AB 406 bars employer retaliation and discrimination when employees take time off for jury duty, to comply with subpoenas, to seek protective orders, or to attend criminal and related proceedings tied to violent crimes. It also creates an explicit leave entitlement—applying to employers with 25 or more employees—for victims and certain family members to take time off for a broad set of safety‑ and recovery‑related purposes (medical care, counseling, safety planning, relocation, legal proceedings, childcare, and more).
The bill adds parallel duties to maintain confidentiality, provide reasonable workplace safety accommodations through an interactive process, and accept a range of certifications (police reports, court orders, medical or counseling documentation, or a signed employee statement). It caps certain leave amounts, ties leave concurrency to federal and state family‑care laws, and requires employers to post a department form describing rights and duties in multiple languages.
These mechanics matter for HR, compliance, and employers planning staffing and safety protocols—and for advocates helping survivors preserve employment while securing safety and justice.
At a Glance
What It Does
Outlaws discrimination or retaliation for employees taking time off for jury duty, court appearances, protective orders, and crime‑related proceedings; establishes a statutory leave right for employees (and certain family members) at employers with 25+ employees for a wide set of safety and recovery purposes. It requires confidentiality, accepts several forms of certification, and obligates employers to engage in an interactive accommodation process.
Who It Affects
California employers (anti‑retaliation rules apply broadly; leave entitlements kick in at 25+ employees), HR and legal teams who manage leave and accommodations, victim service providers who may supply certifications, and employees who are victims or whose family members are victims of qualifying acts of violence.
Why It Matters
This law creates a California‑specific statutory leave and accommodation framework focused on violence survivors, layering new documentation, confidentiality, and interactive‑process obligations onto existing FMLA/CFRA rules and exposing employers to potential claims for retaliation, denial of accommodation, or improper disclosure.
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What This Bill Actually Does
AB 406 does two related things: it sets clear limits on employer conduct when an employee needs time off because of involvement with the justice system or to secure safety, and it creates an explicit leave and accommodation framework for victims and their family members. The anti‑retaliation language covers jury service, subpoenas and court appearances, and taking time to obtain restraining orders or other injunctive relief; a specific provision (effective in the bill as written on January 1, 2026) extends protections for attending a wide set of crime‑related judicial proceedings.
These protections prohibit discharge, discrimination, and retaliation.
For employers with 25 or more employees, the bill enumerates a long list of reasons that qualify for leave: seeking medical care, counseling, shelter or victim services, safety planning, relocation and securing housing, enrolling children in new schools, providing care to recovering family members, attending legal proceedings, and arranging childcare when necessary for safety. Employers must permit use of available paid time off (vacation, sick, compensatory) and may set certain caps on total leave taken under the statute; leave runs concurrently with FMLA/CFRA when eligibility intersects.The bill allows employers to require reasonable advance notice when feasible and to request certification after an unscheduled absence.
It prescribes acceptable forms of certification—police reports, court orders, medical or counseling notes, victim‑advocate documentation, or a signed employee statement—and requires employers to keep such information confidential, disclosing it only as required by law or when necessary to protect workplace safety (with notice to the employee). Employers must engage in a timely, good‑faith interactive process to identify reasonable accommodations (examples include transfers, changed schedules or workstations, locks, and other safety measures), but they may deny accommodations that constitute an undue hardship under state law or that would conflict with workplace safety obligations.
Employers who request certification may recertify every six months, and they may not retaliate for requests for leave or accommodations.Finally, the statute requires employers to provide written notice of rights using a department form; the Labor Department must post that form in multiple languages and employers are not required to provide the notice until the form is available online. The text also defines key terms—"qualifying act of violence," "victim," and "family member"—and attaches limits and procedural guardrails that will shape how HR teams implement the law in practice.
The Five Things You Need to Know
The leave entitlement for family‑member purposes applies only to employers with 25 or more employees; anti‑retaliation protections tied to jury duty, subpoenas, and obtaining relief apply broadly to all employers.
Acceptable certification includes a police report, court protective order, documentation from medical or counseling professionals and victim advocates, or a signed statement by the employee or their representative.
Employers may limit total leave taken under subdivision (b) to 12 weeks; special caps allow five days for relocation when the family member is alive and not a victim, and a 10‑day total cap for family‑member leave in some circumstances.
Employers must engage in a timely, good‑faith interactive process and provide reasonable safety accommodations (transfers, changed schedules, locks, etc.), but may deny accommodations that create undue hardship under Government Code Section 12926 or would violate workplace safety duties under Labor Code Section 6400.
Any documentation an employee provides identifying them or a family member as a victim must be kept confidential; employers may request recertification of victim status every six months after an initial certification.
Section-by-Section Breakdown
Every bill we cover gets an analysis of its key sections.
Anti‑retaliation for jury duty, subpoenas, protective orders, and crime‑related proceedings
Subdivision (a) forbids employers from discharging, discriminating, or retaliating against employees who take time off for jury service, to comply with subpoenas or court orders as witnesses, to obtain injunctive relief (TROs, restraining orders), or to attend judicial proceedings related to crimes. This provision creates a broad, employer‑facing prohibition that does not itself condition protection on employer size, meaning even small employers cannot retaliate for these activities. Practically, HR teams must treat such absences as protected and avoid adverse employment actions tied to them.
