Blue collars are out of fashion at the State Capitol. 

Democrats are losing working families and, rather than pay attention, they are pushing them out the door in droves. Instead, they are cultivating elite voters more concerned about pronouns than paychecks. 

Colorado is not alone in the trends pushing working-class, non-college-educated Americans – and particularly Hispanics – away from Democrats (although Republicans are far from sealing the deal as their new home). They were once the reliable foundation of the Democratic coalition. 

Liberal author Ruy Teixeira – once a prominent player in the national progressive movement – has been sounding alarm bells for Democrats regarding their lack of concern about the loss of working class voters.

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In a recent piece for the American Enterprise Institute, Teixeira detailed how upside-down President Joe Biden is with working-class Hispanics, with a 37-point margin viewing his job performance unfavorably. And though in the same Pew poll Biden is down only 7 points with working-class Black Americans, he is minus-29 with Blacks under age 50.

That’s the equivalent of a 6-inch political tumor sticking out of the forehead of the Democrat Party.

Teixeira’s prescription to his fellow Democrats? “Leave the comforting confines of the bubble most (Democrats) inhabit.” That means taking seriously the concerns and anxieties of Americans in general, and working families in particular, including the cost of living, crime, illegal drug use – and less of the fashionable hard-left mix of extreme environmentalism, gender identity and pro-criminal measures that ignore real-world problems.  

Colorado Democrats sure aren’t taking his advice. 

Tip a glance at the legislative priorities that have emerged as the session lurches toward its halfway point – both in what the liberal majority is passing and what it is killing. 

If you are among the tens of thousands of Coloradans who work in energy, manufacturing – or the hundreds of thousands of other workers whose jobs are connected to those sectors – the Democrats are working hard to put you out of work. 

The marquee bill recently put out of its misery would have eliminated oil and gas in Colorado altogether, not great news for the tens of thousands of Coloradans who have found family-sustaining jobs at energy companies. The number of jobs stretches beyond 300,000 when indirect jobs tied to the energy industry are considered, according to the American Petroleum Institute.

It’s what one commentator said is “a carbon-neutral iteration of limousine liberalism that did Democrats no favors in recent years.” 

But there is a lot more.  

Liberals also are pushing a bill designed to hound manufacturing companies, creating a kangaroo court system of mandatory minimum penalties that could soar into the millions of dollars even for minor paperwork violations. And they want citizens with no knowledge of manufacturing or air emissions to be able to get up one day and file complaints that not only are expensive to defend, but could threaten the existence of the facility. 

That’s legalized harassment. 

This session, liberals have killed bills to help reduce crime, claiming the reality of crime in working-class communities is overblown. A bill to help give special needs kids more school choice was guillotined while Democrats are pushing a bill to kneecap charter schools, which have been an oasis for many families. 

Working families live in working-class communities – the places where their policy priorities make life harder, not easier. 

The elitist left, comfortable in their Subaru wagons, COVID mask still dangling from the rear-view mirror, haven’t met many working men and women.  

They might learn the effects of their legislation if they did. Blue-collar workers build communities, make rail for light rail, keep the supply chain running and make the windmills that power wind energy. Thanks to them you can heat, cool and light your homes,

They emerge from their shift dirty from a day’s work, looking forward to a beer after a long, hard often-dangerous shift at the plant. They look forward to hunting trips. They drive pickups, some with six digits on the odometer with racks for rifles. 

They are told their jobs aren’t important, and that worries about food, clothing and a safe neighborhood are overblown. They’re told their manufacturing job just be switched out for another job through the arrogantly named state “Office of Just Transitions.” 

There’s nothing just in elitists targeting your job and your future and handing you a bureaucrats’ brochure as they take your paycheck. It’s not clear how the Office of Just Transitions feeds your family when your job transitions to Alabama. 

It’s mean spirited and callous. And gives lie to the notion progressives care about blue-collar Coloradans.

Sean Duffy, a former deputy chief of staff to Gov. Bill Owens, is a communications and media relations strategist and ghostwriter based in the Denver area.