The 61-16 vote came after a lengthy and emotional back-and-forth between Democrats, who said the bill is necessary to protect LGBTQ+ youth, and Republicans, who said it would infringe on the student-parent relationship.

AB 1955 by Assemblymember Christopher M. Ward (D-San Diego) would shield teachers from retaliation for supporting transgender student rights and prohibit school policies that require “forced disclosure” of youth gender decisions to their families.

The legislation responds to a wave of conservative-backed school board policies that have sought to notify parents if their child changes their name or pronouns, or if students request to use facilities or participate in programs that don’t match their gender on official records.

Implementation of those policies are held up in court. But Democrats said Thursday that legislation is necessary to safeguard transgender K-12 students who may not feel safe at home to come out to their parents. They cited high bullying and suicide rates of transgender youth.

“It’s not the job of teachers to be the gender police. They want to teach, and they want to be able to provide a safe and supportive environment. And when they do, students will thrive,” a tearful Ward said on the Assembly floor, surrounded by his Democratic colleagues who stood in support of the bill. “Nothing in this bill gets involved in the parent-child relationship.”

The vote came after combative opposition from Assemblymember Bill Essayli (R-Corona), who opposed the measure over concerns about “parental rights” and accused Democrats of fear mongering.

Assembly Speaker Pro Tem Jim Wood (D-Healdsburg) repeatedly cut Essayli’s microphone during the debate and ruled that he was “out of order” for speaking about other legislation during his testimony against AB 1955, as well as for “disparaging the house.”

“I am tired of being interrupted by you,” Essayli told Wood.

Essayli, who compared state Democrats to the “Chinese Communist Party,” responded by attempting to block the testimony of his Democratic colleagues.

The floor debate was disrupted by several procedural votes required in order to cut Essayli’s time. The Democratic caucus ultimately paused the vote to take a recess after Assemblymember Corey Jackson (D-Perris) was physically restrained by his colleagues to stop him from confronting Essayli on the Assembly floor.

“I went blank. I lost it,” Jackson told The Times. “I don’t think sometimes that my Republican colleagues understand that for some bills, this is not about policy. This is about acknowledging people’s humanity. So of course it’s personal.”

Jackson said he apologized to his fellow lawmakers for the distraction and that he did not speak to Essayli about the matter.

“We stand with you. We do not want anyone to be bullied or hurt or erased or any of this stuff,” Essayli said after ultimately being allowed to speak on the floor about the bill. “When a child is going through this, it’s a very difficult and emotional time…. We do not believe that the government — the schools — have any authority to withhold information from parents at all, period.”

Several members of the California Legislative LGBTQ Caucus shared their own coming out stories in support of the bill and their experiences with unsupportive families.

Assemblymember Lori D. Wilson (D-Suisun City) said a teacher was the one to tell her that her child is transgender. She was “disappointed” by that teacher’s judgment.

“If my teacher had told my parents … I don’t know if I would’ve survived that day, because that was the level of abuse that was happening in my home,” Wilson said. “I don’t care how old you are. That is a personal decision.”

Newsom will have 12 days to sign or veto the bill, which cleared the Senate 29-8, once it officially hits his desk.

The Democratic governor is a staunch LGBTQ+ advocate. He signed a bill in 2022 that named California a sanctuary for transgender children and their families seeking healthcare and support they can’t get in red states.

But he shocked LGBTQ+ advocates when he vetoed a bill last year that would have required judges in custody battles to consider a parent’s support for their child’s gender identity. In a veto message, he said, “I urge caution when the executive and legislative branches of state government attempt to dictate — in prescriptive terms that single out one characteristic — legal standards for the judicial branch to apply.”

Newsom does not typically comment on pending legislation.

When asked about the issue last year, he told The Times that he understands parents’ concerns but said that the school board policies are being used as a guise by Republicans to “bully” the LGBTQ+ community.

The governor, a father of four, said he “draws the line” at requiring teachers to “out” students.

“I take very seriously the work I do as a parent at home to meet their needs, and I don’t honestly expect teachers to sub my role as a parent,” Newsom said in November. “I want them to teach my kids, and I want them to keep them safe and make them feel included and not outed.”

