Colorado ballot measures restricting boys from girls’ sports, Digi Mart USA News (Colorado): A Colorado mother who said her daughter was secretly socially transitioned at school helped lead a grassroots campaign that delivered major midterm victories, including measures restricting boys from playing in girls’ sports in the traditionally Democratic state, according to a Fox News Digital report.
Erin Lee, executive director and co-founder of Protect Kids Colorado, told Fox News Digital that the campaign’s success was deeply personal, coming more than five years after an experience involving her daughter transformed her from a self-described left-leaning Democrat into a prominent parental rights advocate. “I co-founded Protect Kids Colorado because, five-and-a-half years ago, my 12-year-old daughter was secretly transitioned in her sixth-grade classroom,” Lee said.
In 2023, Lee, her husband and another couple, whose daughters were then sixth-graders at Wellington Middle-High School, sued educators at the Poudre School District with the assistance of America First Policy Institute and Illumine Legal, according to a copy of the lawsuit.
Her group championed three ballot initiatives. Proposition 133 increases penalties for child sex trafficking to life in prison without parole.
Proposition 134 would generally require students to compete on school sports teams corresponding to their biological sex. Proposition 135 would prohibit certain gender-transition surgeries for minors.
Proposition 133 passed with approximately 62% support, while Proposition 134 received roughly 52% and Proposition 135 also received 52%. In the same election, Coloradans re-elected Democratic Sen.
John Hickenlooper in a landslide with 60 percent of the vote.
Lee said the results demonstrate opposition to certain transgender policies that extend beyond traditional partisan lines. “Colorado broke ranks where they voted for Democrats,” Lee said.
“They also voted yes on these commonsense child protection measures.” She added, “I think that really speaks volumes to the fact that gender ideology is not a winning issue.”
Lee said the campaign relied on more than 3,300 petition circulators, over 1,900 notaries and support from more than 1,000 churches. She claimed opponents spent more than $5 million, outspending her organization by more than 20 to 1.
“This really was a movement of the people,” Lee said.
Lee also described the personal toll of her family’s experience, alleging that school officials turned against her and her husband after they questioned their daughter’s change in gender identity. “We walked through a living nightmare,” she said.
Lee said her daughter later moved on from the gender confusion and asked her mother to become an advocate for others who might find themselves in a similar place.
Lee said she sees the election results as evidence of a broader cultural shift. “Gender ideology is a house of cards,” she said, arguing that the Colorado vote could inspire similar efforts elsewhere.
“The voters have spoken,” Lee said. “We’ve come a long way culturally for this to have passed.”
A spokesperson for Poudre School District told Fox News Digital that the district does not comment on individual students, consistent with federal student privacy law. The spokesperson said the claims in Lee v.
Poudre School District R-1 were dismissed by the U.S. District Court for the District of Colorado, that the dismissal was affirmed by the U.S.
Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit in April 2025, and that the U.S. Supreme Court denied a subsequent petition in October 2025.
The spokesperson stated that at no stage of the litigation was the district found liable.
Fox News Digital reached out to LGBTQ advocacy organization One Colorado for comment, as well as Families Not Politics, an organization opposing the measures.
