Pressure ramps up for California legislators to change, keep child sex abuse law

Stephen Hobbs, The Sacramento Bee on Aug 21, 2026

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SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Advocacy groups took to the California Capitol Thursday to decry a last-minute effort to modify a state law that greatly expanded who could file childhood sexual assault claims against public agencies.

The pushback came as legislators are considering changes to the law under increasing pressure to stem what school districts, counties and others say are potentially crippling costs from current claims, future cases and insurance premium hikes associated with them. The deadline to pass bills this year is Aug. 31.

“Children were abused in the systems that the government created to protect them,” said Jennifer Rodriguez, executive director of the Youth Law Center — an organization that advocates for changes to foster care and juvenile justice systems — said at a press conference outside the Capitol. “I am deeply troubled that so much of the conversation here in Sacramento, in this building, right now is about one question: How do we pay less when abuse happens?”

Assembly Bill 218, which passed in 2019, greatly expanded the time and circumstances that someone could file a lawsuit for alleged sexual abuse, including allowing people to file claims decades after they were a child. The fight over of the future of the law is centered on a complicated challenge: How do agencies fairly compensate people abused decades ago in juvenile justice centers, foster homes and other settings while ensuring that public agencies don’t collapse under the weight of claims?

Also hanging over the debate are allegations that some claims filed under AB 218 may not be true. The Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office is investigating whether fraudulent allegations were included in thousands of cases that were settled by the county in a $4 billion agreement made last year.

Assemblymember Dawn Addis, D-Morro Bay, said she has been involved in conversations among legislators about potential changes and is eager to know more about what happened with the Los Angeles County cases.

“We all want true survivor voices to be heard, to have access to justice and to start preventing any child from becoming a survivor in the first place,” she said.

School officials blame attorneys who seek to take advantage

School officials advocating for changes to the law said during their own news conference that their goal was not about cutting off compensation to people who were harmed. They lobbed blame at attorneys for taking advantage of the law for their own gain.

“School districts are diverting millions of dollars from classrooms, insurance premiums are soaring, insurers are leaving the market, and some districts face the possibility of insolvency,” said Debra Schade, president of the California School Boards Association. “Those consequences are felt by today’s students through fewer teachers, larger classes, reduced counseling and mental health supports and greater strain on special education.”

Schade urged legislators to pass caps on damages people can receive in court and raise the standard of evidence needed to win a case, particularly when potential witnesses or records to verify the allegations are not available.

Advocates calling for the law to remain the same say caps don’t take into account that each abuse case is unique and that a higher evidence standard would be unfair, in part because the public institutions were the ones controlling the records in the first place.

Legislators have held private discussions about possible changes throughout the year. Last year, a bill died that would have shortened the amount of time someone could file a claim.

State Sen. Caroline Menjivar, D-Panorama City, who declined to vote in favor of that bill, said she has been involved in the ongoing conversations.

“We have kept survivors at the center of what we’re looking to do,” she said of the conversations among senators, “which is a really tight-rope balance of continuing to center survivors but also finding a way to not make these public municipalities or public entities insolvent.”

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