Colorado has some of the most liberal laws in the nation to protect the rights of transgender people, but it has not come anywhere close to solving the controversy of trans people playing sports.
When the Colorado State University women鈥檚 volleyball team won the conference championship last month, defeating a team with a transgender player, it raised renewed questions about a simmering issue.
The title game came after some other teams, including Wyoming, Utah State and Boise State, forfeited their matches against San Jose State, refusing to play a team with a transgender woman on the roster. And it came as a new wave of trans people are trying to because of anti-trans rhetoric during the presidential campaign, a flood of state-level proposals against transgender rights, and a looming U.S. Supreme Court decision on a of gender-affirming medical treatment for adolescents.
Colorado for years has been considered a safe harbor for transgender people. It has one of the simplest processes in the nation to change the gender marker on a birth certificate 鈥� some states require proof of surgery or prohibit changing the gender marker at all. The Colorado Anti-Discrimination Act prohibits discrimination in housing and employment based on gender identity, and the state has disallowed discrimination in private health insurance plans based on gender identity.
Last year, Colorado became the first state in the country to explicitly include gender-affirming medical care in its insurance requirements, meaning that insurance companies must cover the care in individual plans and small group plans. Gender-affirming care for adolescents, which can include hormone therapy and puberty blockers, has been banned in 26 states. Colorado, though,, protecting the right to gender-affirming care, including for kids and teens.
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