2025 Legislative Package

2025 Legislative Package

My 2025 legislative package is designed to help make California and our Senate district more affordable, ensure that we have clean water while protecting against future droughts, accelerate our transition to clean energy, and ensure that artificial intelligence (AI) is safe and beneficial.     

Below is a summary of my bills in 2025 that are on Gov. Newsom's desk, are two-year bills eligible to move forward in January 2026, or have already been signed into law. The summaries include links to more information about each bill. (Updated Oct. 10, 2025)

Helping Make California More Affordable
 

• SB 24 Protecting Ratepayers
  Approved by the Legislature on Sept. 12, 2025, SB 24 helps protect Californians against higher utility bills by strengthening oversight of investor-owned utilities like PG&E and others, and preventing them from using ratepayer funds to fight local efforts to create a municipal utility. For more information, email Brett.Hailey@sen.ca.gov
   
• SB 279 Helping Farmers & Winegrape Growers
  Approved by the Legislature on Sept. 9, 2025, SB 279 reduces costs for CA farmers and winegrape growers by allowing them to compost large amounts of green waste onsite during a biomass event, such as the removal of an orchard or vineyard. The bill also allows community composting programs, urban farms, and school farms to compost larger amounts of green waste onsite. For more information, email Lauren.Winn@sen.ca.gov
   
• SB 543 Low-Cost Housing
  Approved by the Legislature on Sept. 2, 2025, SB 543 helps address CA’s housing affordability crisis by streamlining the construction of low-cost housing known as accessory dwelling units (ADUs), also called backyard cottages or in-law units, and junior accessory dwelling units (JADUs), such as an attached garage converted into living space. For more information, email Robert.Gammon@sen.ca.gov
   
• SB 711 Making Tax Filing Easier
  Signed into law by Gov. Newsom on Oct. 1, 2025, SB 711 makes it easier for CA taxpayers – especially taxpayers with small businesses – to file their taxes by aligning numerous state tax requirements with federal requirements for the first time in a decade. For more information, email Heather.Caden@sen.ca.gov
   
• SB 846 Protecting Farmworkers’ Wages 
  Signed into law by Gov. Newsom on July 14, 2025, SB 846 protects farmworkers from wage theft by updating state law that holds agricultural employers accountable. For more information, email Lauren.Winn@sen.ca.gov

Ensuring Clean Water and Protecting Against Drought
 

• SB 31 Expanding the Use of Recycled Water
  Approved by the Legislature on Sept. 4, 2025, SB 31 helps drought-proof CA by boosting the use of recycled water. It also protects the state’s fresh water supply by allowing businesses, homes, and agencies to expand their use of recycled water for irrigation and other uses, rather than relying on drinking water. For more information, email Lauren.Winn@sen.ca.gov

Creating Clean Energy Jobs and Fighting Climate Change
 

• SB 787 Job Growth in Clean Energy Supply Chains
  Approved by the Legislature on Sept. 13, 2025, SB 787 helps ensure more clean energy jobs will come to California by requiring state agencies, labor unions, environmental organizations, clean energy industries, and other sectors to coordinate CA’s supply chain development for three key clean energy sectors: batteries, offshore wind, and building-decarbonization technologies. For more information, email Lauren.Winn@sen.ca.gov
   
• SB 86 Green Energy Manufacturing Jobs
  Signed into law by Gov. Newsom on Oct. 1, 2025, SB 86 creates clean manufacturing energy jobs in California by extending a key program that provides tax incentives to CA green energy manufacturers. The bill also adds fusion energy to the tax incentive program. For more information, email Lauren.Winn@sen.ca.gov
   
• SB 327 Accelerating Fusion Energy
  Fusion energy has the potential to produce unlimited amounts of safe clean energy by mimicking the power of the sun to combine atoms. Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in our district has been on the cutting edge of fusion technology. A two-year bill, SB 327 boosts fusion energy by creating a fusion data center that would foster research and collaboration, and establish fusion data standards. For more information, email Brett.Hailey@sen.ca.gov

Ensuring Artificial Intelligence Is Safe and Beneficial
 

• SB 7 No Robo Bosses Act       
  Approved by the Legislature on Sept. 12, 2025, SB 7 requires human oversight of artificial intelligence systems in the workplace to help prevent abuses. The groundbreaking legislation would bar CA employers from relying primarily on AI systems, known as automated decision-making systems (ADS), to discipline or terminate workers without human oversight. For more information, email Heather.Caden@sen.ca.gov and Aaron.Gilbert-O’Neil@sen.ca.gov
   
• SB 813 Safety Standards for Artificial Intelligence   
  A two-year bill, SB 813 will lay the groundwork for the nation’s first transparent safety and security standards for artificial intelligence created by independent, third-party panels of AI experts and academics, while also cementing CA’s position as a global leader in AI innovation. For more information, email Heather.Caden@sen.ca.gov and Aaron.Gilbert-O’Neil@sen.ca.gov
   
• SB 833 Human Oversight of AI in Critical Infrastructure
  A two-year bill, SB 833 requires human oversight of AI in CA’s critical infrastructure in order to safeguard the state’s transportation, energy, communications, emergency services, and financial services systems. If enacted, SB 833 would also be the first such law in the nation. For more information, email Heather.Caden@sen.ca.gov and Aaron.Gilbert-O’Neil@sen.ca.gov

I am also joint author of the following legislation this year:

• SB 80 Nuclear Fusion Hubs (with Sen. Caballero)
  Signed into law by Gov. Newsom on Oct. 3, 2025,SB 80 accelerates adoption of fusion energy, which has the potential to produce unlimited amounts of safe clean energy, by requiring the CA Energy Commission to establish a program to provide financial incentives for fusion energy research. For more information, email Brett.Hailey@sen.ca.gov
• SB 237 Stabilizing Gas Prices (with Sens. Grayson, Hurtado, and Richardson, and Asm. Wilson)
  Signed into law by Gov. Newsom on Sept. 19, 2025, SB 237 is groundbreaking legislation that is designed to stabilize gasoline prices as the state transitions away from fossil fuels. For more information, email Brett.Hailey@sen.ca.gov
• SB 663 Wildfire Property Tax Exemption (with Sens. Allen and Perez) 
  Signed into law by Gov. Newsom on Oct. 10 2025, SB 663 doubles the amount of time that survivors of the LA wildfires have to access property tax relief, while extending the length of time survivors have to rebuild. For more information, email Heather.Caden@sen.ca.gov
• SCR 25 Advancing Fusion Energy (with Sen. Blakespear)
  Chaptered by the Secretary of State on Sept. 2, 2025, SCR 25 advances fusion energy in CA by setting a goal of establishing a first-of-a-kind fusion pilot plant in the state by the 2030s. For more information, email Brett.Hailey@sen.ca.gov

For updates on the above legislation and on the California state budget, please follow me on Facebook, X-Twitter, Instagram, BlueSky, or Threads.