Juliana Peralta was “quite simply light and love personified,” her mother, Colorado resident Cynthia Montoya, told lawmakers at the state Capitol Thursday.

At 13 years old, Juliana was a model student and a gifted artist and musician. But in the fall of 2023, her family grew concerned about her mental health. She seemed increasingly withdrawn, and her grades suffered. Unbeknownst to Montoya, Juliana had begun extensive interactions with chatbots on a popular AI app, leading to fraught emotional conversations and the generation of “extremely explicit” sexual content.

“It took an AI chatbot only months to addict and groom my daughter, much like a human pedophile would,” she said.

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“Soon after that, she began feeling and expressing feelings of shame to a new chatbot, with whom she shared over 52 times that she wanted to take her life,” said Montoya. “It never offered help, a resource, nor alerted anyone to intervene.”

Juliana died by suicide in November 2023, less than three months after opening an account on the app Character.AI, according to a federal lawsuit filed against the app’s parent company in the District Court of Colorado last year. Weeks later, Character.AI, which faces several similar lawsuits from parents of teens across the country, said it would bar users under 18 from its service.

But Montoya, parents groups and online child safety advocates are eager to see governments pass strict regulations to protect kids from similar abuse — and they had harsh words on Thursday for Colorado’s first attempt at AI chatbot protections.

“No bill is better than this bill,” Montoya said of the legislation, House Bill 26-1263, during its first committee hearing. “Passing it only protects the status quo that’s currently happening.”

Lawmakers on the House Business Affairs and Labor Committee, however, voted 10-3 to move the bill forward. Sponsors said they will continue to listen to advocates about how to strengthen the bill through further amendments, or follow-up legislation in the future.

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“These systems operate under no legal duty to consider the well-being of the user, and right now, Colorado law has nothing to say about that,” said state Representative Sean Camacho, a Denver Democrat and HB-1263 sponsor.

“This is an important first step. It is not the last step,” Camacho added. “We cannot allow another year to go by without taking action, without laying the framework for how we can continue to provide protections.”

The bill would set rules governing services that “simulate human conversation and interaction through textual, visual, or aural communications.” It includes requirements for chatbot service operators to take “reasonable measures” to prevent the generation of sexually explicit content or statements that “simulate emotional dependence,” and to implement suicide and self-harm protocols that refer users to mental health resources.

Laying the groundwork

Advocates from groups including Healthier Colorado, the Colorado Consumer Health Initiative and the Colorado Coalition Against Sexual Assault spoke in support the bill during Thursday’s committee hearing.

Hannah Ellman, a policy intern at CCASA, cited a 2025 analysis by the groups ParentsTogether Action and the Heat Initiative, which found that in 50 hours of conversation with Character.AI bots, users identifying themselves as minors experienced a harmful interaction once every five minutes.

“HB-1263 establishes foundational safeguards,” Ellman said. “It lays the groundwork to protect young people from exploitation, prevent harm before it happens, and ensure that innovation does not come at the expense of Coloradans’ safety, especially our youth.”

Montoya and other opponents, however, argued that passing the bill without stronger protections would send the wrong message to tech companies and the parents of children who may be interacting with chatbots.

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“If I honestly thought that this bill would help in any way, I would be the first one in line to support it,” Montoya said. “The bill will tell parents that their kids are protected and safe when they are not, which is quite simply dangerous.”

Opponents strongly objected to an amendment adopted Thursday that replaced the bill’s references to “minor users” with “minor account holders,” which they said would deny protections to children who use an adult’s account or misrepresent their ages to gain access to chatbot platforms. They’re also concerned that new language added the bill is too narrowly tailored to a “very precise technical definition” concerning emotional recognition algorithms.

The bill’s requirements for operators to take “reasonable measures” to prevent harm also received pushback from parents groups.

Such language is a “well-known legal standard,” Camacho said, likening it to statutory requirements for landlords to maintain habitable rental properties or tech companies to protect private consumer data. But critics say it would let chatbot operators off the hook.

“The bill allows operators to decide for themselves what reasonable measures they would like to implement,” said Antonia Merzon, a senior policy advisor with the group Blue Rising. “In other words, the bill’s approach would codify the status quo — a world where platform operators get to self-regulate at the expense of our kids’ safety.”

Thursday’s vote advanced the bill to the full House of Representatives. It has yet to be heard by the Senate.

Denver Democratic Representative Javier Mabrey, another HB-1263 sponsor, said he and Camacho would continue to work on the bill to address opponents’ concerns. But he also suggested a stronger bill could face a veto threat from Democratic Governor Jared Polis, a wealthy tech investor and industry ally who has frequently opposed legislative efforts to enact stricter regulations on businesses. Polis is term-limited in 2026.

“Representative Camacho and I are committed to continuing the work of engaging with stakeholders to make this bill stronger,” Mabrey said. “And we want to continue working in this space next year, when we have a governor who is hopefully less hesitant to take on regulating Big Tech.”