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Over the summer, when a Southern California school board opposed a new state-determined social studies curriculum that included a bio of slain gay rights activist Harvey Milk, Gov. Gavin Newsom issued a threatening tweet calling out the school board president by name. “This isn’t Texas or Florida. In the Golden State, our kids have the freedom to learn,” Newsom tweeted. “Congrats Mr. Komrosky you have our attention. Stay tuned.”

Newsom followed up the vague warning with a far more tangible one. In a subsequent statement, the governor labeled the board’s reluctance to accept the curricula an act of “hate” and announced a $1.5 million fine for what he described as a “willful violation of the law.” He also threatened a lawsuit and a state Justice Department civil rights investigation. “Demagogues who whitewash history, censor books, and perpetuate prejudice must never succeed,” Newsom added. “Hate doesn’t belong in our classrooms, and because of the board’s majority’s antics, Temecula has a civil rights investigation to answer for.” Komrosky and other members of the school board for the Temecula Valley Unified School District were concerned about Milk’s well-documented relationship with a 16-year-old boy when he was in his 30s.

He and other board members labeled Milk a “pedophile” and didn’t want his bio included in a supplemental curriculum for certain grade levels. After Newsom’s threat of legal action, the school board began to waver. Komrosky called an emergency Friday meeting that stretched late into the night and partially backed down, agreeing to accept the textbooks but putting off a decision on the 4th-grade lessons on civil rights, including the gay rights movement, until the board and parents could review it further.

The confrontation spurred weeks of headlines, with members of the LGBTQ+ community praising the governor’s actions while parents’ rights groups bemoaned the top-down threats from the highest level of state government.

The Democrat-controlled state legislature last month passed a bill that would legalize hefty state fines for school boards that reject state-determined curricula and other state policies. The state attorney general also sued a different school district in Chino for requiring parents to be notified when their children begin identifying as a different gender in California public schools. In mid-October, a judge sided, at least temporarily, with the state, and granted a preliminary injunction against the parent notification policy until he makes a final decision.

Over the last several months, the school board clashes have fueled a series of protests and rallies at the state Capitol in which parents, students, pastors, and school board members have accused the Newsom administration and the state legislature of keeping secrets from parents and undermining their ability to care for and oversee their children. On the other side of the debate are Newsom, Attorney General Rob Bonta, state Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond, and members of the LGBTQ+ community who argue that the school boards are trying to ban textbooks teaching diversity.

They also assert that students in the state public elementary schools who are changing their gender have a right to privacy from their parents who could try to stop them from transitioning – or worse – use physical force as punishment for doing so. Amid the furor on both sides of the school board controversies, in late August, Newsom announced the latest round of grants to support an effort to combat hate crimes against transgender, Muslim, and black people after the attorney general’s office found a 20% increase in such crimes across the state in 2022.

Among the taxpayer-funded grants is $630,000 to Equality California, an LGBTQ+ group fighting alongside Thurmond against school boards’ parental notification policies and their ability to object to diversity-oriented curricula. Over the last four years, the state has provided $400 million in federal grants to fund security measures for faith-based organizations and other nonprofits, and $196 million in grants to local organizations focused on preventing hate crimes and supporting survivors.

The funding is taking place as the state is running a $31.5 billion budget deficit, up from $22.5 billion projected in January. The state recently awarded this year’s nearly $91.5 million in “Stop the Hate” grants to more than 170 community groups after at least two disturbing incidents that police say were motivated by anti-LGBTQ+ views and racism. In August, a San Bernardino store owner was murdered after an argument over a rainbow “pride” flag hanging outside her store, and an Oakland elementary school was evacuated after receiving a bomb threat that police said was racially motivated.

Newsom last week also approved $10 million in funds to boost the presence of police at synagogues, mosques, and other places of worship as tensions have flared over the possibility of local violence stemming from the Israel-Hamas war. Allowing all places of worship to receive the funds to boost security appears even-handed and proactive at a time of rising tensions and threat levels. But the “Stop the Hate” grant to Equality California has sparked criticism from opponents that Newsom is inappropriately using state taxpayer funds to assist the top LBGTQ+ organization fighting parents over school board policies.

According to the California Department of Social Services, which issued the grants, the grants “may” fund various services and programs, including those providing mental health and legal services for victims and their families. The website also says funds could go to prevention services, including “arts and cultural work, youth development, senior safety and escort programs, safety planning, training and cross-racial alliance work.” Equality California has been at the center of the fight for protecting children’s right to change genders without their parents’ knowledge in public schools across the state.

