Bill could make forced marriages harder in California

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Hello and welcome to another week of Capitol Confidential. 

In the following days I’ll be bringing you the latest from the Legislature as session returns after the summer break. In the meantime, here’s some of the latest legislative news, including a bill that could tackle an issue that legislators have struggled to address.

Supporters of a proposed law would finally address forced marriages in California, by giving prospective victims a legal tool to prevent them from happening in the first place. 

As the Chronicle’s Raheem Hosseini reported last week, it builds on what has been a years-long struggle in the Legislature to advance bills aimed at preventing child marriages – which are still legal in California if minors receive parental consent and a court order. 

AB2534, from Assembly Member Ash Kalra, D-San Jose, would allow those facing the prospect of being married against their will to obtain restraining orders against anyone attempting to make it happen. The bill would do so by explicitly covering forced marriages, which are illegal in California, under the state’s Domestic Violence Protection Act, codifying legal protections for an overlooked and misunderstood class of abuse victims and survivors, advocates say.

It is modeled after the forced marriage protection order that the United Kingdom adopted in 2007. California’s version, advocates and survivors say, would be both a national first and a long time coming in a state that has tried — and failed — to outlaw child marriages. California is among just a handful of states without a minimum marriage age.

Casey Carter Swegman, director of public policy at the Tahirih Justice Center, said it’s important to make a distinction between forced marriage and child marriage, as not all forced marriages involve children and not all child marriages are forced.

If AB2534 succeeds where those attempts failed, advocates like Swegman and lawmakers like Kalra say it will be because they started listening more carefully to survivors.

One of those survivors is Sadia Khan, who was forced into marriage at 19 years old – launching a harrowing period of abuse and escape, as Hosseini extensively reported. 

Khan, 31, is a policy advocate with the Family Violence Law Center in Oakland, which provides crisis support and legal assistance to domestic violence and sexual assault survivors, and has been fighting for AB2534 for months as it journeyed through floor votes and committee hearings. 

It has received no opposition and passed through committee with unanimous support. 

Khan also worked on a 2025 bill, signed by Gov. Gavin Newsom in October, that allows judges to waive a four-year limit for survivors. That bill, AB1134, was introduced by Assembly Member Jasmeet Bains, D-Bakersfield, and coauthored by Kalra. 

Other related bills passed in recent years include SB374 in 2021, by former Sen. Dave Min, which added “reproductive coercion” to the list of behavior considered as coercive control under the Domestic Violence Protection Act. SB1141, from Sen. Susan Rubio, D-Baldwin Park (Los Angeles County) codified case law recognizing that “disturbing the peace of another party” as defined in the Domestic Violence Protection Act also includes coercive control. 

Read more about Khan’s experience, including her work advocating for survivors like herself, in Hosseini's story here. 

Newsom released four years’ worth of tax returns, years after the state’s tax return law was scuttled 

For the first time in years, Newsom’s office made the governor’s 2021, 2022, 2023 and 2024 tax returns available to reporters last week. 

The Chronicle’s Sophia Bollag was among the group authorized to view the 718 pages of returns in person in the governor’s offices in Sacramento. They were permitted to take only handwritten notes on the documents, Bollag reported, and were prohibited from photographing or removing them from the office. 

It’s the first time in years Newsom’s office has made the financial documents available — despite committing in 2018 he would release his returns every year, and after pushing a tax return disclosure law aimed at President Donald Trump. 

For most local and state offices, candidates must make financial disclosures, just not necessarily a full-on release of their tax returns. According to the California Fair Political Practices Commission, every elected official and public employee who makes or influences governmental decisions is required to submit a Statement of Economic Interest, also known as the Form 700. This includes city council members and city managers, members of public boards and agencies, and statewide positions from controller and attorney general to governor.

But for those running for governor, tax return filings are mandated. That’s due to a tax return disclosure law, SB27, signed by Newsom his first year in office, which demanded those running for president in California release their filings. Failure to do so would have prevented presidential candidates from appearing on the ballot. 

That law, led by Sens. Mike McGuire, D-Geyserville, and Scott Wiener, D-San Francisco, was aimed squarely at Trump, who broke with decades of precedent by declining to release his tax records during his 2016 campaign for the White House.

It was quickly challenged in court by the California Republican Party. The California Supreme Court unanimously struck down the law in November 2019, concluding it violated the state Constitution. 

But another provision of that law survived, making it impossible for candidates to appear on the ballot for governor unless they release the last five years of tax returns. 

Those records for gubernatorial candidates Xavier Becerra and Steve Hilton, between 2021 and 2025, are available here. 

Questions? Thoughts? Interesting tidbits to share? Reach out at [email protected], and follow me on X, @KathrynPlmr.