“Carry it, don’t marry it,” is an old truism at the State Capitol — advice to novice lawmakers not to get too attached to the bills they sponsor. Even if their handiwork survives the legislative process, it might get amended to the point it’s unrecognizable.

The current crop of ruling Democrats must have missed that lecture. They grew so fond of the biggest bill of all, the annual state budget, they simply couldn’t bring themselves to cut it down to size even after it was clear state coffers couldn’t pay for it. Yes, even after the governor had summoned them back into special session this month to nix a nearly $783 million deficit.

Unwilling to bring their budget into balance — though by law, they must — they handed the knife to Gov. Jared Polis, and even he did very little cutting. For their part, all lawmakers did was look for more money to pay for their wish list.

As adeptly reported by our news affiliate Colorado Politics, lawmakers passed laws to squeeze more tax revenue out of Colorado businesses to help cover some of their overspending. That should help them raise about $253 million from tax credit sales, tighter controls on foreign “tax havens,” elimination of tax incentives to insurance companies for home offices, taking away the state’s vendor fee to retailers for collecting state taxes, and “decoupling” the state from the federal code on tax issues, such as qualified business income deductions and “foreign-derived intangible income” deductions.

Colorado businesses and individual taxpayers currently file state taxes based on their federal income tax adjusted gross. Meaning, the kinds of popular and productive tax cuts recently enacted by Congress in its One Big Beautiful Bill Act also apply to our state taxes.

But Colorado lawmakers, who loudly denounced the federal cuts for eating into state revenue as a result, balked at passing those same benefits on to our own state’s taxpayers. Instead, they went scrounging under the couch cushions for any spare change to fund their insatiable spending.

As insult to injury, the money-grubbing legislation passed in last week’s special session — essentially, to roll back the effect of federal tax cuts — flouts the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights in our state constitution. That landmark policy requires any tax hike to be put to voters. As Colorado Politics reported, the taxpayers-advocacy group Advance Colorado posted on social media it would add any violations of TABOR arising out of the special session to a lawsuit the group filed in July over the legislature’s decision to tax overtime pay.

Meanwhile, the governor will cover the rest of the spending overage by tapping up to $326 million of the state’s general fund reserve; $3 million from a hiring freeze that went into effect on Aug. 27, and a transfer of $149 million from cash funds, including $105 million from the state’s affordable housing fund.

The only real cut will be $103 million pared from state agency budgets — only about an eighth of the overall deficit. The rest of the gap will be closed by raiding funds and gouging at least some of the taxpaying public.

Much as Colorado’s lawmakers sought to blame Congress for having the audacity to cut taxes, they have no one to blame but themselves. In league with the governor, they engorged the state budget with new spending and programs year after year. When Congress finally decided to give taxpayers a break, our legislature refused to go along. Their spending priorities were too important — more so than the welfare of rank-and-file Coloradans.

It’s a deficit of the legislature’s making, but don’t hold your breath waiting for them to own up.