{"id":2643159,"date":"2026-08-11T13:44:02","date_gmt":"2026-08-11T17:44:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/utm_sourcerssutm_mediumrssutm_campaigncolorado-has-been-running-a-state-funded-grooming-and-mutilation-operation-for-years\/"},"modified":"2026-08-11T13:50:40","modified_gmt":"2026-08-11T17:50:40","slug":"utm_sourcerssutm_mediumrssutm_campaigncolorado-has-been-running-a-state-funded-grooming-and-mutilation-operation-for-years","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/utm_sourcerssutm_mediumrssutm_campaigncolorado-has-been-running-a-state-funded-grooming-and-mutilation-operation-for-years\/","title":{"rendered":"CO Has Been Running A State-Funded Grooming Op For Years"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">20<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Futm_sourcerssutm_mediumrssutm_campaigncolorado-has-been-running-a-state-funded-grooming-and-mutilation-operation-for-years%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=2643159&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><p>Teh report highlights concerns about Colorado\u2019s approach to gender identity and medical interventions for children. It claims that taxpayer dollars are increasingly used to promote transgender ideology among youth, including through social media campaigns, educational programs, and healthcare services. specifically, programs like \u201cI Matter\u201d provide confidential mental health counseling to minors, allegedly facilitating access to gender-affirming treatments without parental consent, including for very young children. Public school clinics are also reported to focus on gender transitioning, with staff receiving specialized training.Additionally, Colorado\u2019s medical school and Children\u2019s Hospital Colorado are accused of training future doctors to support early and irreversible gender transition procedures in minors, often concealing these treatments from parents and encouraging medicalization from a young age.The report notes legal mechanisms for enforcing gender transitions on children and upcoming ballot initiatives to restrict such surgeries.  <\/p>\n<p class=\"readmore\">\n    <button onclick=\"showReadMore()\" id=\"readmorebtn\">Read more&#8230;<\/button>\n<\/p>\n<hr id=\"line\">\n<span id=\"more\"><\/p>\n<div>\n<p>Colorado has been using taxpayer dollars to groom children into believing they are \u201ctransgender\u201d and point them to mutilation surgeries, emphasizing that many do not need parental consent.<\/p>\n<p>According to a new <a href=\"https:\/\/donoharmmedicine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/DNH-Colorado-GAC-Pipeline-Paper-8-4.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">report<\/a> from Do No Harm, Colorado spends millions of dollars on government programs, social media influencer campaigns, and medical school curriculums all aimed at convincing children they are a different gender, pointing them toward medicalization, and bullying the parents who do not want to destroy their children. Colorado even paid \u201cqueer\u201d children ages 12-18 to participate in virtual meetings about \u201ctransition\u201d resources, the report stated.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cSomething unsettling is happening in Colorado. A publicly funded network of Colorado organizations is pushing resources that promote youth gender ideology on vulnerable children,\u201d Dr. Kurt Miceli, chief medical officer at Do No Harm, said. \u201cOur report is a case study examining how the transgender industrial complex has pushed further and further into the lives of children, reaching even as far as <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/ohio-invests-26-million-in-school-health-centers\/\" title=\"Ohio Invests  Million in ... Health Centers\">school-based health centers<\/a> in the state.\u201d<\/p>\n<h2><strong>\u2018I Matter<\/strong>\u2018<\/h2>\n<p>Colorado\u2019s \u201cI Matter\u201d program was set up to provide free mental health counseling to children, costing taxpayers <a href=\"https:\/\/www.wsj.com\/opinion\/trump-should-act-against-colorados-transgender-subsidies-083408f6\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">about $11 million<\/a> per year. The program includes a \u201cconfidentiality waiver\u201d that strips parental consent around age 12, though the report states it is unclear how the program verifies parental consent under that age. Participation in \u201cI Matter\u201d also does not require insurance or citizenship.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe program also notes that it will refer patients to healthcare providers for further treatment, allowing a child to confidentially begin the medical journey of sex-rejecting \u2018transition\u2019 without parental knowledge or consent,\u201d the report states. <\/p>\n<p>The program is not solely focused on \u201ctransitioning\u201d children, but of the 12,896 total encounters with children from 2021-2024, 469 were considered \u201cgender-affirming care,\u201d three of which involved children ages five and younger. Forty-six of those sessions were for children between 6 and 9 years old, and 40 sessions included children with special needs.