He Voted to Make Misgendering a Kid “Coercive Control” in Custody Court. Now He Wants Your Vote for Congress.
Manny Rutinel is a 31-year-old Yale-trained attorney, a Colorado state representative, and — as of June 30, 2026 — the Democratic nominee for one of the most competitive U.S. House seats in the country. He is also the answer to a question few voters in Colorado’s 8th Congressional District have been asked yet: what happens to a parent who refuses to use their child’s preferred pronouns during a custody dispute?
On April 6, 2025, Rutinel cast a recorded “Yes” vote on Colorado House Bill 25-1312 — the Kelly Loving Act — in the version that instructed family courts to treat “deadnaming” and “misgendering” a child as a form of coercive control when deciding parental responsibilities. The bill passed the House 36-20 that day. Weeks later, after national backlash, the Colorado Senate stripped the custody provision before Governor Jared Polis (D) signed a narrower version into law. But the House floor vote is a permanent public record, and it now follows Rutinel into a general election against Republican Rep. Gabe Evans that both parties treat as a top-tier national target.
“Far-left liberal Manny Rutinel wants the government to take away your kids if you don’t adopt his radical transgender agenda,” National Republican Congressional Committee spokesperson Zach Bannon told Fox News Digital. “Disgusting and disqualifying.” Rutinel’s office did not respond to a request for comment on the vote.
- 36-20 — the Colorado House vote on April 6, 2025 — Rutinel voted “Yes” on the version of HB25-1312 that classified misgendering a child as coercive control in custody disputes · Source: Colorado General Assembly floor-vote record
- 40-24 — the final House vote on the Senate-amended bill, May 6, 2025 — after the custody-coercive-control language had already been stripped · Source: Colorado General Assembly
- 7-4 — the party-line House Judiciary Committee vote advancing the original bill, where a Democratic sponsor compared parent groups opposing it to the KKK · Source: Fox News, Daily Signal
- 0.8 pts — Gabe Evans' (R) margin of victory in CO-08 in 2024 — the district Rutinel is now trying to flip · Source: Fox News
- May 16, 2025 — the date Gov. Jared Polis (D) signed the amended Kelly Loving Act into law — without the custody-coercive-control provision Rutinel voted for · Source: Colorado General Assembly
Rutinel was appointed to the Colorado House of Representatives on October 13, 2023, filling a vacancy for District 32, which covers Commerce City and parts of Adams County. He is an attorney, a graduate of Yale Law School and Johns Hopkins, and the CEO of a small nonprofit called Climate Refarm. In January 2025 he launched a campaign for Colorado’s 8th Congressional District — one of the closest House races in the country, decided by 0.8 percentage points in 2024, when Republican Gabe Evans unseated Democratic incumbent Yadira Caraveo.
On June 30, 2026, Rutinel defeated former state Rep. Shannon Bird in the Democratic primary by a 26-point margin, outraising her nearly two-to-one. He now faces Evans in November in a district President Trump carried by less than two points in 2024 — and one Trump has already weighed in on directly, endorsing Evans for re-election on Truth Social in April 2025. National Republicans immediately began linking Rutinel to New York City’s Zohran Mamdani, an attack line that predates the misgendering-vote story but sets the stage for it: Rutinel’s legislative record is now a general-election issue in a seat that could help decide which party controls the House.
House Bill 25-1312 — named the Kelly Loving Act after a transgender woman killed in the 2022 Club Q mass shooting — was introduced March 28, 2025. As originally drafted and as it stood when the full House voted, the bill instructed courts weighing child custody to treat certain parental conduct as “coercive control.” The bill’s own language was explicit: “A court shall consider reports of coercive control when determining the allocation of parental responsibilities in accordance with the best interest of the child,” with deadnaming, misgendering, or threatening to publish a child’s gender-affirming health records named as qualifying conduct.
The practical effect, according to First Amendment lawyers and family-law critics alike, was to put a thumb on the scale against any parent — regardless of motive — who declined to affirm a child’s gender transition. Aaron Terr, director of public advocacy at the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, argued the bill “blurs the line between unlawful conduct and constitutionally protected speech.” The House Judiciary Committee advanced the bill 7-4 on a party-line vote after an hours-long hearing in which Democratic Rep. Yara Zokaie told a Republican colleague that consulting parent-rights groups on the bill was unnecessary: “We don’t ask someone passing civil rights legislation to go ask the KKK their opinion.”
“We don't ask someone passing civil rights legislation to go ask the KKK their opinion.”
Colorado state Rep. Yara Zokaie (D) · House Judiciary Committee hearing on HB25-1312 · April 2025
Colorado's proposed Kelly Loving Act would prohibit 'misgendering' and 'deadnaming' with 'intent to discriminate' in places of public accommodation. The bill blurs the line between unlawful conduct and constitutionally protected speech. The state can ban discriminatory acts, such as refusing service, but it can't censor or compel speech to match government-approved views on gender — or any other issue.
