Proposition 133: Voters passed the tougher version of a bill lawmakers killed

By Shaina Cole | Contributing Writer, Rocky Mountain Voice

Colorado voters approved life without parole for child sex trafficking, giving it more yes votes than any other measure on the 2026 ballot.

A House committee killed a narrower version of it nine months ago on a 7-4 vote. The legislature can rewrite what voters just passed, and a simple majority is all it takes.

Proposition 133 drew 62.05 percent in the Secretary of State count, last updated at 7:29 p.m. MST Wednesday. That is a margin of 558,873 votes and the highest yes share of the 14 statewide measures. The Associated Press called it at 9:08 p.m. election night, the first of the 14 to be called.

What it changes

Child sex trafficking is a class 2 felony today, carrying eight to 48 years in prison and five years of mandatory parole. Proposition 133 makes it a class 1 felony carrying life without parole, and strips a judge’s discretion to impose anything else.

It also widens the crime. It reaches anyone who knowingly trades anything of monetary value to buy or sell sexual activity with a minor, putting buyers under the same mandatory sentence as traffickers.

The measure writes its own name into statute. A new subsection in the certified text states that the short title of the section is the “Children Are Not for Sale Act.”

It takes effect Jan. 1, 2027, and reaches only offenses committed on or after that date. No one now serving a sentence is affected.

Another new subsection states that nothing in the section limits a governor’s standing authority of pardon, commutation or clemency. Legislative Council’s fiscal analysis builds that in, projecting that prison costs will eventually level off because life sentences end “due to an offender dying or potentially receiving a commutation or pardon.”

The bill that came first

Rep. Scott Bottoms, a Colorado Springs Republican, introduced House Bill 26-1082 on Feb. 2 under the same name the initiative would later write into statute. It had no co-sponsors and no Senate sponsor.

House Judiciary heard it Feb. 10. A motion to send the bill to Appropriations failed 4-7.

The committee then postponed it indefinitely on a 7-4 vote. It never reached the floor.

Erin Lee leads Protect Kids Colorado, the group that later put the initiative on the ballot. She testified for the bill at that hearing, RMV reported in February.

“There’s only one way to stop child sex trafficking,” Lee said. “And that’s to make the penalty harsh enough that people will not buy or sell a child, at least not here in Colorado.”

Opponents at the same hearing argued the sentence would reach the wrong people. One of them, Lori Rose Kepros, told the committee, “We represent people who are prosecuted under this statute,” and said that includes “survivors who get locked up and threatened by prosecutors.” Ariane Frosh of the ACLU of Colorado said mandating life without parole “prevents a court from taking into account mitigating and individualized circumstances.”

Lawmakers had turned down a different sentencing bill two years earlier. House Bill 24-1092 would have required minimum prison terms for child prostitution offenses rather than life sentences for trafficking. The House State, Civic, Military and Veterans Affairs Committee postponed it indefinitely on an 8-3 vote in February 2024.

What the legislature did pass

A second bill was already moving. Senate Bill 26-015, introduced Jan. 14, cleared Senate Judiciary 6-1 the day after House Judiciary killed Bottoms’ bill.

The bill worked inside Colorado’s existing sentencing structure rather than replacing it, much as the failed 2024 bill had tried to do. It requires judges to impose at least the minimum presumptive sentence for a list of child commercial sex offenses and orders 364 days in county jail as a probation condition for soliciting.

It also removes the spousal exception and makes internet luring of a child a class 3 felony when done with intent to meet for commercial sexual activity.

It passed the Senate 34-0 and the House 64-1. Sens. Byron Pelton and Dylan Roberts, with Reps. Jarvis Caldwell and Monica Duran, carried it as prime sponsors, two Republicans and two Democrats. Caldwell is the House minority leader.

More than 40 lawmakers from both parties signed on as co-sponsors. Gov. Jared Polis signed it June 3. It took effect July 1, four months before the election.

Detective Kate Morsey of the Douglas County Sheriff’s Office had told senators that “right now in Colorado, purchasing a child for commercial sexual activity is probation eligible.”

Protect Kids Colorado built its victory statement this week on the legislature’s record.

“For years, Colorado families asked their elected representatives to take these concerns seriously, only to see legislation repeatedly rejected at the Capitol,” said former state Sen. Kevin Lundberg, the group’s chairman. “Yesterday, Coloradans spoke for themselves. They have made clear that the legislature’s refusal to act did not reflect the will of the people.”

Lee had made the same argument in October, before the vote. “The legislature had an opportunity to strengthen these protections and failed,” she told the Colorado Sun. “Now Colorado voters have the opportunity to decide for themselves whether these crimes deserve stronger consequences.”

Lawmakers did reject the life-without-parole bill. They also passed a narrower sentencing bill that has been law since July.

The initiative goes further than the bill did

The two proposals are not identical, and the difference sits in the provision reaching buyers.

House Bill 26-1082 covered someone trading anything of monetary value for sexual activity with a minor “who the person knows is being trafficked for sexual servitude,” according to Legislative Council’s summary of the bill as introduced. The buyer had to know the minor was a trafficking victim.

Proposition 133 drops that element. Its text reaches anyone who “knowingly trades anything of monetary value to buy or sell sexual activity with a minor,” with no requirement that the buyer know anything about trafficking.

Voters approved a wider law than the one the legislature declined to pass.

What lawmakers can do now

Proposition 133 amends the Colorado Revised Statutes rather than the constitution. That means the General Assembly can change or repeal it without returning to voters, the Denver Post reported.

Lawmakers also customarily pass enabling legislation to put a voter-approved statutory change into effect, which gives them a second point of contact with it.

They convene Jan. 11, 10 days after the measure takes effect. Democrats held 49 of 65 House seats and 24 of 35 Senate seats on preliminary returns as of Wednesday morning, two-thirds of both chambers for the first time.

Gov.-elect Phil Weiser said Wednesday that revising a statutory ballot measure is “a natural and, I believe, appropriate role for the legislature,” the Denver Post reported. He was speaking about Propositions 132, 134 and 135, and did not name Proposition 133. RMV reported on Proposition 134 Thursday.

What the fight was about

The Colorado Coalition Against Sexual Assault and the Colorado Organization for Victim Assistance argued all year that the measure would catch trafficking victims forced to recruit or facilitate for their traffickers.

Proponents answered that existing law already protects them. Colorado lets a victim charged with trafficking raise a defense that they were forced or coerced, and supporters said the measure would not affect that protection, the Colorado Sun reported in October. Legislative Council’s Blue Book says current law “provides legal defenses and protections for individuals charged with this crime who are victims of sex trafficking.”

Where the count stands

Proposition 133 leads 1,439,203 to 880,330. Propositions 134 and 135, the other two measures from Protect Kids Colorado, lead at 52.56 percent and 52.15 percent. Neither has been called.

AP has called six of the 14 statewide measures. Four constitutional amendments were rejected. Propositions 133 and NN were approved.

None of these results are official.