Live updates: Colorado lawmakers pass trans rights, pro-labor legislation; Senate advances ride-hailing bill

On the penultimate day of the Colorado legislative session, tense policy debates are still winding their way through the House and Senate. Some contentious debates have largely been resolved — or, in the case of an artificial intelligence bill, killed entirely. Our reporters are providing updates on the action in the Capitol.

This story will be updated throughout the day.

3:01 p.m. update: In a new statement on House Bill 1291, which would add regulations on ride-hailing companies like Lyft and Uber to prevent sexual assaults, Gov. Jared Polis’ office says he still has “significant” concerns despite amendments to the measure. HB-1291 is set for a final vote in the Senate on Wednesday.

“Governor Polis is committed to making Colorado safer for everyone, including making sure ride-sharing companies are keeping riders and drivers safe. He has shared concerns about privacy, conflicts with federal and existing state law, and the ability of the bill to be successfully implemented and the ability for (transportation network companies) to comply,” spokeswoman Shelby Wieman wrote. “He will review the final bill if it reaches his desk, but at this point there remain significant legal and policy concerns with the legislation.”

2:44 p.m. update: The Colorado Senate formally passed House Bill 1312, a measure that would increase protections for transgender people and one of the last major contentious issues facing the General Assembly.

The debate on the bill ran late into Monday night over staunch Republican opposition. It passed this afternoon on a 20-14 vote, with Democratic Sens. Kyle Mullica and Marc Snyder joining Republicans in voting no.

The bill, which needs to go back to the House for a vote on Senate amendments, would make it discriminatory not to refer to a transgender person by their chosen name or to disrespect their gender identity and expression in contexts like workplaces and schools. It also would make it easier for people to change their names on legal documents and identification cards.

“(The bill) ensures Coloradans aren’t policed based on their expression of themselves through the types of clothes that they wear relative to their gender identity,” Sen. Nick Hinrichsen, a Pueblo Democrat, said. “It ensures that Coloradans are not discriminated against in matters such as housing, employment or health care, (or) on the basis of who they are, on the basis of the way that they were born — perfect and equal as we all are.”

Senate Republicans continued to press their opposition. Several members raised concerns the bill still would infringe on parental rights and cut parents out of conversations about their children’s gender identities. Despite opposing the bill, Senate Minority Leader Paul Lundeen praised the bill’s namesake, Kelly Loving. Loving was a transgender woman killed during the Club Q shooting in November 2022. 

“Let’s preserve the sanctity of the family unit and uphold the rights of Colorado parents to raise their children without fear of state interference,” Lundeen, a Monument Republican, said. “And at the same time, acknowledge that Kelly Loving was a hero who threw herself between her friends and the threat that was coming at them.”

In interviews after the vote, Mullica, of Thornton, said he had concerns about the bill’s effect on parental rights. Snyder, of Manitou Springs, said constituents he heard from opposed the bill, and he worried it didn’t truly advance the cause of equal rights as much as create carve-outs.

Both Democrats said they supported trans rights and pointed to other votes, including support for House Bill 1309 to guarantee access to gender-affirming care.

Sen. Chris Kolker, a Centennial Democrat sponsoring the bill, rejected the argument that the bill strips rights for some by expanding them for others. It simply reinforces existing civil rights protections, he said. Sen. Faith Winter, a Broomfield Democrat and co-sponsor, read text messages from families with trans members about how a lack of public accommodations hurts their ability to affirm their children.

1:39 p.m. update: Colorado lawmakers fully passed a pro-union bill, putting the legislation on a direct path to a veto showdown with Gov. Jared Polis.

Senate Bill 5 passed the House on a party-line 43-22 vote. It would remove a unique piece of state law that requires that organized workers pass a second election, with a 75% threshold — after the first vote required to form a union — before those workers can negotiate the provision of union contracts that address dues and fees.

The bill was backed by every legislative Democrat, and its supporters have argued that the second election is an unnecessary, anti-union impediment to collective bargaining. They’ve also explicitly linked it to debates over the future of the Democratic Party as it sorts through its 2024 electoral losses.

“If we can’t unanimously, as members of the Democratic Party, stand with (easing unionization), we’re going to continue to lose working-class voters,” Rep. Javier Mabrey, a Denver Democrat, said before the final vote. “It should be a no-brainer for us to vote for it and for the governor to sign.”

