Congressman Jeff Crank (R-CO) and his Democratic challenger Jessica Killin, agree: our health care system is a mess. At their respective Colorado Springs events this week, the candidates made clear that’s about all they agree on.
Killin joined Colorado legislators and health advocates at Boulder Park in Colorado Springs to discuss the impact on Colorado after Congressional Republicans slashed more than $1 trillion from Medicaid and the Affordable Care Act (ACA) as part of President Donald Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill.
“Jeff Crank brags that he was the deciding vote on that bill,” said Killin. “That bill is estimated to take about 225,000 Coloradans off of their health care. As I go across this community talking to people every single day, I hear from people who got a raise, who got a promotion, but they don’t feel it because their deductibles went up, because their premiums went up. I hear about people who are having to make choices between insulin and groceries, between the healthcare they need and being able to afford their mortgage. People shouldn’t have to make these decisions. At a time when we are also in an affordability crisis, healthcare should be affordable and high quality, and we are not doing that. The One Big Beautiful bill is only making it worse.”
During an appearance at an El Paso County Republican Women meeting this week, Crank agreed with Killin, in part. “Health care is a mess in the United States — a total mess,” he said. “There’s lots of things that we could do to fix it”
Crank blamed the issues with health care on the Affordable Care Act. “The insurance companies are running the show, and why are they running the show? Because they went in the back room several years ago and they sat down with the Obama administration and they wrote Obamacare,” he said. “The Obamacare guarantees subsidies to insurance companies. That’s what it does. So I just tell people, if you don’t like health care, guess what? You don’t want Obamacare. Because that’s really the reality of it. The Affordable Care Act is what we have today. So if you like it, don’t try and say, ‘Well, it would be better if it was socialized’ or ‘It would be better if it was whatever.’ What we need is free market reforms and accountability for insurance companies when they’re denying people.”
Killin pushed back on Crank’s claims during an interview with Colorado Times Recorder after the press conference. “I think the reason health care is not working for the American people is because of the policies of Jeff Crank and Donald Trump,” she said. “They’ve been ripping away at the Affordable Care Act for the last decade to make it a non-working bill that doesn’t work for the Americans. They’ve done everything within their power to make health care more expensive and less accessible to Coloradans and the American People, including all the cuts that are in the One Big Beautiful Bill that have made our lives more expensive and have made healthcare less accessible.”
Crank defended his record of cutting taxes. “I voted for the Working Families Tax Cuts Act [also also known as the One Big Beautiful Bill],” he said. “And one of the things that it did was provide the largest tax cut in American history, $4.5 trillion worth of tax cuts. When you hear someone on the other side, a Democrat, say they oppose that bill, what they’re really saying is, they would have voted for the largest tax increase in American history. Because that’s the reality. If we hadn’t passed that bill, all of the tax cuts from 2017 would have expired and would have been the largest tax increase in American history. You talk about affordability, well let’s talk about what that means to the average El Paso County family. That’s thousands of dollars because of the vote that this Congress made in passing the Working Families Tax Cuts Act — thousands of dollars in the average family here in El Paso County’s pockets. So you want to talk about affordability — you bet, let’s talk about it. What did we cut? We doubled the child tax credit for working families. We kept marginal rates lower — they were about ready to go up. Tax increases were coming. [We] cut taxes on Social Security, cut them on overtime, and so many other things. Capital gains tax cuts. All those things. You hear all this nonsense about ‘Oh, it was just tax cuts for the rich.’ They’re tax cuts for average everyday Americans and the people that are saying otherwise are simply out of touch.”
According to Yale’s Budget Lab, a non-partisan policy research center, almost half of households will see an income tax cut of less than $100 in 2026 under the new tax law, and about 20% of households will see a tax cut of more than $1,000. These households are concentrated in the upper-middle income range.
Killin says otherwise. “[It sounds to me like Jeff Crank hasn’t actually talked to his constituents and heard from them because I talk to people across our community every day,” she said. “They do not feel like things have gotten more affordable. And to the extent that the tax cuts might have reduced costs for some people, or reduced taxes for some people, the majority of those tax cuts went to billionaires who honestly didn’t need those tax cuts. I believe there should be strategic, thoughtful tax cuts that are focused on the middle class. My belief is that the sign of a healthy society is one that has a social safety net, lifts up and takes care of its most vulnerable, but also has a robust middle class. This economy that Crank has created is gutting the middle class, it’s reducing economic opportunity, it’s making life more expensive for Coloradans and Americans. Everyone I talk to says their healthcare is more expensive, their groceries are more expensive. They can’t afford to buy a home, they can’t pay their rent, they can’t afford to go on vacation. So he thinks he’s done something on affordability, but people are not feeling it.”
