California’s craziest last-minute laws could change your bills, kids’ screen time, shopping, driving

Time is running out in Sacramento.

California lawmakers are scrambling on the final day of the legislative session to send hundreds of bills to Gov. Gavin Newsom by the end of Monday — and some of the most contentious measures could affect everything from household bills to your kids’ screen time.

Here are five controversial bills Californians should be watching:

SB 492: Wildfires, utilities and homeowners

The most contentious fight in the California Legislature this session has wrestled with who ultimately pays when utility equipment starts catastrophic fires: utilities and their ratepayers, insurers and their policyholders, or victims themselves.

Newsom suffered a rare defeat in the final legislative session of his governorship, as fellow Democrats spent the weekend rejecting major pieces of the lame-duck governor’s push to overhaul wildfire liability and reduce utilities’ financial exposure.

Newsom ultimately backed down from proposals that included limiting insurers’ ability to recover wildfire payouts from utilities, settling instead for a narrower compromise that speeds payments to victims, blocks hedge funds from buying certain wildfire claims and bars utility executives from collecting bonuses when their companies ignite catastrophic fires.

The bill is expected to head to the governor’s desk.

AB 2564: Surveillance pricing and your discounts

Assemblymember Chris Ward (D-San Diego) wants to stop retailers from using personal information and algorithms to determine what individual shoppers pay. The bill targets “surveillance pricing,” which supporters say could allow businesses to secretly charge customers more based on what data suggests they are willing to pay.

But the California Chamber of Commerce has panned the protections as myths, saying the same technology can be used to offer personalized discounts. Recent amendments preserve things like loyalty programs, abandoned-cart discounts and offers based on previous purchases, but retailers would face new limits on how personal information can be combined to determine those discounts.

SB 1119: Guardrails on kids’ AI friends

California lawmakers are making a late-session push to put guardrails around AI “companion chatbots” used by children. SB 1119 — introduced by Sen. Steve Padilla (D-Chula Vista) — would require companies to assess chatbots’ risks to kids and build protections against content encouraging suicide, self-harm, drug use, eating disorders and sexual abuse.

The bill would also create screen-time-style controls for AI friends. Children would generally be limited to one continuous hour and two hours total per day unless a parent changes the settings, while push notifications and persistent conversational memory would be disabled by default. Companies would also face requirements for responding to suicide or self-harm threats.

AB 2760: If the gloves fit

Assemblymember LaShae Sharp-Collins (D-San Diego) is making an eleventh-hour push to prohibit federal, state and local law enforcement agencies from using “shock gloves” that deliver an electric jolt — just as ICE awarded a $16.7 million contract to buy 6,000 pairs.

The proposal was inserted into AB 2760 through a late “gut-and-amend” process on Aug. 21, replacing legislation dealing with county inspectors general. Supporters have raised concerns about the safety and potential misuse of the devices, while law enforcement groups argue they provide officers with another less-lethal option before resorting to batons, projectiles or firearms.

Sacramento County Sheriff Jim Cooper, a former Democratic Assemblymember, slammed the measure.

“You want to see a reduction in the use of lethal force, yet you take away our less-lethal options,” Cooper said. “What is it that you want? You can’t have it both ways.”

AB 2015: Big Brother takes the wheel

Assemblymember Buffy Wicks (D-Oakland) is targeting an increasingly familiar California headache: navigation apps diverting motorists from clogged highways onto neighborhood streets.

AB 2015 would have Caltrans study how third-party navigation services affect traffic on state and local roads, potentially laying the groundwork for future policies governing routing apps. Supporters argue communities need help when apps such as Google Maps and Waze funnel highway traffic through overwhelmed residential neighborhoods.

Republicans have blasted the bill as an “anti-driver” push, warning that state intervention could eventually limit motorists’ ability to use technology to escape congestion rather than addressing the underlying problem — California’s chronically congested roads. The measure has passed the Legislature and is headed to Newsom.

AB 2691: Which sex offenders can run for office?

A bill intended to keep sex offenders and human traffickers out of elected office sparked a nasty Capitol fight over which convicted sex offenders should still be allowed to run.

Assemblymember Dawn Addis (D-Morro Bay) wants to permanently bar people convicted of human trafficking and the most serious felony sex crimes — generally Tier 3 offenses requiring lifetime sex-offender registration — from holding public office.

Republicans erupted after Senate amendments narrowed the original proposal, arguing the changes leave people convicted of certain sex crimes involving minors legally eligible to seek office, including seats on local school boards. Addis says the bill would nevertheless impose the toughest restrictions of their kind in the country. The measure passed with bipartisan support and is now awaiting Newsom’s signature or veto.

Download The California Post App, follow us on social, and subscribe to our newsletters