By Taylor Penley | Fox News
Parental rights advocates are cautioning against a “totalitarian” transgenderism bill rammed through the Colorado state House that they say could jeopardize parents’ chances in custody battles if they “misgender” or “deadname” their children.
“This is giving the authority to our state to take our children away if we don’t agree with these gender transitions, so it’s got huge ramifications for all parents, especially those in custody situations who are fighting with their ex-spouses to stop their children from being medicalized,” Erin Lee, a mom from the Centennial State, told “The Faulkner Focus” on Monday.
She added, “It opens the door for all parents to potentially have their children forcibly removed by the state if they’re not willing to affirm their child’s mental health distress.”
Erin Lee (left) and Erin Friday (right) are warning against a Colorado bill involving transgenderism and parenting. (The Faulkner Focus)
HB25-1312, which imposes state-mandated gender policies on schools and considers it “coercive control” in child custody cases when a parent does not affirm a child’s gender identity, was among a slate of Democratic-led bills pushed through earlier this month.
More specifically, the bill states that, “when making child custody decisions and determining the best interests of a child for purposes of parenting time, a court shall consider deadnaming, misgendering or threatening to publish material related to an individual’s gender-affirming health-care services as types of coercive control.”
The Colorado bill, which would create the Kelly Loving Act, named after a transgender man who was killed in the 2022 Colorado nightclub shooting by a nonbinary gunman, also prohibits Colorado courts from enforcing laws from other states that remove children from parents who allow transgender treatments for minors.