California employers will face three new sets of laws on artificial intelligence in the workplace beginning in 2027. Governor Gavin Newsom signed the bills on September 30, 2026. One requires human review before AI-driven discipline or termination. Another bans AI tools that read employees’ emotions or nervous-system activity. The third requires employers to say so in their layoff notices when AI or automation is behind a mass layoff. The bills were part of a package of 13 AI measures announced in a Governor’s press release that described several as first-in-the-nation worker protections. “AI should expand opportunity — not come at the expense of workers and families,” Newsom said in the release.
SB 947, by Senator Jerry McNerney (D-Pleasanton) and sponsored by the California Federation of Labor Unions, dubbed the “No Robo Bosses Act of 2026,” is a narrower version of SB 7, which Newsom vetoed in October 2025. In his veto message on SB 7, the Governor called its notice requirements “unfocused” and its restrictions “overly broad.” The new bill drops SB 7’s advance notice requirement for applicants and employees and concentrates on discipline and termination decisions. Its core requirements take effect July 1, 2027, according to several law firm analyses.
The law applies to “automated decision systems,” which it defines broadly as computational processes using machine learning, statistical modeling, data analytics, or AI that produce a score, classification, or recommendation used to assist or replace human discretionary decisions. Routine tools such as spam filters, firewalls, and calculators are excluded. Employers may not rely solely on such a system to discipline or fire an employee. When an employer primarily relies on a system’s output, a human must investigate and corroborate it. The employer may not act on output that cannot be corroborated or is inaccurate, incomplete, or misleading. The employer must then give the employee a written, plain-language notice stating that it relied on the system, that a person corroborated the output, and that the employee may request a description of the data analyzed. The law also bars using these systems to infer protected characteristics, to undermine compliance with workplace laws, or to retaliate against workers for exercising their rights.
The Labor Commissioner and public prosecutors enforce the law, with a $500 civil penalty per violation. Injunctive relief, punitive damages, and attorney fees are available in civil actions. Commentators note that the law creates no express private right of action, but they expect plaintiffs to seek the penalties through the Private Attorneys General Act (PAGA). Employees covered by a collective bargaining agreement that clearly waives the law and provides its own protection from algorithmic management are exempt. Independent contractors, who were covered in earlier drafts, are not.
McNerney said in a statement that “AI must remain a tool controlled by humans.” Management-side firms, while generally describing the laws as narrower than earlier proposals, have flagged undefined terms and the risk of PAGA exposure.
AB 1883, by Assemblymember Isaac Bryan (D-Los Angeles), takes effect January 1, 2027. It prohibits employers from using a “workplace surveillance tool” that incorporates AI to recognize, infer, or predict an employee’s emotional state, or to collect “neural data.” That term covers information from measuring activity of the central or peripheral nervous system, such as readings from an EEG headband, but not data merely inferred from other sources. A workplace surveillance tool is any system or device that collects data about employees’ activities, communications, biometrics, or behavior by means other than direct human observation. Examples include video, audio, time-tracking, and geolocation tools. According to Fisher Phillips, the ban could reach AI sentiment analysis of employee emails, chats, or call transcripts, and it applies even if the employer never uses the data for an employment decision.
The law covers private employers of every size and public employers, as well as labor contractors and their client employers. It does not prohibit using a surveillance tool “to ensure safety,” and commentators disagree about how broadly that exception reaches. A narrow exemption applies to certain federally required defense, aerospace, and national security work. Enforcement mirrors SB 947: the Labor Commissioner and public prosecutors may act, with penalties of up to $500 per violation and the possibility of injunctive relief and punitive damages. There is no express private right of action. Job applicants and independent contractors are not covered. A companion bill signed the same day, AB 1331, separately restricts workplace surveillance in bathrooms and similar private areas.
SB 951, by Senator Eloise Gomez Reyes (D-Colton), amends the California WARN Act, effective January 1, 2027. The Cal-WARN Act already requires covered establishments, those with 75 or more employees in the preceding 12 months, to give 60 days’ notice of a mass layoff, relocation, or termination. Under SB 951, when the action is caused “in whole or in substantial part” by AI or other automated technology, the notice must carry the statement “This notice is for a technology displacement” at the top. It must also identify the number of affected workers, their occupations and work locations, the job functions the technology will perform, and the type of technology involved.
The Employment Development Department must publish summaries of these notices and a quarterly statewide summary of technology-driven displacement. By January 1, 2028, it must also report to the Legislature on AI’s effects on hiring. Existing Cal-WARN remedies, back pay and benefits and a civil penalty of up to $500 per day, are unchanged. The amendments build on SB 617, which expanded required notice content as of January 1, 2026.
The new statutes add to obligations employers already face under the Civil Rights Council’s regulations on automated-decision systems under the Fair Employment and Housing Act. Employers will also face the California Privacy Protection Agency’s rules on automated decisionmaking technology, which begin to apply to significant employment decisions in 2027.