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI Matter\u201d also advertised its services to children using social media influencers specifically chosen because their audience was mostly children. The $5 million influencer campaign \u201cstressed the confidential nature and lack of parental consent at I Matter,\u201d the report states.<\/p>\n<p>The primary target audience was children ages 12-18 (the cohort that does not require parental consent at all) and the secondary audience was parents with children ages 7-18. While influencer talking points for the children emphasized the lack of parental consent, the ones targeted at the parents are asking them to give their children over to government transition therapists.<\/p>\n<p>\u201c\u2018Having a child in therapy is not a sign of failure\u2019 and \u2018Sometimes youth need to talk to someone else (a professional, not a parent),&#8217;\u201d the talking points state.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI Matter\u201d does not provide things like puberty blockers, hormones, or mutilation surgeries itself, but its free counseling sessions appear to be a gateway into convincing children to believe they are a different gender, and then pointing them to organizations that will medicalize their dysphoria.<\/p>\n<h2><strong>Public School Clinics<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>According to the report, Colorado\u2019s School-Based Health Center (SBHC) are clinics housed inside public schools that provide health care outside the capabilities of a standard school nurse\u2019s office. From 2021-2022, there were 53 operating in the state, which offered \u201cwell-child exams, sick visits, health screenings, immunizations, mental-health counseling, reproductive health, and health education.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Costing $21.5 million in operating costs, the clinics saw 34,427 patients over the course of 96,452 visits.<\/p>\n<p>Services provided do not specifically mention \u201cgender-affirming care,\u201d but trainings and resources given to practitioners are heavily focused on \u201ctransitioning\u201d children, according to the report.<\/p>\n<p>The trainings included: \u201cIntroduction to Providing Gender-Affirming Care to Transgender &#038; Gender Diverse Youth,\u201d \u201cIntroduction to Providing LGBTQ+ Competent Care,\u201d \u201cSupporting Gender-Expansive Youth,\u201d and \u201cWorking With Gender Diverse Youth For Advanced Practitioners.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The report said that \u201cThe explicit note that [Supporting Gender-Expansive Youth] was \u2018not an introductory course\u2019 suggests an institutional trajectory of building GAC competency among school-based health providers.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>As The Federalist <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2025\/03\/13\/exclusive-linda-mcmahon-meets-with-detransitioners-to-discuss-schools-pushing-gender-transition\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">reported<\/a>, schools are a a major part of the \u201ctransgender\u201d medicalization pipeline.<\/p>\n<h2><strong>University Of Colorado<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>Multiple initiatives from CU\u2019s medical school train future doctors in how to transition children and strongarm parents into castrating and mutilating their children.<\/p>\n<p>Children\u2019s Hospital Colorado is an affiliate of CU\u2019s school of medicine, which offers puberty blockers, hormones, and \u201cmental health services\u201d through its gender clinic called the \u201cTRUE Center for Gender Diversity.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In 2025, the TRUE Center gave puberty blockers to 257 children and cross-sex hormones to 549 adolescents.<\/p>\n<p>The TRUE Center is also staffed by CU school of medicine faculty as opposed to Children\u2019s Hospital Colorado, including for all billing and collection for clinical services.<\/p>\n<p>CU\u2019s \u201cLGBTQ+ Health\u201d curriculum appears to shed light as to why that might be: It \u201cuncritically supports\u201d the \u201ctransition\u201d of children at essentially all stages of life, and it suggests billing workarounds to avoid calling attention to it.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cColorado\u2019s future physicians are taught to follow the child\u2019s lead if he or she expresses any sign of gender incongruence, convince parents that irreversible gender \u2018transition\u2019 is the right choice for their child, and even assist in hiding aspects of a child\u2019s gender \u2018transition\u2019 from his or her parents,\u201d the report states.<\/p>\n<p>Students are taught that children as young as 18 months old can \u201cdistinguish between gender identities,\u201d and by six years old, \u201cdevelop his or her own gender identity.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The courses uses an example of a five-year-old boy and tracks him throughout the \u201ctransition\u201d process.<\/p>\n<p>Even slight evidence of gender incongruence from the boy allows the physician to start angling toward a \u201ctransition,\u201d and they will start pressuring the parents to seek \u201ctherapy\u201d and the possibility of \u201ctransition.