AB 2615

April 28, 2026

The Honorable Buffy Wicks, Chair

Assembly Appropriations Committee

1021 O Street, Suite 8220

Sacramento, CA 95814

[email protected]

RE: AB 2615 (Zbur/Addis) — Educational Equity: Discrimination — OPPOSE

Dear Chair Wicks:

On behalf of tens of thousands of constituents, allied organizations, and more than 2,000 churches across California, the California Family Council strongly opposes AB 2615.

AB 2615 presents itself as a technical cleanup to AB 715 (Zbur/Addis, Chapter 428, Statutes of 2025), the legislature's response to antisemitism controversies in California schools. In practice, it is something far more consequential. This bill removes existing accountability standards for classroom instruction, builds a legal shield around the state's most controversial sex education curriculum, and shifts power away from local school boards toward Sacramento, all under the banner of anti-discrimination reform.

The Bill Removes the Only Legal Prohibition on Classroom Advocacy

Under current law established by AB 715, teachers must deliver instruction "consistent with accepted standards of professional responsibility, rather than advocacy, personal opinion, bias, or partisanship." AB 2615 deletes this standard entirely, replacing it with a requirement that instruction be "balanced and fair" and "foster critical thinking."1 Whatever the appeal of that language, it is undefined in statute and unenforceable in practice. The bill's own committee analysis acknowledges the problem, asking: "Would teachers have to teach a 'balanced' view of slavery? To achieve 'balance,' would they need to teach creationism alongside evolution?" That vagueness will not protect all viewpoints equally. In California's education system, enforcement will be driven by whoever holds institutional power, and selective application against traditional moral viewpoints is a predictable result. The bill also shifts the word "align" to "consistent with" in describing the relationship between teacher instruction and adopted curriculum, further loosening the connection between classroom content and state-adopted standards.

The Bill Shields Sexually Explicit Materials from Parental Challenge at Every Grade Level

AB 2615 prohibits local school boards from banning any textbook, material, or curriculum simply because it contains "inclusive and diverse perspectives," and it specifically shields materials compliant with Education Code Sections 51933 and 51934, the statutes governing California's comprehensive sex education framework, which mandates LGBTQ-affirming content.1 This is the provision that reveals the bill's true direction. It builds a legal firewall around the state's most ideologically contested curriculum while stripping local boards and parents of the tools to challenge it.

The consequences extend to every classroom, kindergarten through twelfth grade. Under AB 2615, if a textbook or instructional material is labeled “inclusive and diverse,” a term left undefined in statute, a school board may be legally prohibited from removing it, regardless of how sexually graphic its content is or how young the students it targets. Books with explicit sexual content marketed toward students who identify as LGBTQ would receive the same legal protection as any other classroom resource, insulated from parental challenge under the “inclusive and diverse perspectives” umbrella. No age limit. No content threshold. Parents of a seven-year-old and parents of a seventeen-year-old alike would be left without recourse. This is not an anti-discrimination policy. It is content immunity granted by a category label.

The bill also narrows the remedy for discriminatory materials: where AB 715 required immediate and permanent removal of offending resources from all course offerings, AB 2615 requires only that "all violating portions" be omitted. Materials containing problematic content may remain in classrooms with only surgical edits, a standard subject to selective application. This pattern echoes prior Sacramento measures, including AB 1955 (2024), which prohibited schools from notifying parents when a child identified as a different gender, and the defeat of AB 1314 (Essayli, 2023), the parental notification bill refused a hearing by Sacramento Democrats.

The constitutional concern is equally serious. The committee analysis itself cites Pickering v. Board of Education (1968) and Connick v. Myers (1983), raising First Amendment questions about replacing a clear professional responsibility standard with vague, subjective terms.1 A standard that cannot be defined cannot be enforced fairly.

When Governor Newsom signed AB 715, he acknowledged "urgent concerns about unintended consequences" and noted "firm commitments" by the authors to address them. AB 2615 does not address those concerns; it deepens them. Rather than restoring accountability, the bill removes guardrails, weakens local control, and insulates the most contested curriculum in our schools from challenge. In a state where parents elected 34 pro-parental-rights school board members in November 2024, this bill is Sacramento's answer: limit what those boards can do.

For these reasons, California Family Council respectfully opposes AB 2615. We urge the Committee to vote no and to protect the authority of California parents and local school boards to hold educators accountable for what is taught to their children.

Respectfully,

Greg Burt

Vice President, California Family Council

References

1 California State Legislature, "AB 2615 — Educational Equity: Discrimination," 2025–2026 Legislative Session. https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=202520260AB2615