You left. You did the hardest thing. And then you walked into a family courtroom and discovered that leaving didn’t end the control — it just moved it into a new arena. The person who monitored your phone, isolated you from your friends, and told you that you were nothing without them is now your co-parent by court order. The legal system that was supposed to protect you doesn’t always recognize what you survived as abuse.
That is what Colorado’s HB26-1309 is trying to change. And it is under organized opposition right now, with a Senate floor vote scheduled for May 11, 2026.
Here is what you need to know.
Editor’s Note (May 13, 2026): On Monday, May 11, 2026, HB26-1309 has passed its first vote. It is currently proceeding through the Colorado Senate, where it is scheduled for final consideration today. This article provides background and analysis of the bill as it moves through the legislative process. A follow-up will be published once the final vote is completed.
Table of Contents
- What Is Colorado HB26-1309?
- Who Is Opposing This Bill, and Why
- What This Bill Means for Survivors of Coercive Control
- The Broader Colorado Legislative Context
- What “Coercive Control” Means in the Context of This Bill
- What You Can Do
- Understanding the Opposition’s Concerns Without Losing the Frame
- Related Links
- Frequently Asked Questions
- References
What Is Colorado HB26-1309?
HB26-1309, titled “Abuse in Cases of Separation,” is a bill currently before the Colorado Senate. It was introduced in the 75th Colorado General Assembly and sponsored by Representative Meg Froelich, Representative Tammy Story, and Senator Katie Wallace.1
The core of the bill is a structural change to how Colorado family courts handle parental responsibility determinations when domestic violence is alleged. Under current Colorado law, courts determine parenting time and decision-making responsibilities based on the “best interests of the child” standard — and domestic violence history is one factor among many in that assessment.
HB26-1309 changes that sequence entirely. It requires courts to first determine whether a party has committed domestic violence before considering best interests factors at all. If the court finds by a preponderance of the evidence that a party committed domestic violence, a legal presumption activates: it is presumed not to be in the best interests of the child to allocate parental responsibilities to that parent.
That presumption can be rebutted. But the burden shifts.
How the Bill Defines Domestic Violence
This is where HB26-1309 moves well beyond traditional physical violence frameworks. The bill’s definition of domestic violence explicitly includes coercive control, economic abuse, technological abuse, stalking, sexual assault, health-related abuse, and human trafficking.
The inclusion of coercive control as a legally recognized form of domestic violence is significant. Research by Evan Stark — whose foundational coercive control framework was developed with the intellectual groundwork laid by Susan Schechter — established that coercive control creates what he described as a “reign of terror” that constrains victims’ liberty across all domains of life, not just in moments of physical violence.2 Stark’s 2007 work, Coercive Control: How Men Entrap Women in Personal Life (Oxford University Press), remains the field’s foundational text on this subject.3
Family courts have been slow to operationalize this understanding. A bill that makes coercive control a recognized predicate for parenting presumptions represents a meaningful shift.
What the Bill Says About Health-Related Abuse
The bill defines health-related abuse as interference with, or controlling or preventing access to, medical care, mental or behavioral health care, or reproductive health care — including contraceptive use, reproductive health care information, or controlling or attempting to control pregnancy outcomes.
This definition is grounded in documented patterns of coercive abuse. Controlling a partner’s access to healthcare — including reproductive healthcare — is a well-documented dimension of intimate partner coercive control. Practitioner experience across seven years of direct work with this population confirms that reproductive coercion is a consistent feature of the most severe presentations of coercive control.
What the Bill Says About Therapeutic Standards
HB26-1309 also changes the qualifications required of mental health professionals involved in domestic violence cases before the court. It requires that any mental health professional working with a party found to have committed domestic violence must hold a master’s or doctoral degree, have specialized training and expertise in treating domestic violence survivors, and have completed a 52-week domestic violence abuser intervention program.
This matters. Requiring specialized competency — rather than general approval — raises the floor for what counts as appropriate therapeutic intervention in these cases.
Who Is Opposing This Bill, and Why
On May 8, 2026, the Colorado Catholic Conference published a joint letter from the four Colorado bishops, urging the faithful to contact their senators and vote no on HB26-1309 before passage.4
The bishops identified two provisions as the basis for their opposition.
