{"id":28898,"date":"2024-03-03T22:41:36","date_gmt":"2024-03-04T05:41:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/colorado-lawmakers-clash-over-bills-to-protect-transgender-names\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T00:44:08","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T06:44:08","slug":"colorado-lawmakers-clash-over-bills-to-protect-transgender-names","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/colorado-lawmakers-clash-over-bills-to-protect-transgender-names\/","title":{"rendered":"Colorado lawmakers clash over bills to protect transgender names"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"The
The Colorado State Capitol is seen on Jan. 24 in Denver. The Democratic majority in Colorado's House pushed forward two bills Friday, March 1, 2024 protecting transgender people's chosen name. (David Zalubowski\/The Associated Press)<\/span>David Zalubowski<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n

DENVER \u2013 Colorado\u2019s House was tense Friday morning as the Democratic majority pushed two bills through the chamber that would protect transgender people\u2019s chosen names: one allowing those convicted of a felony to change their name to conform with their gender identity and another requiring school staff use a student\u2019s chosen name.<\/p>\n

These are the latest in a slew of bills across the country that have precipitated<\/a> a national tug of war.<\/a> Democrat-controlled legislatures including Hawaii and New Jersey have introduced bills similar to Colorado\u2019s, while Republican lawmakers in Idaho, Kansas, Wyoming and Louisiana are digging their heels with bills in the opposite direction.<\/p>\n

The proposals stirred emotional debate, and at times tears, on the Colorado House floor Friday, along with a number of breaks to negotiate what could and couldn\u2019t be said in the well. The morning included wide-eyed surprise and huffs from both parties, prompting a back and forth of retorts and accusations over three hours of discussion.<\/p>\n

\u201cI am patently offended by the generalization and characterization of trans people with crimes against children,\u201d said Democratic Rep. Brianna Titone, a transgender woman, as she stared at Republicans in the chamber. \u201cI won\u2019t stand for that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Both bills passed the House roughly on party lines and are now headed to the Senate for further debate.<\/p>\n

Republicans pushed back on the bill to allow those convicted of a felony to change their names to match their gender identity, arguing that it would allow those who committed future crimes to hide behind a new name.<\/p>\n

\u201cThank you for helping them if they want to do criminal activities, thank you for helping them cloak their identity,\u201d said Republican Rep. Richard Holtorf.<\/p>\n

Democrats pointed out that a name change would still have to be signed off on by a judge, and that the ability for someone convicted of a felony to change their name has existed for years in cases of marriage and adoption.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf this was really about saying, \u2018People with felonies should not be able to change their names,\u2019 and not just one group of people, we would\u2019ve heard that any woman who\u2019s committed a felony is trying to hide when she want\u2019s to get married,\u201d said Rep. Jennifer Bacon, Democrats\u2019 assistant House majority leader.<\/p>\n

The second bill debated Friday would require school staff use students\u2019 chosen names and make it a form of discrimination not to. Democratic Rep. Jennifer Parenti described how her transgender teenager first started using their chosen name at school before later speaking with Parenti.<\/p>\n

\u201cI looked at them and I said, \u2018I\u2019m sorry if I ever gave you the impression that this wouldn\u2019t be OK,\u2019\u201d said Parenti, eyes welling with tears. But \u201cit makes sense \u2026 that someone might want to try something this difficult out in a safe space before talking to their parents about it.\u201d<\/p>\n

That\u2019s the thrust of the argument the bill\u2019s proponents have made, saying the measure particularly protects transgender youths whose family may not be as accepting. In turn, Republicans argued this bill would strip parents\u2019 rights and limit involvement in their child\u2019s life. The bill wouldn\u2019t require that the school keeps parents in the dark.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Bills would protect transgender people\u2019s use of chosen names<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":28899,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[394,28],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-28898","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-colorado-legislature","tag-headlines"],"acf":[],"author_name":"Website Administrator","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28898","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=28898"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28898\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":80571,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28898\/revisions\/80571"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/28899"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28898"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28898"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28898"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=28898"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}