On April 6, 2025 — a Sunday floor session Colorado Democrats used to push the bill and a separate abortion measure through in a single limited-debate sitting — the full House passed HB25-1312 on Third Reading, 36 in favor, 20 opposed, 9 absent. Colorado’s official floor-vote record lists Manny Rutinel among the 36 “Yes” votes. That is the version of the bill that contained the coercive-control custody language. There is no ambiguity in the record: Rutinel voted for the bill that treated a parent’s refusal to use a child’s preferred pronouns as evidence weighed against them in a custody proceeding.
April 6, 2025: House passes HB25-1312, 36-20. Rutinel votes Yes. The bill at this stage includes the custody-coercive-control provision.
Late April–early May 2025: Facing sustained criticism from parental-rights groups and First Amendment advocates, Senate sponsors strip the custody provision by amendment.
May 6, 2025: Amended bill returns to the House and passes 40-24 — without the custody language. Rutinel votes Yes again, on the narrower bill.
May 16, 2025: Gov. Jared Polis (D) signs the amended Kelly Loving Act into law. The custody provision Rutinel originally voted for is not part of the law that took effect.
The Kelly Loving Act was signed into law by Gov. Jared Polis, expanding legal protections for transgender people in Colorado.
That timeline cuts against the loosest version of the criticism — no Colorado parent has actually lost custody under a “misgendering” statute, because the provision never survived to become law. But it does not touch the sharper version: Rutinel had the chance to vote on the coercive-control language specifically, twice, and every recorded vote he cast on it was Yes. Nothing in the public record shows him raising an objection to the custody provision before it was removed by others.
Colorado’s 8th District — stretching along the I-25 corridor through Adams, Weld, and Larimer counties, from Denver’s northern suburbs to Greeley’s farm country — is one of a small handful of seats either party could plausibly need to help decide control of the House in 2027. Evans, a decorated Army helicopter pilot and former police officer, won it by 0.8 points in 2024. President Trump personally endorsed him for re-election on Truth Social in April 2025, calling him “an America First Patriot” with “my Complete and Total Endorsement.” The NRCC has spent the summer of 2026 trying to define Rutinel before Evans’s campaign does it for him — as a “radical socialist” aligned with Zohran Mamdani on one flank, and now, on the misgendering vote, as someone whose legislative record on parental rights is disqualifying on its own terms.
Congressman Gabe Evans is an America First Patriot who is doing a fantastic job representing Colorado's 8th Congressional District. He is a decorated Army Helicopter Pilot and former Police Officer who has served our Nation with Great Honor and Distinction. Gabe Evans has my Complete and Total Endorsement for Re-Election — HE WILL NOT LET YOU DOWN!
Paraphrased commentary · not a verbatim post
Paraphrase reflecting President Trump's real, dated April 28, 2025 Truth Social endorsement of Rep. Gabe Evans — posted before the misgendering-vote story broke, but establishing why the White House and NRCC are treating CO-08 as a marquee race against Rutinel.
“The socialist takeover of the Democrat Party is no longer confined to deep-blue strongholds,” NRCC spokesman Mike Marinella said after Rutinel’s primary win. “The radicals are taking over battleground districts, putting must-win seats out of reach for Democrats.” Whether the misgendering vote moves general-election voters the way the NRCC hopes is untested — but it is now a fixed part of the record Evans’s campaign will run against.
Strip away the campaign rhetoric on both sides and two things are simultaneously true. First: Colorado’s enacted Kelly Loving Act does not strip custody from parents for misgendering their children — that language was removed before the governor signed anything. Second: Manny Rutinel voted, on the record, for the version that would have done exactly that, and he cast that vote as a sitting state legislator who is now asking Coloradans to send him to Congress. Fox News Digital reported his office would not explain the vote when asked.
Voters in CO-08 can weigh that record however they choose. What they should not have to do is guess at it. The bill text, the floor-vote tally, and the amendment history are all public documents, and none of them are in dispute.
Established, by official Colorado General Assembly record: Rutinel voted Yes on HB25-1312 on April 6, 2025 (36-20), when it included the custody-coercive-control provision, and voted Yes again on the amended version May 6, 2025 (40-24), after that provision was removed.
Established, by the enacted statute: the law Gov. Polis signed May 16, 2025 does not classify misgendering or deadnaming as coercive control in custody proceedings — that language did not survive to final passage.
Attributed, not adjudicated: the NRCC's characterization of the vote as “disgusting and disqualifying” is a political judgment, not a legal finding; Rutinel has not been charged with or accused of any crime.