But the bill was opposed by leading business groups and by Polis, who’ve argued that the state’s labor laws have worked well and that workers should have more say in the collection of union dues. Polis has told lawmakers that he will veto the bill unless a compromise is reached with business officials.

Efforts to reach that compromise stretched over the course of the entire session. They finally collapsed last week after business groups rejected Polis’ last offer and labor officials wouldn’t agree to business’ final position. Polis also tried to expand the talks to include some of his priorities that were anathema to labor.

Once legislative leaders sign the bill and send it to Polis, the governor will have 30 days to decide whether to follow through on his threat. In a Monday statement, Polis spokeswoman Shelby Wieman wrote that the governor was “disappointed” that negotiations broke down.

“The Governor’s Office tried to help bridge the gap on this issue,” she wrote, “but unfortunately, agreement was not reached.”

1:20 p.m. update: The Colorado Senate advanced a bill that would regulate ride-hailing companies like Lyft and Uber to prevent sexual assaults, but only after striking a key provision requiring constant audio and visual recording of rides.

House Bill 1291 seeks to increase oversight of the companies to protect drivers and passengers. If it becomes law, it will require regular criminal background checks for drivers and will require rideshare companies to respond promptly to law enforcement subpoenas. It was brought by Rep. Jenny Willford, who said she was sexually assaulted by a driver last year.

Sponsor Sen. Jessie Danielson, a Wheat Ridge Democrat, said the amendment to make recordings of rides opt-in was a particularly difficult change to bring, but it calmed some of the opposition. Riders who set out with ill intent would of course decline to record their rides, she said.

“We have gone far beyond where we intended to, but the integrity of the measure still persists,” Danielson told fellow Democrats during a caucus meeting ahead of the vote. “I wouldn’t have brought it otherwise.”

Fellow sponsor Sen. Faith Winter, a Broomfield Democrat, said she hoped the companies would soon roll out recorded ride options for passengers.

Winter and Danielson said they have been working with Gov. Jared Polis’ office to address some of his concerns about the bill. They also said Lyft has been working in good faith with them on amendments, while Uber — which threatened to pull out of the state if the regulations go into effect — has not.

The bill still needs to go through a final vote in the Senate on Wednesday. It will then need to go to the House for a vote on the Senate amendments before it reaches Polis’ desk.

12:05 p.m. update: House Democrats’ planned reckoning on the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights will not come this year.

That’s not much of a surprise, given the late hour of the session. But lawmakers finally, fully confirmed this week that a resolution that would authorize legislative lawyers to pursue a lawsuit seeking to completely undo the state’s TABOR Amendment — which requires voter approval for tax increases and sets growth caps on government spending — will not be heard on the House floor before the session ends Wednesday.

The bill was never brought to the House floor after it passed an initial committee. Senate Majority Leader Robert Rodriguez said he also hadn’t planned to bring it to the Senate floor, had it passed the House, because he wasn’t sure it had enough support to pass. Some lawmakers in swing districts, he said, were concerned that voting for it would jeopardize their chances of reelection in 2026.

12:01 p.m. update: After lingering for weeks on the Senate calendar, House Bill 1169 — the so-called the “Yes In God’s Backyard,” or YIGBY, bill — was quietly killed late Monday night.

Majority Leader Robert Rodriguez moved to lay over the bill until Thursday — the day after the session ends. He said today that the decision came because the bill lacked sufficient support, and its death was part of a deal with Senate Republicans to end their Monday night filibuster against a transgender rights bill that had threatened to go into the early hours of today.

The bill, which would’ve made it easier for churches and educational institutions to build housing on their property, passed the House in mid-March. But after passing a first Senate committee, it languished on the Senate calendar because it was one vote short of the 18 votes it needed to pass the Senate, said Sen. Tony Exum, a Colorado Springs Democrat and the bill’s sponsor.

“There was no sense in going through the agony of bringing amendments and seeing counter-amendments” if it didn’t have the votes, Exum said. He, too, said HB-1169 was sacrificed in part to end a Republican filibuster.

11:27 a.m. update: The Senate gave initial approval to House Bill 1312 late Monday night, moving forward a much-debated proposal that would add more protections against antitransgender discrimination in state law.

The bill passed after several hours of Republican opposition and filibustering. It now needs a final vote in the Senate, expected today, and then for House sponsors to accept or reject Senate amendments. Assuming none of that holds up the bill, it will move to Gov. Jared Polis’ desk.