Last Friday was the deadline for California state legislators to introduce their bill ideas for this year’s legislative session. Although we have several good bills to report on, we are shell shocked at the number of bad bills introduced. It is going to take several weeks to explain them all to you in detail. Take a look at our Legislative Tracking List if you want to research for yourself the 47 bills we are following.
Here is a brief overview of the 10 worst bills introduced this year just to give you a flavor of what we are up against this year, and why we need your help to oppose them.
- AB 957: Parents to Lose Custody of Kids Over Transgenderism. Authored by Assemblywoman Lori Wilson (D-Fairfield). This bill would strongly encourage California state judges to favor the parent who is affirming a child’s transgender identity when determining who gets custody or receives visitation rights. The bill seeks to push a judge towards removing the custody rights of parents who don’t affirm their child’s self-determined transgender identity or parents who don’t want their trans-identifying children sterilized with puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and mutilating surgeries.
- AB 665: Minors Can Consent to Counseling Without Parents. Authored by Assemblywoman Wendy Carrillo (D-Los Angeles). Bill allows minors 12 and older to consent to their own mental health treatment or place themselves into an outpatient residential shelter without parents’ consent or notification if the professional, after consulting the minor, feels the involvement would be inappropriate. Currently, minors over 12 can only consent to these services if they are in danger of serious physical or mental harm to themselves or to others, or if the minor is the alleged victim of incest or child abuse. This bill would remove those two requirements.
- ACA 5: Repeals Traditional Marriage Proposition 8 from State Constitution. Authored by Assemblyman Evan Low (D-San Jose). This proposed constitutional amendment removes from the state Constitution Proposition 8 language establishing marriage as a union between one man and one woman. This text was put into the state constitution by California voters in 2008, but was later declared unconstitutional by federal judges. This bill has no legal effect, but it gives those promoting same-sex marriage a platform to promote their definition of marriage, and pressure Christians, conservatives, and Republicans to abandon their commitment to traditional/biblical marriage. If passed, this issue will be placed on the 2024 November ballot for voters to decide.
- AB 315: Enables Suing Pro-Life Pregnancy Centers over Misleading Speech. Authored by Assemblywoman Rebecca Bauer-Kahan (D-Livermore). This bill enables pro-abortion activists to sue pro-life pregnancy centers for speech they consider “false or misleading.” But the bill language is so expansive that any pro-life ministry or church that offers women “health counseling service related to pregnancy” could be sued. This bill as been assigned to the Assembly Judiciary Committee, but no hearing date yet.
- AB 1078: Prevents Local Control of Books/Curriculum in Public Schools. Authored by Assemblyman Jackson (D-Moreno Valley). This bill would remove powers that local school boards have over the curriculum taught in their school district by requiring the school district to receive approval from the state board of education before “removing any instructional materials or ceasing to teach any curriculum.” School districts would also have to get the same approval before removing “any books, publications, or papers from schools and school libraries.” The bill also requires that “every instructional material” adopted by a school district “shall include proportional and accurate representation of California’s diversity in the following categories: race, gender, socioeconomic status, religious and sexuality.” This bill is part of Jackson’s “Anti-Racism” bill package and seems targeted at school districts that have banned critical race theory.
- SB 345: Replaces Term “Unborn Child” with “Fetus” in State Laws. Authored by Senator Nancy Skinner (D-Berkley). This bill seeks to dehumanize unborn babies in California law by eliminating all references in state statutes to the words “unborn child” and “unborn person” and replace those terms with “fetus” or “unborn beneficiary.”
- AB 659: Mandates HPV Vaccine for Public and Private School Teenagers. Authored by Assemblywoman Cecilia M. Aguiar-Curry (D-Napa). This bill would add the human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine to the list of 10 other immunizations required to attend public or private school. The vaccine must be given by the 8th grade. Only homeschooled children will be exempt. Medical exemptions approved by the state will be permitted, but religious or personal exemptions are not allowed. This bill has been assigned to the Assembly Health Committee, but there is no hearing date yet.
- SB 58: Legalizes Mind Altering Magic Mushroom for Recreational Use. Authored by Senator Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco). This bill seeks to decriminalize various harmful hallucinogens for recreational use for those 21 and older, like magic mushrooms (Psilocybin). It also includes mind altering, illegal and dangerous hallucinogens like Dimethyltryptamine (DMT), Ibogaine, Mescaline, and Psilocyn. Senator Wiener introduced a similar bill last year but it also included LSD. That bill was vetoed by Governor Gavin Newsom. This bill has been assigned to the Senate Public Safety Committee, but a hearing has not yet been scheduled.
- AB 1432: Required Insurance Companies to Cover Abortions and Trans-Treatments. Authored by Assemblywoman Wendy Carrillo (D-Los Angeles). This bill requires all California insurance policies to cover “abortion, abortion-related services,” and “gender-affirming care,” which includes sterilizing cross-sex hormones and puberty blockers for minors, plus sex change operations and plastic surgeries to make people look like the opposite sex.
- AB 5: LGBTQ Indoctrination Training for Teachers. Authored by Assemblyman Rick Chavez Zbur (D-Santa Monica). This bill provides tools and training so public school teachers can create a school culture that embraces a harmful LGBTQ worldview about identity and sexual behavior in order to make LGBTQ-identified kids feel supported.
