Colorado lawmakers move to sidestep Supreme Court ruling on therapy speech

By Jennifer Sey | Commentary, Sey Everything

The Colorado legislature is attempting to sidestep the Supreme Court ruling with a new "conversion therapy" lawsuit bill

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled on March 31, 2026, in Chiles v. Salazar (8-1 decision, with Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson dissenting) that Colorado’s 2019 ban on “conversion therapy” for minors violates the First Amendment’s free-speech protections as applied to talk therapy. (I wrote about it here.)

The Supreme Court’s ruling said the Colorado law was unconstitutional because it constituted “viewpoint discrimination.” The Supreme Court made it clear that talk therapy is protected speech, not “conduct.”

But Colorado refuses to accept the Supreme Court’s ruling. Instead, the insane state that I live in (because I was trying to escape the insanity of California!) has immediately implemented a work around.

Yes that’s right. Colorado Democrats decided to double down.

What the actual [F*#!] is wrong with these people? (Sorry, I try hard not to curse but sometimes I just can’t help it.)

They pushed amendments to HB26-1322 to redefine a counselor’s speech as “conduct” in statute — the exact argument the Court just rejected.

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Here’s what happened, from the beginning:

The prior law HB 19-1129 prohibited mental health professionals from engaging in any talk therapy that challenged a minor’s gender confusion. The state called this conversion therapy. Because, so the “logic” goes/went — children know who they are and if they say they are boys when they are actually girls and you as a therapist don’t just accept that, you are attempting to “convert” them — into non-trans I guess? The therapist who challenges or simply asks a question is practicing “conversion therapy.” The therapist is converting them from their true trans boy-ness.

The state called it conversion therapy on purpose, of course, to summon the gruesome practice (which isn’t utilized anymore) of electric shock therapy once meant to undo the gayness in the Ls and the Gs.

So yeah . . . talk therapy in which a therapist says to a child hey have you considered maybe you’re still a boy and it’s ok that you don’t like sports or other stereotypically boy things? was against the law in Colorado until a few days ago.

What was required by law was for a therapist to say to a child questioning their sex —Yes you are a girl. Obviously you’re a girl. You may have a penis but you like dolls and you have long hair so you’re a girl. Duh. Next!

Literally mandated by law.

But on March 31, the Supreme Court held that, when applied to pure talk therapy, the Colorado ban was viewpoint discrimination: it allowed therapists to affirm or support a minor’s identity exploration/gender “transition” but barred them from helping a minor who wanted to align identity with biological sex. Or a minor who had experienced trauma, maybe sexual assault even, and had adopted some TikTok driven hypothesis that perhaps their discomfort was actually because she was trans. The therapist could not question that trans identity. By law. The therapist had to just affirm affirm affirm.

Justice Neil Gorsuch’s majority opinion said this “censors speech based on viewpoint” and that lower courts had wrongly treated it as mere regulation of professional conduct rather than speech.

Immediately after the ruling, the Democratic-controlled Colorado legislature accelerated a pre-filed bill (HB26-1322, “Civil Actions for Conversion Therapy Survivors”) as the workaround. The bill had been introduced in mid-March and cleared committee on March 25, but the House fast-tracked and passed it on April 2 (40-23 vote on third reading); it is now headed to the Senate.

Instead of a direct regulatory ban enforced through licensing/disciplinary proceedings, HB26-1322 creates a private right of action. Minors (or former minors) who received “conversion therapy” (defined essentially the same way as in the old law) can sue the licensed mental health professional for economic damages, non-economic damages, and punitive damages. It also imposes liability on employers or supervisors who knew or should have known the therapy was occurring. Crucially, there is no statute of limitations — suits can be filed at any time. If passed and signed, it would take effect July 1, 2026.

Here is the attempted dodge: shift from state enforcement (licensing discipline for the speech itself) to private lawsuits for resulting harm, while narrowing the definition to emphasize “coercive” direction toward a predetermined result (hoping courts see this as regulable harmful conduct/injury rather than viewpoint discrimination).

Supporters state: It does not regulate speech — it ensures accountability for conduct when licensed providers cause harm.

They frame it as a tort for proven injury, not a speech restriction.

READ THE FULL COMMENTARY AT SEY ANYTHING

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