Proposition 134 and 135 fact check: What the measures say and what opponents claim

By Shaina Cole | Contributing Writer, Rocky Mountain Voice

A Facebook post from the Douglas County Democrats warns that under Proposition 134, any student accused of being transgender could face an invasive gender check, with no appeal.

The measure itself contains no such thing.

There is no examination in the final text. No mechanism for one student to accuse another. No appeal provision in either direction, because there is no finding to appeal from.

The measure uses the word “complaint” once, and it runs the other way. It bars a government entity, licensing organization or athletic association from entertaining a complaint or opening an investigation against a school for keeping a separate team for female students.

The language did not originate with the county party. It tracks the campaign website of Families Not Politics, the committee opposing both measures.

The site tells voters that any girl could face an invasive gender check if she is accused of being transgender, and that with no appeals process parents are powerless to stop it.

Families Not Politics warns that any girl “could face an invasive gender check” and that there is “no appeals process.”
Proposition 134’s text has neither.
Screenshot: familiesnotpolitics.com, accessed Sept. 30, 2026

The post’s other target is Proposition 135, which would bar certain surgeries on minors.

Families Not Politics has a line for that one too. “This measure takes healthcare decisions out of parents’ and doctors’ hands, with no way to appeal if the government gets it wrong,” its website says.

The county party’s post repeats that sentence, changing only “This measure” to “It.”

RMV fact-checked an earlier version of the sports claim in May, when the group told voters the measure would open girls to “invasive gender inspections.”

What Proposition 134 says

Proposition 134 requires schools to designate athletic teams as male, female or coed, and bars male students from female teams. A female student may play on a male team where no female team is offered.

Sex is defined by whether a person’s reproductive system is organized around the production of ova or sperm, not by a birth certificate.

One section of the measure runs directly against the post’s framing.

Section 25-60-105, titled “Protections under the Americans with Disabilities Act,” says that notwithstanding any other provision in the article, a person born with a diagnosis of a disorder or difference in sex development must receive all legal protections and accommodations afforded under federal law.

Each school’s governing body must adopt a policy implementing the measure.

The measure “does not impose a specific method for determining or demonstrating biological sex,” the Legislative Council’s Blue Book analysis says. Individual schools or school districts “must determine their own verification procedures.”

The measure neither requires an appeal nor forbids one. Districts are free to write one into their procedures. That silence is what the post converts into “no appeal.”

The Blue Book does carry a body-inspection warning, in its arguments-against section, where a prediction about how districts might act belongs. The campaign and the county party present it as something the measure does.

Some Colorado districts have already had to decide for themselves.

What a district with this policy actually does

At least seven Colorado schools and school districts have adopted policies barring biological males who identify as female from female sports, according to the Blue Book.

El Paso County’s District 49 adopted its policy in May 2025.

Asked how the district verifies a student’s sex, D49 Director of Communications David Nancarrow described a paper trail that already exists.

Students enroll with a birth certificate, which Colorado law lets a person change without surgery under section 25-2-113.8, known as Jude’s Law. At athletic registration, the student and family state the student’s sex again, and the athletic physical form requires the student, the parent and a physician to certify it. Staff then compare that paperwork against the registration records on file, checking whether it has been changed.

The physical form is the Colorado High School Activities Association’s Preparticipation Physical Evaluation, revised in June 2025, which CHSAA requires of interscholastic athletes every year. Its last page, the Medical Eligibility Form, is the only one submitted to the school.

On that page, gender is a fill-in line in a student information block marked “to be completed by student and parent.” What the healthcare professional signs is a different certification. It says the student was examined and is medically eligible for all sports, for certain sports or for none.

Nothing on the page asks about anatomy, chromosomes or hormone levels.

Gender is a fill-in line on the only page of the CHSAA physical a school receives. Nothing on it asks about anatomy, chromosomes or hormones.
Screenshot: CHSAA Medical Eligibility Form, revised June 2025

“Well over 99% of our students already identify as a boy or a girl,” Nancarrow wrote.

In the more than 16 months since the policy was adopted, Nancarrow said, the district has handled zero eligibility disputes.

Asked whether a family can contest an eligibility decision, Nancarrow said all district policies are subject to accommodations and waivers.

