Does Colorado's law prohibiting licensed counselors from engaging in "conversion therapy" with minors violate the First Amendment when applied to talk therapy? Specifically, does the ban on practices that attempt to change a minor's sexual orientation or gender identity regulate professional conduct or protected speech? If it regulates speech, does the law's distinction between affirming and changing identities constitute impermissible viewpoint discrimination?

• The law as applied to her talk therapy restricts her First Amendment right to speak freely with consenting clients.
• The statute discriminates based on viewpoint by permitting speech that affirms a client's identity while prohibiting speech that helps a client change it.
• The restriction should be subject to strict scrutiny rather than the rational-basis or intermediate-scrutiny review applied by the lower courts.
• The law's labels of "treatment" or "therapeutic modality" cannot be used to circumvent constitutional protections for speech.

• The law regulates professional conduct and "therapeutic modalities" rather than expression, meaning it only incidentally burdens speech.
• The state has a compelling interest in protecting minors from the documented harms of conversion therapy.
• The law falls within a long tradition of state authority to regulate the medical profession and proscribe "substandard care."
• The regulation is a valid exercise of the state's police power to ensure the safety and efficacy of healthcare provided to residents.

• The Court held that Colorado's law, as applied to talk therapy, regulates speech based on viewpoint and therefore triggers strict scrutiny.
• The Court reasoned that talk therapy is the "quintessential form of protected speech" and cannot be reclassified as "conduct" or "treatment" simply through government labeling, citing *NAACP v. Button*.
• The law is viewpoint-discriminatory because it permits speech providing "acceptance, support, and understanding" under Colo. Rev. Stat. § 12–245–202(3.5)(b)(I) but forbids speech that "attempts . . . to change" identity under § 12–245–202(3.5)(a).
• The Court emphasized that viewpoint discrimination is an "egregious form" of content regulation from which governments must nearly always abstain, citing *Rosenberger v. Rector and Visitors of Univ. of Va.*.
• The Court rejected the "professional speech" exception, citing *National Institute of Family and Life Advocates (NIFLA) v. Becerra* to hold that licensed professionals do not have diminished First Amendment protections.
• The "speech-incident-to-conduct" doctrine does not apply because the speech is not integrally related to unlawful conduct (*United States v. Williams*) nor is the restriction unrelated to content (*Sorrell v. IMS Health Inc.*), citing *Cohen v. California* and *Holder v. Humanitarian Law Project*.
• The Court found no historical tradition of permitting content-based restrictions on "substandard care" that would exempt this law from strict scrutiny, citing *United States v. Alvarez* and *United States v. Stevens*.
• The Court concluded that the state cannot aggregate discrete traditions—such as licensing, informed consent, and malpractice—to create a new, broader category of lesser-protected professional speech.