Efforts to raise the age of consent in Oklahoma return to Legislature

OKLAHOMA CITY — An Oklahoma House member has reintroduced a bill that would modify the age of consent after it failed at the end of the 2024 session.
House Bill 1003, authored by Rep. Jim Olsen, R-Roland, would raise the age of sexual consent from 16 to 18 years old in Oklahoma. The bill also includes what he calls a “Romeo and Juliet provision” which protects those who had sex with children between 14 and 18 years old from prosecution if they are within four years of age.
If passed, Oklahoma would join 11 other states in having the age of consent be 18 years old.
“We don’t want the 35 year old coach to be nice to the 16-year-old girl and gain her consent,” Olsen said. “We don’t feel like that’s a good situation. … We don’t want people taking advantage of 16 or 17 year old girls in that respect.”
During the 2024 session, Olsen tabled a similar bill aiming to raise the age of consent. He refused to advance it after a bipartisan group of legislators added an amendment that would have also banned most childhood marriages.
“It got derailed by a Democrat wanting to deal with an entirely different issue in the bill and there was confusion,” Olsen said. “So basically, it got shot down last session. Hopefully we can do a little bit better this session.”
He said that his attitude has not changed when it comes to adding an amendment prohibiting child marriage to this bill.
“As far as age of marriage, I can see very reasonable points on both sides of that question,” Olsen said. “But it’s actually a different section of law. It’s a different issue, and our law says you have to deal with a single subject. So you know, people that want to do something along that line should do it in a separate bill.”
Rep. Andy Fugate, D-Oklahoma City, has introduced House Bill 1141 this session which would ban child marriage unless a court has emancipated the minor.