The Gender Identity Claim
The bishops’ statement asserts that HB26-1309’s definition of coercive control could be applied to parents who decline to affirm a child’s “trans identity,” and that this could result in custody loss. They cite this as an overreach of the bill’s domestic violence framework into parental religious and moral authority.
It is important to read the actual bill text carefully here. HB26-1309’s definition of coercive control focuses on patterns of behavior that isolate, surveil, and restrict the liberty and autonomy of a partner or family member. The bill does not specify gender identity affirmation as a named category of coercive control. However, it is accurate that coercive control definitions are broad by design — because coercive control itself operates across many domains of a victim’s life.
The relevant question for survivors and their advocates is not whether this bill could theoretically be applied broadly. It is whether courts will apply it appropriately — and whether the bill’s procedural safeguards (preponderance of evidence findings, written judicial findings, specific conditions) create adequate guardrails.
The Reproductive Coercion Provision
The bishops’ second objection concerns the health-related abuse provision. Their statement characterizes this provision as redefining abuse to include “a male partner advocating for the life of his preborn child if he opposes the mother’s decision to abort.” They frame this as disregarding the father’s role and contradict it through Catholic teaching on the sanctity of life.
This framing requires careful scrutiny from a coercive control perspective. Reproductive coercion — which includes pressuring, threatening, or physically interfering with a partner’s reproductive autonomy — is a documented form of intimate partner abuse. Research consistently finds that reproductive coercion co-occurs with other forms of coercive control and is associated with significant harm to survivors. The bill’s language targets control and interference, not disagreement or advocacy conducted without coercion.
These are genuinely contested political and moral questions. This platform does not take a position on abortion policy. What this platform does hold is that controlling a partner’s access to reproductive healthcare through intimidation or coercion is a recognized dimension of domestic abuse — and that survivors of this specific harm deserve legal recognition.
What This Bill Means for Survivors of Coercive Control
If you have been through a family court process as a survivor of coercive control, you likely know exactly why this bill matters. You may have been told that what happened to you didn’t “rise to the level” of domestic violence because there were no police reports, no visible injuries, and no single event that courts could weigh against your abuser’s polished presentation.
Coercive control does not produce police reports. It produces anxiety, self-doubt, and a learned helplessness that looks — to an untrained eye — like a high-conflict personality. That misread happens in courtrooms across the country every day.
What HB26-1309 attempts to do is require courts to look at coercive control first, before applying the standard best-interests analysis. For survivors, that sequence change is not technical. It is the difference between being believed and not being believed in the room that determines your children’s lives.
The co-parenting context is where post-separation abuse escalates most dangerously. Research by Emma Katz on children’s experience of coercive control — including her 2016 work published in Child Abuse Review — documents that children who witness coercive control suffer harm that extends well beyond any individual violent incident.5 Children are secondary victims of coercive control, not peripheral bystanders.6 Legislation that takes coercive control seriously in parenting determinations protects children, not only adult survivors.
Learn more about the legislative changes in Colorado and other jurisdictions at Global Coercive Control Legislation Index: May 2026 Update
The Broader Colorado Legislative Context
HB26-1309 is not the only domestic violence legislation moving through Colorado this session. HB26-1009, the Colorado Mandatory Lethality Assessment Act, passed the Senate in April 2026 and requires law enforcement officers to conduct lethality assessments when responding to domestic violence calls. If the assessment indicates a high-risk victim, officers must immediately connect that person with a victim’s advocate.
These two bills, taken together, represent a significant legislative moment for Colorado survivors. One addresses the point of crisis intervention. The other addresses the long aftermath — the court process where control so often continues.
The Colorado General Assembly is scheduled to adjourn on May 13, 2026. HB26-1309 is listed for Senate second reading on May 11. That means the window is narrow.
What “Coercive Control” Means in the Context of This Bill
The term coercive control appears in the bill’s definition of domestic violence as a standalone recognized category. For readers encountering this term for the first time, it is worth pausing here.
