Colorado Governor Jared Polis Signs Bill Forcing Taxpayers to Fund Abortions

Colorado Governor Jared Polis has signed a bill forcing Colorado taxpayers to fund abortions.

Polis signed SB25-183, a recently approved state measure that would allocate a minimum of $1.5 million per year of taxpayer funds to cover elective abortions. With Colorado having abortions up to birth, that means taxpayers will be on the hook for paying for killing viable babies who could easily live outside the womb.

And with the $1.5 million figure a minimum, Colorado residents may be forced to pay even more to kill thousands of babies.

“One thing pro-life and pro-choice people agree on nationwide is that they don’t want to pay for other people’s abortions, and yet Colorado is asking its citizens to do just that,” said Priests for Life National Director Frank Pavone to LifeNews this morning condemning Polis’ signature.

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Pavone noted, as have other pro-life advocates, that the amendment Colorado voters passed to make killing babies in abortions a state constitutional right made it clear that state residents would not have to fund abortions.

While 62 percent of Coloradans voted for Amendment 79 in November, removing the prohibition on public funding for abortion, the electorate was informed by the legislative blue book and media that Amendment 79 would not cost the state money. Four months later, the state legislature introduced SB 183 with a 1.5-million-dollar fiscal note in a year when Colorado is in a 1-billion-dollar deficit.

“This is part two of last November’s vote on Amendment 79,” Pavone said. “That misguided and destructive measure creates the fiction that somehow there is virtue enforcing people to pay for child-killing.”

“A Colorado lawmaker recently touted the cost-saving benefits in ‘averted births,’ but abortion averts birth by killing children. These advocates might want to point that out. Polis has just signed a death warrant for his own constituents,” he added.

As the Catholic bishops of Colorado noted:

Recent data show a conservative cost estimate of state-funded abortion is actually more than $2 million per year. In an abhorrent effort to offset the costs, the legislative fiscal note stated that the state will save money because more babies will be aborted, and the cost of abortion is cheaper than the cost of labor and delivery. Such a statement is an egregious reflection of the inhumane mentality behind the bill.

Furthermore, the fiscal note drastically underestimates the cost of abortion, calculating the average abortion at $1,300, which is the average cost of first-trimester abortions only.[2] According to the Colorado Department of Health, abortions after 21 weeks’ gestation make up 3.4% of all abortions in Colorado (the national average is 1 percent). In 2024, 1.1% of Colorado abortions were in the third trimester. Second and third-trimester abortions can cost between $3,000 – $30,000. The fiscal note also does not consider the cost of abortion travel of women outside of Colorado for abortion, which has gone up substantially in the last three years.

This legislation was introduced weeks after several botched abortions by unregulated abortion clinics were reported in Colorado — one of which resulted in the loss of life of an 18-year-old Fort Collins young woman. The value of the lives of preborn babies and their mothers is incalculable, and the impact on our state will be catastrophic.

Every human life, from conception to natural death, is a sacred gift from God. No act of law can change this truth, nor can it erase our moral obligation to defend the most vulnerable among us.

The allocation of millions of dollars in taxpayer funds to subsidize the deliberate ending of innocent life is a tragedy for Colorado. Rather than using state resources to support life-affirming alternatives — such as comprehensive prenatal care, adoption services and resources for women facing unexpected pregnancies — this bill instead prioritizes public funding of abortion at the expense of the lives of preborn children, the health of their mothers and the conscience rights of millions of Colorado taxpayers who morally object to abortion.

Despite the current law in Colorado, the Catholic bishops of Colorado and the three dioceses are committed to doing our part to help pregnant mothers who are considering abortion through the ongoing expansion of medical services, housing, counseling and resources, both during their pregnancy and after.

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