DENVER — Under a second Trump presidency, Coloradans' rights could change. If Republicans control the presidency and Congress, personal rights could be more restricted than they are today.
Abortion
In 2022, Democratic Gov. Jared Polis signed into law abortion access rights for people in Colorado. Nothing changed, it was just solidified in state law.
In November, a ballot issue will ask Colorado voters to put those same rights in the state constitution, making it harder to change in the future.
“I believe this is following a similar course as slavery, where it was first left up to the states, and then eventually, it came back on a national level to say this is a human rights issue,” said Faye Barnhart from Colorado Life Initiative.
Barnhart tried and failed to get an issue on the November ballot defining a fetus as a person under the 14th Amendment, which guarantees that no person shall be denied life or liberty without due process.
“I believe that if we applied the 14th Amendment, that we could apply that to all living human beings,” Barnhart said. “It really is a national issue to protect all children.”
“Colorado is insulated unless there is a federal ban at the congressional level passed and then signed into law by the president,” said Cobalt President Karen Middleton.
Middleton is also co-chair of Coloradans for Protecting Reproductive Freedom, the group behind the ballot issue to put abortion access into the Colorado Constitution.
“[Vice Presidential nominee] JD Vance, who is the new running mate, explicitly opposes abortion, including no exceptions for rape or incest,” Middleton said. “I am very suspicious of the platform as it’s written, and what I am seeing is that they are really out to overturn any abortion protections left in the country. They want a national ban.”
While Trump has touted being responsible for overturning Roe v. Wade, he is not currently calling for a national abortion ban.
"For 52 years, people have wanted to end Roe v. Wade, to get it back to the states, and we did that,” Trump said on April 10.
LGBTQ+ rights
Another focus under another Trump presidency could be LGBTQ rights. Trump has called for punishments for teachers and educators that allow gender neutrality.
"If any teacher or school official suggests to a child that they could be trapped in the wrong body, they will be faced with severe consequences, including potential civil rights violations for sex discrimination and the elimination of federal funding,” Trump said in a campaign video.
“We all remember our youth ages, right? And there were times we probably experimented. Actually, I was quite the tomboy as well,” said state Rep. Leslie Herod, D-Denver. “Could you imagine a school telling me that I couldn’t dress the way that I wanted to dress, to come to school every single day simply because it looked more masculine than it did feminine? What decade are we in? That is absurd.”
Herod is part of the LGBTQ+ caucus. She warned that Colorado taxpayers would be on the hook for federal policies that limit gender neutrality.
“If a school were to create gender-affirming bathrooms or say that we have gender-neutral bathrooms, that school could lose federal funding,” Herod said. “Will Colorado taxpayers then have to foot the bill for the millions of dollars of federal funding that will no longer be coming into our state because we are gender-affirming? Yes. That is a huge problem.”
Gender and sports
Part of the Trump platform calls to “keep men out of women’s sports.”
“I do believe that if you are biological male that you should participate in men’s sports, not women’s sports,” said state Rep. Lisa Frizell, R-Castle Rock.
Frizell sponsored a bill in 2023 that failed in its first committee to limit sports participation in high school college and intramurals based on the biological sex of the person at birth.
“Over 20 states have adopted that same policy, so this isn’t Lisa Frizell going rogue and thinking Colorado should do something different," Frizell said. "This is something that has been embraced all around the country.”
Unlike the Trump platform, Frizell said she believes this is a local issue.
“Policy matters as important as this should not be broad-brushed by the federal government,” Frizell said. “I voted for him twice already. I’m going to vote for him again. That doesn’t mean that we all have to line up lockstep.”