Coercive control is not a single act. It is a pattern of behavior designed to dominate, isolate, and surveil a partner across all domains of their life. It includes monitoring communications, controlling finances, isolating from family and friends, regulating daily behavior, and using children as instruments of control. Evan Stark’s framework — grounded in Susan Schechter’s foundational work — frames coercive control as a liberty crime, not simply a violence crime. It deprives victims of their freedom, not only their safety in moments of physical danger.
This distinction matters enormously in family court. A single incident of violence can be minimized, explained away, or counter-alleged. A pattern of coercive control, properly documented, is harder to distort. Legislation that formally recognizes coercive control as domestic violence gives courts the framework to see that pattern — if they are trained to look for it.
Seven years of direct practitioner work with severe and treatment-resistant presentations of narcissistic abuse confirms that the post-separation phase is frequently the most dangerous period for survivors. The legal system — particularly family court — becomes the new arena for control when physical access is removed. Lawfare, post-separation abuse, and the weaponization of parenting time are not edge cases. They are the norm in the population this platform serves.
What You Can Do
If you are a Colorado resident, you can contact your state senator directly before the May 11 vote. The Colorado General Assembly’s website allows you to find your legislator by address at leg.colorado.gov/find-my-legislator.
If you are not in Colorado, this bill’s progress matters for the broader legislative landscape. Colorado’s coercive control framework will be watched by advocates and legislators in other states. A bill that enshrines coercive control in family court presumptions — with clear evidentiary standards and written judicial findings — provides a legislative model that other states can adapt.
This platform tracks coercive control legislation globally through the Global Coercive Control Legislation Index. The Index was established in 2020 as the first systematic index of its kind and has been cited in peer-reviewed publications including the South Illinois University Law Journal, VERN University, Palgrave Macmillan, and the University of Agder.
Understanding the Opposition’s Concerns Without Losing the Frame
Legislation that expands the legal definition of domestic violence will always generate opposition. Some of that opposition comes from genuinely held religious or philosophical convictions. Some comes from those with a material interest in keeping coercive control unrecognized to maintain the status quo. Both deserve to be read carefully.
The Colorado bishops’ concerns about parental rights in gender identity cases reflect a real political tension in current legislative drafting. Definitions of coercive control that are broad enough to capture the lived reality of survivors are also broad enough to be contested at the margins. This is not unique to HB26-1309. It is a consistent challenge in coercive control legislation globally.
What this platform holds is that the answer to drafting challenges is better drafting — not the defeat of the underlying legislative goal. A bill that makes coercive control a predicate for parenting presumptions is a meaningful advance for survivors. The appropriate response to concerns about overreach is amendment and judicial guidance, not abandonment of the framework.
Related Links
Frequently Asked Questions
HB26-1309 is a Colorado bill titled “Abuse in Cases of Separation” currently before the Senate with a floor vote scheduled for May 11, 2026. It requires family courts to determine whether a party has committed domestic violence before applying the best interests of the child standard to parenting time decisions. If domestic violence is found, the bill creates a rebuttable presumption that awarding that party parental responsibilities is not in the child’s best interests. The bill’s definition of domestic violence includes coercive control, economic abuse, technological abuse, health-related abuse, stalking, sexual assault, and human trafficking.
The Colorado Catholic Conference issued a joint letter from four bishops on May 8, 2026, urging the faithful to call their senators to vote against HB26-1309. The bishops’ stated concerns center on two provisions: that the bill’s coercive control definition could be applied to parents who decline to affirm a child’s gender identity, potentially triggering custody loss; and that the health-related abuse provision could classify a partner opposing abortion as an abuser. The bishops frame these provisions as undermining parental rights and contradict the health-related abuse clause through Catholic teaching on the sanctity of life.
Coercive control is a pattern of behavior used to dominate, isolate, and surveil a partner across all areas of their life. Unlike single incidents of physical violence, coercive control operates continuously — through surveillance, financial control, isolation, regulation of daily behavior, and the use of children as instruments of control. In family court, coercive control has historically been difficult to prove because it leaves no visible injuries and often generates no police reports. Legislation that formally recognizes coercive control as a form of domestic violence — and places it before the best interests analysis in parenting determinations — gives courts the framework to see patterns of abuse that would otherwise be invisible. You can learn more at What Is Coercive Control.
