As the proclaimed “land of opportunity,” our country has promised that any American who works hard can get ahead. The fact that so many working people feel like they aren’t getting ahead, no matter how hard they work, was a major factor driving Trump’s victory in the 2024 election. 

Trump managed to convince voters that, as president, he would bring down the costs of groceries and healthcare and increase the number of good-paying jobs. Our newly elected CD3 Rep. Jeff Hurd, R-Grand Junction, also promised to bring higher-paying jobs to our region and tackle the high costs of food, utilities, and childcare. Both Trump and Hurd were short on details about how they would accomplish these things, but the majority of voters took them at their word.

Many of us find it hard to understand why voters would believe Trump’s promises to prioritize working people over elites. Trump’s biggest legislative achievement in his first term was the 2017 tax cuts, which he promised would benefit the middle class, not the highest earners. Yet as Americans for Tax Fairness has documented, people earning just under $70,000 a year had their taxes reduced by about $780, while people earning $700,000 per year enjoyed a tax cut of about $50,000.

The biggest winners of Trump’s tax cuts were the wealthiest corporations. Despite the huge profits of Delta, IBM and dozens of other Fortune 500 corporations in 2018, they paid $0 in federal income taxes that year. 

It’s now up to us to hold Trump and Hurd accountable for their campaign promises. We need to speak up when Trump’s policies — and Hurd’s votes in favor of those policies— fail to benefit working people. If the cost of groceries remains high, strike up a conversation with folks in the grocery store checkout line. If labor unions are weakened, ask your co-workers how they feel about that. If your Social Security or Medicare benefits are reduced, or you suddenly find you need to wait years before you qualify for benefits, share your thoughts in a letter to the editor. 

Trump is already allowing Elon Musk – a tech billionaire – to begin calling the shots. Without any input from Trump, Musk demanded that Republican lawmakers remove a clause in the proposed federal budget that would have made it harder for Americans to build factories in China. Musk already has one giant Tesla manufacturing center in China; he plans to build another. 

Republican lawmakers bowed down to Musk’s demand. He’s now free to build more factories in China so he can manufacture Teslas much more cheaply than if he hired American workers. The fact that Trump is allowing multi-billionaire Musk to wield so much power over our government does not bode well for working people in the US.

Given Trump’s record of pandering to the ultra-wealthy, Musk’s focus on growing his personal fortune, and the tendency of Republicans in D.C. to fall in line behind the far-right – even after campaigning as moderates, like Jeff Hurd did – we’ll need to push our elected officials at the local and state level if we want to address the pressing needs of working people here in Garfield County.

The Modular Housing Production & Construction Trades Training Facility in Rifle is an example of the kind of bold and innovative projects that local government officials can help bring to fruition, whoever is in the White House. The City of Rifle is partnering with our local Habitat for Humanity and the Colorado River Board of Cooperative Educational Services to build a manufacturing center that will address multiple local issues at once: provide job training in the latest digital construction technology; attract good-paying advanced manufacturing jobs to the region; and make it more financially feasible for local communities, hospitals, and schools districts to build affordable housing for their employees.

When this production/training facility was just getting started in 2023, Garfield County Commissioners refused to even provide a letter of support to accompany Habitat’s application for a federal grant. That is unacceptable. The commissioners now earn salaries of over $125,000/year. We should be demanding that they earn their keep by finding solutions to our housing and employment issues and actively supporting other entities that are tackling these challenges.

Historically, Garfield County has been able to rely on the oil and gas industry for jobs. That’s no longer the case. The commissioners’ 2024 budget shows that oil and gas is now 10th on the list of the county’s largest employers. Oil and gas jobs here are down to an average of 430 jobs per quarter.

Elected officials at every level are our public servants. They work at our discretion. We can all do our part to hold them accountable for their campaign promises and for finding solutions to the most pressing needs of the everyday people they were elected to serve.

Debbie Bruell of Carbondale chairs the Garfield County Democrats and is a past member of the Roaring Fork Schools Board of Education.