Colorado’s assault on families: TABOR, parental rights and the bills lawmakers killed

By Colleen Enos | Commentary, Christian Home Educators of Colorado

In the United States of America, we cherish our freedoms. We have the freedom to protect our families, to practice our faith, to educate our children, and to live in safe communities. Coloradans want to experience those freedoms in our state, too, not just as an ideal in our country. We want truth, justice, and the American way.

The American way of limited government and keeping our own money is at risk with the constant attack against the Taxpayer Bill of Rights (TABOR). Homeschool families’ ability to educate their own children becomes increasingly difficult as the state of Colorado takes additional resources away from us. SB26-135, State Public K-12 Education Funding, wants to circumvent TABOR restrictions and proposes keeping our TABOR refunds again, only this time, permanently. The Colorado legislature is proposing a ballot measure that would increase the funding of K-12 public education by 2% “of the statewide total program funding for the 2026-27 budget year” for 10 years.

To give perspective on this, the total program funding for 2025-26 (the current school year) was approximately $10 billion. Two percent of that number is $200 million. That doesn’t include Amendment 23 money that requires an increase in education money of at least the rate of inflation each year; last year, it required an increase of 2.3%. Combined, this equals over $400 million each year. When we add to that our declining student enrollment and increasing public education spending, the numbers are hard to swallow. Colorado homeschool families can’t afford this, but the bill passed the Senate Finance Committee and is currently in Appropriations. CHEC testified against this bill.

Protecting our families is becoming a serious issue in Colorado. SB26-004, Expand List of Petitioners for Protection Order, has passed the Colorado Senate, passed the House State, Civic, Military, and Veterans Affairs Committee, and is on its way to passing in the full Colorado House. This harmful anti-protection bill could result in homeschool families who exercise their Second Amendment rights being targeted as “a danger” by any schools where they participate in part-time or extracurricular programs. A Red-Flag order against the parents would remove their firearms, according to the bill.

Families are also trying to protect their athletic daughters who participate in school sports teams from competing against biological males. They rightfully believe the truth that God created humans male and female (Genesis 1:27 NKJV). Despite this, HB26-1083, Protect Female Sports Act, was unceremoniously killed in committee on March 9th. Additionally, because people of faith are concerned with the safety of all women, Representative Scott Bottoms sponsored HB26-1243, Department of Public Health and Environment Regulation of Abortion Clinics. This bill asked the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment to regulate second and third-trimester abortion “clinics” the same way as other clinics in the state are regulated. This sensible safety measure was also killed in committee.

Freely practicing our faith also keeps our communities safe from sexual predators and unethical physicians, and maintains accountability for both. In this spirit, HB26-1128, Limitation on Gender Transition Procedure Claims, was brought by Representative Ken DeGraaf to allow a youth harmed by a gender transition procedure to sue the provider for damages and receive justice. It was also unceremoniously killed by the same committee that killed the previous two bills on a party-line vote.

Thankfully, penalties on convicted human sex traffickers of adults and children will be increased by the passage of SB26-075, Trafficking & Commercial Sexual Activity Offenses, which is currently in the Senate Appropriations Committee. CHEC testified in support of this bill.

Read more commentary by Colleen Enos at chec.org.

Colleen is a homeschooling mom of eight who began her homeschool journey in 1994 and graduated her last two children in 2024, spanning 30 years. Her children range in age from 20 to 36 years old. She has been married to her husband, Mark, for 39 years, and they are now grandparents to five grandbabies. She has been a speech and debate coach for 17 years, pouring her time, effort, and energy into preparing the next generation to speak truth into our culture. Colleen serves homeschool families as the CHEC Director of Government Relations and is working hard to safeguard homeschool freedom through her work with the legislature. You can reach Colleen at [email protected].

 

Editor’s note: Opinions expressed in commentary pieces are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the management of the Rocky Mountain Voice, but even so we support the constitutional right of the author to express those opinions.