Live updates: Gov. Polis signs first special session bills as Colorado legislature enters likely final day

Colorado’s special legislative session convened Tuesday as lawmakers continue working to address a nearly $800 million budget shortfall caused by impacts from the recent federal tax bill.

This story will be updated throughout the day.

2:30 p.m. update: The delay on Colorado’s first-in-the-nation artificial intelligence rules is heading to Gov. Jared Polis’ desk after the measure cleared both chambers. Senate Bill 4 originally sought to create new rules around the use of AI in areas like job and rental applications and to divvy out responsibility when AI tools lead to biases against people.

Those negotiations fell apart in the final days of the special session, leading to a simple delay of rules set to go into effect in February. Under the new bill, expected to be signed by Polis, the rules won’t go into effect until the end of June — giving lawmakers the next regular session to tune the rules.

12:56 p.m. update: As the House took up its final votes, Gov. Jared Polis’ office announced that he’d signed the first two bills passed during the special session.

Senate Bill 3 amends an existing ballot measure that seeks to raise money for the state’s school meals program by taxing wealthier residents. Under the new version, excess funds raised by the ballot measure would go to funding food assistance, which faces funding cuts under the federal budget bill.

According to estimates on the ballot measure, taxes would increase only on those Coloradans who make more than $300,000 a year.

Here’s why the Colorado legislature is now meeting in a special session — and what’s at stake

Polis also signed Senate Bill 2, which allows the state Medicaid program to cover services at clinics like Planned Parenthood. The federal tax bill temporarily blocked federal Medicaid reimbursement to health care providers that also provide abortion services.

“Time and time again, and most recently last November, Colorado voters have overwhelmingly said they will support and defend their right to reproductive health care,” Sen. Lindsey Daugherty, an Arvada Democrat, said in a statement when the bill passed the Senate. “Amidst a hostile national landscape, this legislation is yet another step we must take to protect Coloradans’ right to safe, accessible and affordable reproductive health care.”

12:31 p.m. update: Welcome back to a quiet Capitol for what is likely — hopefully — the sixth and final day of the special session. State lawmakers are expected to give final approval to the handful of bills still on their docket.

The legislature has already passed most of the bills that Democratic leadership unveiled to raise roughly $250 million, part of their three-pronged plan to fill the $783 million budget hole. They are set to pass the last of those measures today, putting all of them on Polis’ desk.

Once those votes are done, the House plans to consider a resolution condemning former Rep. Ryan Armagost. He resigned last week after Democratic leaders announced they would seek to censure him for taking and sharing a picture of a Democratic lawmaker, whose appearance was then mocked in a private GOP group chat and then on social media.

On Monday night, the House gave initial approval to the ghost of the legislature’s artificial intelligence bill, with a healthy dose of dissent.

After a day of frenzied lobbying and deal-breaking, Senate Bill 4 was stripped of its entire contents, including a provision that AI developers could be held liable if their technology discriminates against people when AI is used in consequential decisions like job applications or bank lending. It included other provisions adjusting state regulations passed in 2024.

“Somebody tell me, what is Big Tech’s incentive to ensure that their product isn’t doing these things? Isn’t causing harm? I don’t know … (isn’t) turning into a Hitler reincarnate,” Rep. Emily Sirota, a Denver Democrat, said Monday night. She was referencing how Elon Musk’s AI chatbot on X, Grok, started likening itself to Adolf Hitler earlier this summer.

As it stands, SB-4 now would only delay the state’s current AI regulations from taking effect. They were set to go into effect in February. The bill simply delays the existing rules’ implementation until June 30, which means lawmakers will — once again — be tasked with overhauling them in the coming months.

The bill’s supporters said Monday that though they reached a deal on SB-4 with several groups, major AI and technology companies objected to the deal and helped blow it apart because they didn’t want to shoulder any legal liability for AI’s use.