Jeff Hunt is an outspoken conservative, but he is battling Colorado State Capitol officials to ensure free speech rights are protected for all his fellow citizens.
The radio host and former executive director of Western Conservative Summit wants to see the Capitol change its unevenly applied rules regarding political apparel worn inside the Senate and House galleries.
The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression sent the Colorado House and Senate sergeant-at-arms a legal letter recently, and a lawsuit is up next if an unfavorable response is received.
The recent letter stems from an incident last year when the Senate sergeant-at-arms ordered Hunt to take off his “Pro-Life U” sweatshirt or leave the gallery. Hunt, at the time, worked for Colorado Christian University, which uses that slogan.
“I think that the Colorado State Capitol absolutely needs to change its policies in order to respect the constitutional rights of all Coloradans,” Hunt told the Washington Examiner during a phone interview Thursday.
He said he was inside the gallery for “30 seconds” before he was pulled out by the sergeant-at-arms. He told the Washington Examiner he had designed the sweatshirt and was wearing the “prototype.”
Hunt had been to the Capitol often in the past five years as the director of CCU’s Centennial Institute, a conservative think tank. Normally, he wore a shirt and tie, but that day, he wore the sweatshirt without a problem and did not see it as a political message.
“I guess it’s a political statement, but from my perspective, it was more … [about] promot[ing] the university,” Hunt said.
He said he “wore it a few times” while testifying and in “committee rooms,” but never in the gallery. He has seen other groups throughout the year wearing shirts that would qualify as political, including pro-gun control shirts, he said.
Just weeks prior to the March 2023 incident, “Angels Against Gun Violence” were allowed to sit with their paraphernalia in the gallery, according to FIRE’s letter.
“It took about 5 minutes on Google” to find this example, Hunt told the Washington Examiner.
But he doesn’t want those people silenced. Instead, he wants “to make sure that whether you’re progressive or conservative, you’re able to freely share your political viewpoints without fear of being asked to leave.”
Capitol officials later tried to claim the rule only applies to political messages that relate to legislation being debated by the Senate. That day, the Colorado Senate was debating legislation about pregnancy resource centers, according to FIRE’s account.
If such a rule existed, it would undermine one of the benefits of the First Amendment: To speak out in favor of or against legislation. But that rule does not even exist. According to FIRE, the “post hoc explanation to reporters appears nowhere in the text of the rule on the website, nor is it posted outside the galleries.”
Hunt called this an “out” and “a bit of a stretch.”
You see people there all the time wearing “Moms Demand Action,” “Planned Parenthood,” and, more recently, “pro-Palestine” materials, he said.
There are already rules about disturbances, and the Capitol absolutely should be able to expel individuals who are disrupting the proceedings. Hunt was not doing that, though.
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The Capitol’s loose understanding of the First Amendment is reflected in its vague “political statements ban,” Hunt told the Washington Examiner.
“It became pretty clear pretty quickly that they have some real problems with regard to free speech issues,” he said.
Matt Lamb is a contributor to the Washington Examiner’s Beltway Confidential blog. He is an associate editor for the College Fix and has previously worked for Students for Life of America and Turning Point USA.