The bill defines health-related abuse as interfering with, controlling, or preventing access to medical care, mental or behavioral health care, or reproductive health care — including contraceptive use, reproductive health care information, or controlling or attempting to control pregnancy outcomes. This definition is grounded in documented patterns of intimate partner coercive control. Reproductive coercion — including pressuring or interfering with a partner’s access to reproductive healthcare — co-occurs consistently with other forms of coercive control in the research literature and in practitioner-observed case presentations.
Post-separation is the period of highest risk for many survivors of coercive control. When physical access to a partner is removed, the courtroom frequently becomes the new arena for control — through litigation, lawfare, contested parenting time, and the weaponization of children. HB26-1309’s requirement that courts assess domestic violence before applying best interests factors means that a survivor’s documented history of coercive control is considered first — not buried under a general factors analysis. For co-parenting situations involving a narcissist or abuser, this sequence change is significant.
As of May 9, 2026, HB26-1309 is listed for Senate second reading on May 11, 2026. The Colorado General Assembly is scheduled to adjourn on May 13, 2026. The bill has passed the House and is currently under Senate consideration. Colorado residents can contact their senator through the Colorado General Assembly’s Find My Legislator tool at leg.colorado.gov/find-my-legislator.
If you are in the aftermath of a coercively controlling relationship and facing a family court process, specialist support makes a significant difference. Book a free 15-minute consultation or learn more about narcissistic abuse recovery coaching.
References
- Colorado General Assembly. (2026). HB26-1309: Abuse in Cases of Separation — 75th General Assembly, Second Regular Session.https://leg.colorado.gov/bills/HB26-1309 ↩︎
- Schechter, S. (1982). Women and Male Violence: The Vision and Struggles of the Battered Women’s Movement. South End Press. ↩︎
- Stark, E. (2007). Coercive control: How men entrap women in personal life. Oxford University Press. ↩︎
- Colorado Catholic Conference. (2026, May 8). Colorado Bishops’ Statement on HB26-1309 Abuse in Cases of Separation. Published via Denver Catholic. https://www.denvercatholic.org/colorado-bishops-urge-faithful-to-call-senators-to-vote-no-on-hb26-1309 ↩︎
- Katz, E. (2016). Beyond the physical incident model: How children living with domestic violence are harmed by and resist regimes of coercive control. Child Abuse Review, 25(1), 46–59. https://doi.org/10.1002/car.2422 ↩︎
- Wakefield, M. (2020). The Coercive Control of Children with Dr. Evan Stark. Narcissistic Abuse Rehab. ↩︎
Manya Wakefield is a narcissistic abuse recovery coach, coercive trauma specialist, and the developer of the Coercive Trauma Recovery Method™ and TENEL™ (Traumatic Exposure to Narcissism in Early Life) — proprietary recovery frameworks built from seven years of direct professional work with survivors of coercive control, narcissistic abuse, and Adult Children of Narcissists. Both frameworks have been reviewed by Dr. Michael Kinsey, PhD, clinical psychologist, New School for Social Research. She is the founder of Narcissistic Abuse Rehab, a global social impact platform launched in 2019 to support survivors through evidence-based recovery frameworks. Manya is the author of Are You In An Emotionally Abusive Relationship (2019), a resource used in domestic violence recovery groups worldwide. Her original research contributions include the Global Coercive Control Legislation Index (2020) — the first systematic index of its kind on the web — and the Global Femicide Legislation Index (2026), comprehensive legal references used by advocates, legal professionals, and policymakers internationally, cited in peer-reviewed publications including the Southern Illinois University Law Journal, Palgrave Macmillan, and the University of Agder. Her expertise has been featured in Newsweek, Elle, Cosmopolitan, HuffPost, Parade, and YourTango. She hosts the Narcissistic Abuse Rehab Podcast, available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and Amazon Music. All content on this site reflects Manya's direct professional experience working with survivors of narcissistic abuse and coercive control, her published research, and her ongoing advocacy work.