The group has fiercely opposed the parental rights movement, labeling it homophobic and transphobic, and argues that notifying parents amounts to “forcibly outing” gender-transitioning children, which could lead to physical or emotional harm for these young people who already experience higher rates of depression, mental health, self-harm, and suicide than their peers. Equality California staff have attended school board meetings and appeared alongside Thurmond as he answers questions from the press.

The group’s staffers were among pro-LGBTQ+ advocates whom a Chino school board removed from a meeting along with Thurmond after he spoke against a proposed district policy that would require schools to inform parents if their students were changing their pronouns or asking to use different gendered facilities. Because money is fungible, and the grant can help offset costs for the organization’s other work, parental rights advocates have argued that the grant is inappropriately boosting the group’s lobbying efforts opposing parental rights policies at local school boards.

According to its 2021 tax filings with the IRS, the most recent available, Equality California Institute spent more than $400,000 on lobbying the state legislature and received nearly $6 million in revenue for that year alone. Carl DeMaio, a conservative radio talk show host in California who is gay, was the first to take issue with the Equality California grant in a post on his website, arguing that it was one of several designed to give a financial edge to left-leaning groups, such as Equality California, that actively engage in politics by endorsing candidates and other political activities.

For instance, the group endorsed Thurmond’s reelection last year, lauding him for “personally intervening” in a school board fight in Chino and working “diligently alongside Equality California to counter the attacks against our trans and gender-nonconforming youth, in particular, and we could not ask for a better ally and champion for all California students.” It’s unclear if that endorsement came directly from the Institute or another part of Equality California’s nonprofit organization. “There’s nothing wrong with these far-left groups engaging in political advocacy. It’s their First Amendment right, but not with my tax dollars,” DeMaio told RealClearPolitics. “This is the oldest scam going on in California politics right now.

It’s the utilization of taxpayer money to subsidize Democrat and left-wing political organizations.” “If the National Rifle Association or the Cato Institute or the Heritage Foundation were receiving taxpayer money, the left and the media would be lighting their hair on fire, but here in California, you have political groups getting money from the government, and no one bats an eye,” he added.

Equality California spokesman Jorge Reyes Salinas says the Institute does not engage in political work, as DeMaio alleges, and stressed that the entire grant is devoted to supporting the state’s “Stop the Hate” program. “Equality California Institute’s Stop the Hate program is a tool to ensure that LGBTQ+ Californians know about and have access to culturally responsive resources on hate crimes and bystander intervention,” he said in a statement to RCP. “Through outreach and partnerships, this program aims to advance education on how to curb the sharp increase in anti-LGBTQ hate crimes in California.” Newsom’s office did not respond to RCP’s inquiries about the grant.

Lance Christensen, a former state legislative staffer who ran for California superintendent of schools as a Republican last year, now serves as the vice president of education policy and government at the conservative California Policy Center. The Center is one of the main groups backing the parental rights policies in school boards across the state. Christensen argues that the deck is heavily stacked against his side because parents are already fighting the deep-pocketed teacher unions who back many of the policies parents’ rights groups have tried to fight, including extended COVID school shutdowns that kept students in virtual learning longer than many other states.

On top of that, the leaders of Equality California, which is more ideologically aligned with the Democrats who run the state, “feel like it’s their right and duty to extract money from taxpayers to help amplify their views,” he argued. “The fact of the matter is, most parents are well aware of the positions these groups have,” he said. “They just aren’t aware that their tax dollars are going to subsidize these activities.” Equality California has backed a raft of pro-LGBTQ+ bills that Newsom signed into law in late September, including several measures the governor’s office has said are designed to “better support vulnerable youth.”

Among the new laws is one that would require courts to keep all petitions for a change of gender identity in public documents, including those filed by minors, confidential. The group also strongly backed the Transgender, Gender-Diverse and Intersex Youth Empowerment Act, which would have required judges to consider whether parents have affirmed the gender identity of their children in custody disputes.

While Newsom said he shares the commitment to advance transgender rights, he vetoed that bill in mid-September, arguing that it would inappropriately change legal standards for another branch of government.

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