“If individuals request accommodations based on a unique and specific genetic characteristic or medical verification, we’ll consider those requests on a case-by-case basis.”

D49’s policy is its own, adopted by its board more than six months before a December 2025 settlement let the district keep it without penalty from CHSAA. It is not Proposition 134.

One district is not the whole state. But D49 has run a policy of this kind for more than a year, and its record is paperwork, no disputes and a waiver path.

What Proposition 135 says

Proposition 135 bars anyone from knowingly performing surgery on a minor to alter biological sex characteristics, which it defines as treatment in response to the minor’s perception of sex or gender. No state or federal funds, Medicaid reimbursement or insurance coverage may pay for it.

There is no government approval step. No review board. No permit to be denied. The measure creates no government decision for a family to appeal from.

The measure adds the prohibition to the state’s professions and occupations code. Under the Blue Book analysis for Proposition 135, the Department of Regulatory Agencies would handle complaints if a prohibited surgery were performed or paid for.

The Bell Policy Center’s ballot guide, which the post cites throughout, summarizes the measure this way: Proposition 135 “prohibits medical providers from participating in any surgical procedure that alters a youth’s physical sex characteristics.”

The Bell Policy Center guide the post cites reads Proposition 135 as barring “any surgical procedure that alters a youth’s physical sex characteristics.” The measure lists exclusions.
Screenshot: bellpolicy.org, accessed Sept. 30, 2026

The measure excludes male circumcision and treatment for people born with a medically verifiable disorder of sex development or for acquired physical or chemical abnormalities.

That last exclusion answers a claim Families Not Politics was making in the spring.

The measure “could block surgeries for teens who need life-saving treatment for certain cancers,” the committee’s website said, in an archived copy captured May 21. RMV reported on the claim eight days later.

Before. In May the site warned the measure “could block surgeries for teens who need life-saving treatment for certain cancers.”
Screenshot: familiesnotpolitics.com, archived by the Wayback Machine May 21, 2026

A cancer is an acquired physical abnormality. Surgery to treat one is also not performed in response to a minor’s perception of sex or gender, which is the only thing the measure reaches.

That sentence is gone from the committee’s site now. What replaced it names no procedure and no condition. The measure “could also interfere with medically necessary care for serious conditions that affect kids well beyond transgender youth,” the site says today.

After. The cancer sentence is gone. What replaced it names no procedure and no condition.
Screenshot: familiesnotpolitics.com, accessed Sept. 30, 2026

That one fails on the text for the same reason the cancer claim did.

Care for a condition is treatment for the condition, not treatment in response to a minor’s perception of sex or gender. Whether providers would steer clear anyway is a different argument, and not the one the sentence makes.

The cancer claim itself did not go away. In an op-ed published by the Colorado Times Recorder on Sept. 23, Logan M. Davis wrote that the measure carries “a risk that it may become illegal to perform critical procedures, like a mastectomy on a young woman with breast cancer.”

The same exclusion covers it. So does the same definition.

The surgeons the post left out

The post says major medical groups, including the American Academy of Pediatrics and the American Psychological Association, oppose restricting this care.

On Feb. 3, the American Society of Plastic Surgeons issued a position statement finding “insufficient evidence demonstrating a favorable risk-benefit ratio” for gender-related endocrine and surgical interventions in children and adolescents. It recommends that surgeons delay gender-related breast, chest, genital and facial surgery until a patient is at least 19.

The American Medical Association told NPR that it “supports evidence-based treatment, including gender affirming care,” and that, based on available evidence, “surgical interventions in minors should be generally deferred to adulthood.” The AMA called that a clarification of its existing position, not a reversal.

Neither group called for a ban. The AAP told NPR its guidance “does not include a blanket recommendation for surgery for minors.”

The post argues that the medical profession opposes restricting these surgeries. It leaves out the surgeons’ own association.

Read them for yourself

Proposition 134 runs three pages. Proposition 135 runs two. Both are posted in full on the Secretary of State’s website.

The Blue Book is distributed about a month before the election. By statute, it carries the text and title of each measure along with “a fair and impartial analysis,” according to the Legislative Council.

Everything this story says about what the two measures do was taken from those documents.

A voter can check any of it in an afternoon. County clerks can begin mailing ballots Oct. 2 and must send them by Oct. 9.