California has drawn a bright line through the growing fear of AI-powered workplaces: machines cannot become the final authority over a worker’s livelihood. Governor Gavin Newsom signed new laws targeting job losses, workplace surveillance, automated discipline, and other risks as companies bring artificial intelligence into decisions that affect employees.
The message is direct. AI can assist people, but employers must not hand over the power to fire, discipline, or monitor workers without human control and accountability.
A Human Review Now Stands Between Workers and AI Decisions
One of the central measures is SB 947, known as the No Robo Bosses Act. Authored by Senator Jerry McNerney, the law prevents businesses from relying exclusively on automated decision-making systems when they discipline or terminate employees. The obligation applies when an employer “primarily relies” on an automated decision system.
When AI plays the main role in a disciplinary or termination decision, an employer must have a human review the decision and corroborate it with additional information. That requirement reaches beyond a simple approval button: the human review must check the decision against information outside the automated system.
Affected employees must also receive written notice explaining that AI was primarily used in the decision. The notice must describe the employee data used and provide a human contact who can offer more information.
“AI must remain a tool controlled by humans, not the other way around,” McNerney said. He added, “No worker should ever be fired or disciplined by a machine, AI or not. Artificial intelligence systems have the potential to boost productivity, but they’ve also made errors and misjudgments and exhibited bias.”
The measure returned after Newsom vetoed an earlier version in October 2025. The revised bill removed pre-notification requirements and protections for gig workers, but retained its central restriction on automated discipline and termination.
California Targets Surveillance, Layoffs, and Biometric Predictions
The laws reach beyond the moment when an employee loses a job. Employers cannot use technology to predict a worker’s emotional state from biometric data, a practice that could give automated systems influence over how companies interpret feelings and behavior.
AI-powered surveillance of employee bathrooms is also prohibited. That rule places a clear limit on workplace monitoring, even as companies explore tools that instruct, track, and evaluate workers.
Employers must send written notices to workers when AI is responsible for mass layoffs. The requirement focuses attention on a decision that can affect many families at once, especially when an automated system helps determine who stays and who leaves.
Those concerns are already visible across major workplaces. A lawsuit against Meta alleges that AI-assisted systems ranked and selected workers for layoffs, disproportionately affecting employees who had taken medical or family leave. Workers at Walmart and Amazon have also expressed growing concern about automated HR decisions.
One in four managers use AI to help decide which employees to cut “often or all the time.” Another survey found that 90% of managers in the U.S. say their firms have adopted at least one AI tool to instruct, monitor, or evaluate workers. The technology is no longer limited to experimental projects; it is moving into decisions that shape income and job security.
A Wider Fight Over AI’s Role in Work
California’s laws arrive as public anxiety rises. A July poll found that 39% of Americans believe AI does more harm than good, while a study released in August found that 71% think AI will “take people’s jobs.” The new rules respond to that fear by placing limits on how companies use automated systems, rather than banning workplace AI altogether.
Lorena Gonzalez, president of the California Federation of Labor Unions, AFL-CIO, called the legislation “a turning point.” She said, “Today, California’s workers and our unions have changed the national narrative on how Americans can fight back and win against AI taking over our jobs and workplaces.”
Newsom has paired the workplace measures with other actions on AI, including a broader executive order addressing AI risks and a framework for AI evaluation and auditing. He said, “AI should expand opportunity — not come at the expense of workers and families.” He also said, “We have to do a lot more in the absence of federal leadership.”
The state’s approach extends into the legal profession, where the laws prohibit lawyers from fully handing over core legal work to AI. That restriction follows the same principle: powerful systems may support professional work, but they cannot replace human responsibility for its central decisions.
Federal lawmakers are also pushing into the debate. U.S. Senators Ed Markey and Brian Schatz introduced federal legislation, while California’s action gives workers a direct set of protections against automated discipline, surveillance, and job cuts.
Steve Hilton, California’s Republican nominee for governor, captured the stakes in a statement: “Employers should not be allowed to use AI to decide whether someone is fired, demoted, loses regular hours, or is shut out of the program they rely on for income.”
That question now sits at the center of the future of work. As companies add AI to hiring, monitoring, evaluation, and layoffs, California is demanding a human answer for every decision that can change a worker’s life.
Based on
- California’s new laws target workers’ biggest fear of AI taking their jobs — theguardian.com
- California Gov. Newsom bans AI ‘robo bosses’ in landmark state law — cnbc.com
- Gavin Newsom signs laws to protect California workers from AI threat | California | The Guardian — theguardian.com
- California’s New Law Bans Companies From Relying On AI To Fire Workers — engadget.com
