Colorado Democrats’ Gun Control Agenda Has Failed. HB26-1021 Is the Reset We Need

By Reps. Brandi Bradley and Max Brooks | Guest Commentary, Rocky Mountain Voice

Editor’s update: House Bill 26-1021 will be heard in the House Judiciary Committee on Tuesday, February 17, 2026, upon adjournment in HCR 0107. The committee is scheduled between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. Readers may listen live here: https://sg001-harmony.sliq.net/00327/Harmony/en/PowerBrowser/PowerBrowserV2/20260217/29/17994#info_

For more than a decade, Colorado Democrats have treated gun control as a political obsession. Not because it works. Not because it reduces crime. But because it expands government control and satisfies national activist donors.

Meanwhile, crime has increased, communities feel less safe, and the only people consistently punished are those who follow the law.

House Bill 26-1021, the Second Amendment Protection Act, is a direct rebuke of that failed agenda. It repeals sweeping gun restrictions passed in recent years and restores constitutional rights Democrats have steadily chipped away.

Year after year, they promise the next mandate will finally make Colorado safer. A waiting period. A new age restriction. Another ban. Another lawsuit. Another “reform.” None of it stops criminals.

Criminals do not submit to background checks. They do not follow magazine limits. They do not delay their crimes for three days because the legislature told them to.

Law-abiding citizens do.

That is why Democrats’ policies land hardest on working families, rural Coloradans, veterans, small business owners, and women who simply want the ability to protect themselves.

Colorado’s record speaks for itself. Auto theft and violent crime surged even as gun laws multiplied. Police departments are short staffed. Prosecutors are stretched thin. Repeat offenders cycle through a lenient system. Yet instead of confronting those failures, Democrats double down on the same reflex: restrict rights and blame gun owners.

It is easier to regulate citizens than to fix a broken justice system.

HB26-1021 changes the focus.

Our bill repeals some of the most extreme and ineffective gun laws passed in recent years. It restores fairness to firearm manufacturers and dealers who have been targeted with politically motivated liability schemes. It eliminates duplicative regulations that turn ordinary people into criminals for technical mistakes. It ends the patchwork of local ordinances that make lawful behavior in one county a crime in the next.

Most importantly, it reasserts a simple principle: constitutional rights do not evaporate because a political majority finds them inconvenient.

Democrats have made clear that they view the Second Amendment as a problem to be eliminated rather than a right to be respected. They speak about “common sense” while pushing policies that ignore evidence and blatantly ignore constitutional limits. They claim to stand for safety while refusing to hold violent offenders fully accountable.

That contradiction is catching up to them.

This bill also defends Colorado’s economy. Many firearm retailers and manufacturers are family-owned businesses that operate responsibly and provide much needed jobs. Democrats have subjected them to regulatory harassment and lawsuits designed to drive them out of the market. That is not public safety policy. It is ideological warfare.

We reject it.

Public safety is not achieved by disarming the law-abiding while releasing repeat offenders back into the community. It is achieved by enforcing existing laws, prosecuting violent criminals, and respecting the constitutional boundaries that protect individual liberty.

House Bill 26-1021 is not symbolic. It is corrective. It acknowledges what Colorado voters already know: the current approach has failed.

Democrats will oppose this bill because it dismantles a central pillar of their agenda. It exposes the reality that more restrictions did not deliver more safety. And it returns power to citizens instead of expanding bureaucracy.

Colorado does not need another headline-driven gun bill that makes politicians feel virtuous. It needs leadership willing to admit mistakes and restore the freedoms that were too casually stripped away.

That is what HB26-1021 does.

And that is why we will keep fighting for it.

Editor’s note: Opinions expressed in commentary pieces are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the management of the Rocky Mountain Voice, but even so we support the constitutional right of the author to express those opinions.