California’s Assembly and Senate Appropriations committees cleared 24 of 29 active AI bills from the Aug. 13 suspense file, the twice-yearly “kill day” that decides which measures survive to a floor vote. With three federal preemption attempts dead in Congress, whatever Gov. Gavin Newsom signs by Sept. 30 becomes the practical national AI rulebook on Jan. 1, 2027.

Five bills didn’t make it. The most consequential casualty is AB 412, Assembly member Bauer-Kahan’s copyright training-data disclosure bill carried over from 2025, held by Senate Appropriations after months of industry pressure. That the disclosure regime dies while the customer-service and workplace bills advance is itself the story: California is willing to regulate AI’s outputs and workplaces, not its training pipelines.

The workplace bills survived intact. AB 1883 (Bryan) and its Senate companion SB 947 (McNerney, Reyes) both cleared 5-2 “do pass as amended,” narrowing the “No Robo Bosses” framework Newsom vetoed in 2025. AB 1883 had already passed the Assembly 52-12 in May. AB 2 (Lowenthal), imposing platform liability for harms to children, cleared Senate Appropriations 4-0.

The chatbot and professional-services docket also moved. AB 1609 on customer service chatbots cleared 5-2. SB 300 (Padilla) survived. AB 1979 on healthcare AI passed the Assembly 48-15 on May 21. AB 1651, governing AI on the State Bar exam, and SB 928, requiring CSU instructors to be human, both reached Newsom’s desk this week.

SB 574, Sen. Tom Umberg’s first-in-nation attorney AI guardrails bill, advanced past Appropriations toward floor votes. Umberg told Bloomberg Law the goal is that “litigants as well as the decision-makers have as accurate information as is possible.”

The federal vacuum is doing what the federal vacuum does. Sacramento sets the floor; everyone else complies.

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