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIf parents are not supportive of \u2018transitioning\u2019 their child, students are instructed to confront them with the fallacious claim that their rejection will risk adverse mental-health outcomes, including suicide,\u201d the report states. \u201cContrarily, affirming the child\u2019s gender will allegedly increase self-esteem, social support, and general health and protect against depression, drug use, and suicidal ideation.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Any attempt from the parent to talk about therapy to discourage the child from going down the path of \u201ctransition\u201d is met with accusations of \u201cconversation therapy.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>By 11 years old, the therapists and others have successfully convinced him he is the opposite gender, and he is considered \u201csocially transitioned\u201d and ready to start puberty blockers. By 15 years old, the child has been on puberty blockers for years, and wants to start cross-sex hormones, but wants to conceal that from his parents.<\/p>\n<p>Students are taught how to conceal certain parts of a child\u2019s health records from parents, including improperly billing insurance or not billing them at all. The Children\u2019s Hospital of Colorado has \u201cwork arounds\u201d and will \u201cbill it differently,\u201d according to the report.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIf the parents are unwilling to approve cross-sex hormones, students are essentially instructed to convince the parents to approve them by finding \u2018commonalities (e.g., everyone wants to do what is best for Katerina),\u201d the report states. \u201cStudents are also told that the child can decide \u2018what and how much she wants the provider to share with her parents.\u2019 The practical effect of this could be that parents end up approving an intervention without truly understanding what the \u2018treatment\u2019 entails.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Students are told that by the age of 16, a child has a full enough understanding of the irreversible procedures to decide for themselves whether to be sterilized or mutilated. They are also told that there are \u201cno age minimums for \u2018chest surgeries,&#8217;\u201d and that \u201c\u2018bottom surgeries\u2019 for minors are permissible if there is parental consent along with a letter from a physician and two therapists.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>As The Federalist <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2025\/04\/04\/state-enabled-kidnapping-colorado-democrat-bill-would-give-custody-of-kids-to-parents-who-push-trans-mutilation\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">reported<\/a>, Colorado has numerous legal mechanisms for forcing gender transition on children, including through <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2025\/04\/03\/exclusive-colorado-father-fights-to-keep-government-from-sterilizing-his-14-year-old-son\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">custody battles<\/a>. Later this year, Coloradans will have the opportunity to <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2026\/03\/27\/colorado-will-have-the-opportunity-to-ban-trans-child-genital-mutilation-in-november\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">vote<\/a> on ballot initiatives to stop mutilation surgeries for children.<\/p>\n<hr>\n<p>      Breccan F. Thies is the White House correspondent for The Federalist. He is a co-recipient of the 2025 Dao Prize for Excellence in Investigative Journalism. As an investigative journalist, he previously covered education and culture issues for the Washington Examiner and Breitbart News. He holds a degree from the University of Virginia and is a 2022 Claremont Institute Publius Fellow. You can follow him on X: @BreccanFThies.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Colorado funds programs promoting youth gender transition efforts<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":179,"featured_media":2643160,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/IMG_5688-scaled.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[33651],"tags":[6024,17249,20400],"class_list":["post-2643159","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-western-journal","tag-colorado","tag-grooming","tag-state-funded"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/IMG_5688-scaled.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2643159","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/179"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2643159"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2643159\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2643168,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2643159\/revisions\/2643168"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2643160"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2643159"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2643159"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2643159"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}