Assemblymember Bauer Kahan's 2025 Legislation includes:
Six bills authored by Assemblymember Rebecca Bauer-Kahan were signed into law by Governor Newsom this fall, addressing critical issues from social media safety to insurance reform.
Bills Signed by Governor Newsom:
AB 45 – Reproductive Health Data Privacy
Expands California's leadership in reproductive and digital privacy by ensuring that personal and location data related to health care—particularly reproductive health services—cannot be exploited or used to target patients, providers, or researchers.
AB 56 – Social Media Mental Health Warning Labels
Responding to U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy's call for safety warnings on social media platforms, this bill requires platforms to display mental health warning labels to users, particularly addressing the mental health crisis among young people who spend excessive time on social media.
AB 290 – FAIR Plan Modernization
Passed with strong bipartisan support, AB 290 requires the California FAIR Plan to establish automatic payment systems and provides a grace period to prevent unintentional coverage lapses during increasingly severe wildfire seasons.
AB 578 – Fair Food Delivery Act Enhancement
Strengthens consumer protections by requiring full refunds to customers' original payment method when orders are not delivered, are incomplete, or incorrect. The bill also mandates real customer service support, requiring food delivery platforms to provide access to live representatives for refund requests.
AB 621 – AI-Generated Non-Consensual Intimate Images
Passed unanimously through both the Senate and Assembly, this legislation strengthens civil enforcement mechanisms against websites that use AI to create deep-fake nude images without consent, addressing a growing threat to privacy and safety, particularly for women and girls.
AB-774: A technical clean-up measure to AB 2837 of last year, which protects low-income consumers who are subject to a debt collection judgment by preserving their retirement savings, ensuring due process and accuracy in wage garnishments and bank levies, and providing that amounts wrongfully seized are returned to the consumer.
ACR 113: This resolution recognizes October 2025 as Intellectual Property Awareness Month in California.
Vetoed Legislation:
Despite strong legislative support, Governor Newsom vetoed two crucial pieces of legislation:
AB 432 – Menopause Care Equity Act passed with near-unanimous support but was vetoed despite addressing a real healthcare crisis: up to 70% of women seeking menopause care don't receive the treatment they need. The bill would have ensured insurance coverage for evidence-based treatments and incentivized physician training.
AB 1064 – AI Chatbot Child Safety received supermajority support in both houses but was vetoed. The bill would have protected children from dangerous AI "companion" chatbots that can manipulate children's emotions, create harmful attachments, or encourage dangerous behaviors including suicide and disordered eating.
Other Legislation Introduced:
AB-67: Authorizes the Attorney General’s office to enforce the Reproductive Privacy Act. Status.
AB-222: Creates transparency and efficiency requirements for large AI models and data centers, and protects ratepayers from increased energy costs. Status.
AB-302: Brings the California Medical Information Act medical privacy protections up to date to ensure that as new technologies are developed patients’ private medical information is not being used as a commodity. Status.
AB-412: Requires GenAI developers to provide copyright owners with information about how their copyrighted materials are used. Status.
AB-1018: Protects individuals from discrimination by requiring developers and users to assess automated decision systems (ADSs) prior to being released to the public. Status.
AB-1222: Protects ratepayers by preventing utilities from raising rates to pay for certain legal costs, and by making it easier to challenge last-minute changes to Public Utility Commission decisions. Status.
AB-1405: Creates an enrollment process for AI auditors and adopts minimum transparency and ethical standards for enrolled auditors. Status.