Crank blamed the increase in housing costs on regulations. “[Housing is an] issue everywhere across the country, but it’s especially bad here in Colorado,” he said. “Why is it especially bad in Colorado? Regulation, regulation, regulation in the state of Colorado. I’ve talked to so many home builders and electrical contractors and others that talk about some of the regulations that they’re doing now. Did you know if you build a new house here in Colorado now you have to wire it for electric to your stove — all the way to your stove — whether you’re going to have a gas stove or an electric stove. They still make you wire electricity there. Take away your choice. Take away your choice of whether or not you want gas or electric. So that’s an added cost. Some people say, ‘Well, that’s not much.’ Well, how about this one? They also make you, if you build a new garage, you have to wire your garage for an electric vehicle. You may never want to buy an electric vehicle, you may not be able to afford a home. Because you’re a struggling single mother, or you’re a struggling family, and you can’t afford a home where they add all these things on. You don’t have a choice now, because the crazy Democrats in Denver have decided they’re going to take that choice away from you.”
Builders of custom homes are required to offer buyers an option for electric vehicle-wired garages, which can be turned down. Some cities, like Denver, require electric vehicle-ready wiring in new garages, but not all.
Killin placed the blame for housing issues on a lack of affordable housing inventory. “Once we started this big population boom about a decade ago, a bunch of real estate developers built a bunch of $500,000+ houses that are now sitting empty because incomes have not kept pace,” she said. “We need to bring in higher paying jobs here so we can fill those houses, but we also need to have policies that incentivize the building of affordable houses. First-time homes, so $200,000, $300,000 houses, condos. I’m going to work on incentivizing that at the federal level and also make sure that we’re getting people into their homes earlier. Having a home, buying a home is the number one way to build wealth in this country and I’m gonna focus on a first time homebuyer tax credit, incentivizing builders to build the right types of houses.”
Crank also blamed immigrants for the rise in housing costs. “I wonder what nine million new citizens, new people coming into the United States, flooding over the border and buying homes — I wonder if that had anything to do with it?” he said. “Do you think that hurt supply or drove the price up? Of course it did. The Biden border crisis added to what happened to our housing costs here in Colorado and around the country.”
Colorado’s 5th Congressional District has been reliably Republican for decades, but earlier this year the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC), the primary campaign arm for Democrats in the U.S. House, announced that it has placed CD5 on its list of “districts in play,” or districts the DCCC thinks could flip in this year’s election as Democrats seek to retake control of the House.
Crank seems to be taking the threat seriously, and focused on his opponent during his address to the El Paso County Republican Women. “I want talk about Miss Killin,” he said. “Let’s just be honest. She air-dropped in, in June of last year. Prior to that, she lived in Maryland. She lived in a mansion in Maryland until June. She came out here in June last year. She bought a 3.6 million dollar mansion, a few blocks from the Broadmoor, and paid cash for it by the way — no mortgage. She’s just one of us. Five or ten days later, I can’t remember if it was five or ten days later, she registered to vote for the first time in many many decades here in Colorado, and then a few days later filed to run the United States Congress here. Those aren’t in the TV ads … I’m not gonna sit idly by and allow the community that I love, the community that I’ve lived in since 1998, this community, to have someone come in and be funded by outside interests, predominantly funded by folks in D.C., and Los Angeles, and New York and Chicago. Bankers, lawyers, in those big cities, funneling money into this community to try and buy this congressional seat.”
Killin defended her connections to Colorado Springs. “I grew up here in the middle class,” she said. “I was a child of two public school teachers. I graduated from Falcon High School. I then went on and served my country as a military police officer overseas. I then came back and worked in the private sector at USAA, shoring up the financial security of veterans and service members. Then I returned to public service because I’ve always wanted to give back to my community. My entire career has been about service and I’m proud of my career of service, of what I’ve done and I am excited to be able to give back to the community that raised me. This is my roots, this is where I grew up. And as for his claims about money, I have gotten more campaign donations and raised more money from people right here in El Paso County than he has. Most of his campaign donations have been from corporations and corporate lobbyists … Jeff Crank has taken about $350,000 in campaign donations from health insurance companies and pharmaceutical companies.”
Crank and Killin will participate in two debates in Colorado Springs. On Aug. 27 they will appear in an hour-long, televised debate at 6 p.m. at Penrose House, near The Broadmoor, in Colorado Springs. On Sept. 18 they will take part in an hour-long debate sponsored by the Colorado Springs Chamber & EDC 3 p.m. at Ent Center for the Arts.
