global weather patterns, and developed the GPS dropsonde technology that eliminated passenger plane crashes from wind shear over the past 25 years.
Trump’s December 15 attack made the connection explicit. Polis “won’t allow our wonderful Tina to come out of a high-intensity jail because she caught people cheating on an election,” Trump said. Peters wasn’t cheating, Trump claimed—she caught Democrats cheating. No evidence of systematic voter fraud has been found in the 2020 election.
The White House official’s December 16 statement removed any ambiguity about the NCAR announcement. Asked by CNN whether the closure related to Polis refusing Peters’ release, the official replied that the administration “is always reviewing its federal funding for alignment with the President’s priorities.” When NBC News asked about NCAR specifically, the same official said Colorado constituents would be better served if their governor worked with Trump.
Vought announced two additional Colorado cuts on social media immediately before the NCAR post. The administration cancelled $109 million in environmental transportation grants. It terminated $615 million in Department of Energy funding. All three announcements appeared within hours of each other on December 17.
Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser called the moves “unprecedented and lawless” in a December 17 statement. Trump “may not like Colorado’s voting system or the fact that we take action to protect the integrity of our voting systems,” Weiser said. “But he has no authority to act in this manner, and we will not be swayed by his efforts to threaten, intimidate, or punish our state.”
Senator Michael Bennet told local media his judgment is “this is very much about Tina Peters.” Trump “attempted to get his way through intimidation and he hasn’t gotten his way and he is trying to punish Colorado as a result,” Bennet said.
Representative Joe Neguse, whose district includes Boulder, called it “clearly retaliatory action by the Trump administration connected to the state’s refusal to honor the lawless request by the Trump administration for the release of Tina Peters.” Senators Bennet and John Hickenlooper joined Neguse in a December 17 statement calling the plan “deeply dangerous and blatantly retaliatory.”
On December 19, Bennet and Hickenlooper placed a hold on the Senate appropriations package funding 85 percent of the federal government. “President Trump is attacking Colorado because we refuse to bend to his corrupt administration,” the senators said in a joint statement. “His reckless decision to dismantle the National Center for Atmospheric Research will have lasting, devastating impacts across the country.”
The hold killed hopes for a bipartisan funding deal before Senate adjournment. Senate Majority Leader John Thune acknowledged the Colorado senators’ objection Thursday night, telling reporters there would be “some conversations about that over the next couple of weeks.”
Peters was convicted by a jury in heavily Republican Mesa County. A Republican district attorney prosecuted the case. Colorado’s criminal justice system operated exactly as designed—state officials enforcing state law for state crimes. Trump demanded Colorado hand over a state prisoner for a federal pardon he lacks authority to issue.
Federal research centers, transportation grants, and energy funding now depend on cooperation with Trump’s personal demands, regardless of legal authority or institutional separation of powers. Scientific merit, national security implications, and decades of research that saves lives become irrelevant when a governor refuses to subordinate state law to presidential preference. Every governor understood immediately: federal benefits in your state exist at presidential pleasure, revocable the moment you decline to comply with demands outside presidential authority.
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