Overview
- The key document is an email sent Dec. 15, 2025 by White House aide Emily Underwood that invited officials from Transportation, Energy, Agriculture, Interior and OMB to a same-day call to discuss “immediate actions … with respect to Colorado.”
- Officials say the day after that call the Departments of Transportation and Energy announced cancellations of hundreds of millions of dollars in grants for Colorado projects, steps state lawyers link to the meeting.
- Colorado has made the email central to a lawsuit alleging an unconstitutional scheme to punish the state over the prosecution of Tina Peters, and U.S. District Judge R. Brooke Jackson ordered additional records to be produced as the case moves forward.
- Department of Justice lawyers acknowledged the email’s existence in court but argued the Executive Office of the President is protected from broad discovery, a contention that the judge partly rejected by ordering more information released.
- The dispute follows public pressure from President Trump about Peters and a mid-May 2026 commutation of her sentence by Governor Jared Polis, and the case could clarify limits on presidential use of agency powers and access to White House records.