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2025 Legislative and Budget Priorities

In 2025, LGBTQ Caucus Members voted to approve priority and endorsed legislative packages. Bills under the priorities fall under the “Protecting Against Anti-LGBTQ+ Attacks” bucket. Bills under the endorsements fall under the “Advancing our Progress and Addressing Everyday Challenges” bucket. 

Bills with * are Formal Caucus Priorities (Sponsored Bills), and bills with ** are Formal Caucus Endorsements (Supported Bills).

Health Equity & Access

  • AB 554 (Mark González) – PrEPARE Act**
    • Strengthens existing protections requiring health plans and insurers to cover all HIV pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) medications—as long as they are FDA-approved and clinically effective—without patient cost sharing or other restrictions like prior authorization. Also, ensures that local, community-based clinics can receive timely reimbursement for these drugs.
  • AB 1487 (Addis) – 2STGI Wellness & Equity Fund**
    • Renames the Fund to be inclusive of Two-Spirit peoples and includes grants specific to Indigenous and Two-Spirit Community Members. Also, expands the use of the Fund to also go towards critically necessary programs such as mental health services, educational access, and workforce development.
  • SB 278 (Cabaldon) – HIV Test Results**
    • Allow the sharing of data about HIV viral-load suppression with MCOs and DHCS in order to help eliminate legal barriers to fully using Medi-Cal to tackle the HIV epidemic.
  • SB 418 (Menjivar) – Ensure Equal Access to Care for All*
    • Codifies the ACA’s Section 1557 nondiscrimination protections in healthcare programs and activities into California law.
  • SB 504 (Laird) – HIV Data Reporting**
    • Enhances HIV data reporting between local health officers and the state department.

Privacy Rights & Freedom from Retaliation

  • AB 82 (Ward) – Health Data Privacy & Safety Protections*
    • Protects the privacy of health data and enhances the safety and well-being of patients, their families, and health professionals who receive and provide, respectively, legally protected health services, such as a and gender-affirming healthcare services.
  • AB 715 (Zbur) – California Attorney Protection Act*
    • Protects attorneys from disciplinary action for providing legal services to patients, health providers, and others accessing and providing, respectively, essential and legal health care, such as reproductive and gender-affirming healthcare.
  • SB 497 (Wiener) – Shield Law Expansion*
    • Protects sensitive health data by requiring warrants for law enforcement to access the state’s prescription drug monitoring program, establishes that knowingly sharing information from the database to unauthorized parties without a warrant is punishable as a misdemeanor, and also expands the state’s existing shield laws protecting access to healthcare for transgender and gender-expansive Californians.

Vital Records

  • AB 1084 (Zbur) – Transgender Records Act*
    • Expedites the process for Californians to receive a court order recognizing their name and gender change by shortening the court processing time for uncontested petitions from six weeks to a maximum of two weeks, as well as requires amended birth certificates and marriage certificates to be issued within two weeks.
  • SB 59 (Wiener) – Transgender Privacy Act*
    • Expands confidentiality provisions by ensuring all name and gender change orders, regardless of age, and papers and records associated with them are made confidential.

Combatting Hate

  • AB 449 (Jackson) – Combatting Hate in California*
    • Creates and implements statewide and regional radio, social media, and television campaigns to discourage discrimination based upon, but not limited to, disability, gender, nationality, race or ethnicity, religion, or sexual orientation – and, ensures the advertisements are proportional to the communities most impacted as reported under the AG’s annual hate crimes report.
  • AB 822 (Elhawary) – Commission on State of Hate*
    • Extends the sunset repeal date of the existing Commission on State of Hate – which has undertaken significant work to analyze and address hate crimes and hate incidents in California.

Enhancing Supports in Education & Housing

  • AB 678 (Lee) – LGBTQ+ Housing Supports**
    • Requires the Interagency Council on Homelessness to provide recommendations to enhance culturally competent services for LGBTQ+ homeless individuals, expand SOGI data collection in homelessness programs, and enhance discrimination prevention in homelessness programs.
  • AB 727 (Mark González) – LGBTQ+ Youth Mental Health**
    • Adds the Trevor Project hotline to the list of resources on the back of grades 7-12 student ID cards, as well as updates the Safe Place to Learn Act statute by codifying the inclusion of resources that support students who have been subjected to school-based discrimination on the basis of actual or perceived sexual orientation, gender identity, or gender expression.
  • AB 908 (Solache) – LIFT Act**
    • Adds implementation of supportive policies and initiatives to address LGBTQ+ pupil education and well-being to the state priorities that must be addressed by Local Control and Accountability Plans (LCAPs).
  • SB 289 (Cervantes) – Title IX Oversight Office*
    • Establishes a statewide Title IX oversight office to serve as a point of contact for students in order to investigate campus policies and procedures regarding harassment, rape, sexual assault, and violence complaints, as well as protections related to LGBTQ+ issues. 

Supporting Families

  • SB 450 (Menjivar) – Confirmatory Adoptions**
    • Clarifies and reaffirms California’s longstanding jurisdiction for adoption proceedings, including confirmatory adoptions, for families who either never lived in California or who no longer live here, so long as the child was born in this state.
  • SB 590 (Durazo) – Paid Family Leave for Chosen Families**
    • Expands paid family leave rights for workers, inclusive of LGBTQ+ workers, who need to take time off to care for their loved ones with a serious illness.