Colorado Democrat Shelves Prostitution Decriminalization Effort Amid Growing Criticism

By: Tyler O’Neil | The Daily Signal

Colorado’s Republican House leader is calling foul after a Colorado state senator says he is effectively killing his own bill to decriminalize prostitution—in order to protect “sex workers” from the trauma of having to testify.

State Sen. Nick Hinrichsen, the main sponsor of SB26-097, told the Colorado Sun that his bill lacks the necessary support to clear the Senate Judiciary Committee, so he will ask to delay the measure until after the 2026 legislative session, effectively killing the bill. He said the “sex workers” who persuaded him to bring the bill also persuaded him to effectively kill it.

“Ultimately, we all decided that having a very tense, long committee hearing, where they’d have to be in a room with a lot of law enforcement, religious leaders and other hostile voices — where they’d understandably feel at risk of surveillance, doxxing and threats/intimidation — wasn’t worth it given the lack of reason to believe the outcome will be changed,” he told the outlet.

Yet Laurel Boyle, communications director for Colorado’s House Republican Caucus, told The Daily Signal that 42 people had signed up to testify against the bill, while only one person signed up to testify in favor—and he does not appear to be a prostitute.

Republican Response

“Senator Hinrichsen’s comments are completely out of touch with the legislative process here in Colorado,” Jarvis Caldwell, the Republican minority leader in the state House of Representatives, told The Daily Signal in an interview Monday. “It is the responsibility of every legislator to hear from people who take the time to come to the Capitol and testify, whether they support a bill or oppose it.”

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