The Colorado legislature passed a bill Monday to allow immigrants who plead guilty to certain crimes a method to remedy resulting adverse consequences to their immigration status.

If enacted, Senate Bill 103 would let criminal defendants challenge their guilty pleas for low-level crimes if they had not been advised of the immigration consequences prior to making their plea. This applies to people who pleaded guilty to municipal offenses and class 1 or 2 misdemeanors, including disorderly conduct, trespassing, shoplifting, theft or criminal mischief.

“Senate Bill 103 deals with a constitutional right that non-citizens in this country have,” said bill sponsor Rep. Kerry Tipper, D-Lakewood. “To be advised of immigration consequences of their pleas.” 

Pleading guilty to a crime, even when minor, can cause devastating effects on an individual’s immigration status, Tipper said. This can include making someone with a green card deportable, triggering mandatory immigration detention without bond, barring a person from naturalization or revoking Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals status.

The state House of Representatives approved the bill Monday in a 40-25 vote, following the state Senate’s unanimous approval last month. The bill will now be sent back to the Senate to OK changes made by the House and then to Gov. Jared Polis for final consideration.

Despite receiving unanimous bipartisan support in the Senate, all Republican members of the House voted against the bill, in addition to one Democrat: Rep. Dylan Roberts of Avon.

Opponents argued that the bill would give non-citizens an advantage over citizens when challenging guilty pleas.

“When a citizen believes their guilty plea was done in a way that is constitutionally infirm, the citizen has the burden of proof in providing that proof in front of the court,” said Rep. Terri Carver, R-Colorado Springs. “This bill would say that it is the prosecution, the government, that has the burden of proof in proving that the proper advisements were given (for non-citizens).”

Tipper said this is an unfair comparison since not all guilty pleas are challenged just on constitutional grounds as the pleas covered by the bill are.

“It’s a different array of grounds for challenge,” Tipper said. “What it reflects is the severity of the consequences, the heightened standard of constitutional challenges.”

In the Senate, Republican members said they decided to support the bill because the improper guilty pleas covered under it could also result in defendants losing their Second Amendment right to bear arms.

From 2017 to 2021, 64,036 criminal cases in Colorado resulted in guilty pleas for class 1 or 2 misdemeanors. Of those, approximately 630 people would be eligible to challenge the guilty plea under the bill, according to state estimates.