Leave entitlement for employers with 25+ employees — enumerated purposes
Subdivision (b) establishes the affirmative leave right for employees (or employees with family members who are victims) at employers with at least 25 employees. It lists ten explicit purposes—medical care, shelter and victim services, counseling, safety planning, relocation and housing actions, caregiving for injured family members, legal services and proceedings, and arranging childcare or dependent care necessary for safety. The length and specificity of the list limit disputes about whether a particular activity qualifies, but they also require employers to update internal leave codes and processes to track a broader range of protected reasons.
Notice, certification, confidentiality, and employer knowledge
Subdivision (c) requires reasonable advance notice when feasible and allows employers to request certification after unscheduled absences. It enumerates acceptable evidentiary categories (police reports, court orders, medical or counselor documentation, victim advocate records, or an employee‑signed statement) and requires confidentiality of records. Subdivision (d) separately bars retaliation based on an employee’s or family member’s victim status when the employee notifies the employer or when the employer has actual knowledge—placing the burden on employers to avoid adverse actions once they know or are told.
Reasonable accommodations and the interactive process
Subdivision (e) requires employers to provide reasonable safety accommodations for employees who disclose victim status or the status of a family member and request accommodations. It lists examples (transfer, reassignment, schedule change, changed phone or workstation, locks, safety procedures, and referrals) and mandates a timely, good‑faith interactive process to identify effective measures. Employers may deny requests that cause undue hardship as defined in Government Code Section 12926 or that conflict with the employer’s duty to maintain a safe workplace under Labor Code Section 6400. Employers can request certification for accommodation needs and may recertify every six months.
Enforcement guardrails, paid time off, concurrency, and leave limits
Subdivision (f) makes interference with exercise of rights an unlawful employment practice. Subdivision (g) permits employees to use existing paid leave banks (vacation, sick, comp) for time taken under the statute. Subdivision (h) clarifies the statute does not create unpaid leave beyond the 12 weeks allowed by federal FMLA. Subdivision (i) authorizes employers to limit leave under (b) to 12 weeks total, limit certain relocation leave to five days, and cap some family‑member leave totals at 10 days; it also specifies that leave under this section runs concurrently with FMLA/CFRA when the employee is eligible.
Key definitions and employer notice requirements
Subdivision (j) defines ‘qualifying act of violence,’ ‘victim,’ ‘family member,’ and other terms—importantly including broad categories such as stalking, sexual assault, and other violent acts whether or not an arrest or conviction occurs. Subdivision (k) imposes a notice duty: employers must give employees written notice of rights at hire and annually using a department form entitled “Survivors of Violence and Family Members of Victims Right to Leave and Accommodations.” The department must post that multi‑language form online (the bill specifies many languages) and employers are not required to comply with the notice requirement until the form is posted.
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Explore Employment in Codify Search →Who Benefits and Who Bears the Cost
Every bill creates winners and losers. Here's who stands to gain and who bears the cost.
Who Benefits
- Employees who are survivors of domestic violence, sexual assault, stalking, or other qualifying violent acts — they gain explicit protection from retaliation, a statutory leave right at larger workplaces, and a route to workplace safety accommodations.
- Family members of victims — where the employer has 25+ employees, family members receive covered leave reasons (medical care, counseling, relocation, legal proceedings, caregiving) that help them secure safety and support without automatic job loss.
- HR, legal, and compliance teams — the statute provides concrete certification categories, a defined interactive‑process requirement, and a department notice form to standardize implementation and reduce interpretive uncertainty.
- Victim services organizations, medical and counseling providers, and victim advocates — the law recognizes their documentation as valid certification, formalizing their role in helping employees access protected leave and accommodations.
Who Bears the Cost
- Employers with 25 or more employees — they must administer new leave categories, accept a wide set of certifications, engage in interactive accommodation negotiations, and potentially absorb operational disruptions or accommodation costs.
- Smaller employers (under 25) — while still barred from retaliation, they do not get the same leave entitlement, creating potential operational and equity tensions that can translate into informal costs or turnover when employees need time for safety reasons.
- HR and frontline supervisors — they will bear increased administrative burdens: tracking leave concurrency with FMLA/CFRA, maintaining confidentiality protocols, processing certifications and recertifications, and documenting interactive processes.
- State agencies and the Labor Department — required to design and publish the multilingual notice form and support employer compliance, which creates administrative and posting obligations.
Key Issues
The Core Tension
The central dilemma is straightforward: the law seeks to protect survivors’ safety and access to justice by granting leave, accommodation, and confidentiality, but enforcing those protections without creating unworkable verification burdens or imposing undue operational and safety costs on employers requires balancing privacy, fraud prevention, and business continuity—tradeoffs the statute delegates to operational actors and, ultimately, the courts.
AB 406 balances survivor protections with employer operational limits, but it raises implementation challenges. The certification regime is intentionally broad—allowing a signed employee statement—but that breadth increases the risk employers will face both over‑broad claims and difficulty detecting misuse.
Conversely, strict verification demands could chill legitimate requests; the statute tries to thread this needle by listing acceptable documents and tying confidentiality protections to most documentation, but the line between reasonable verification and intrusive scrutiny will be litigated.
The employer‑size split (leave rights at 25+ employees while anti‑retaliation applies to all) creates equity and administrative complexity. Small employers still must avoid retaliation but have fewer formal leave obligations, which could push survivors working for smaller firms toward informal, ad‑hoc arrangements or job loss.
The concurrency rules with FMLA/CFRA simplify some entitlements but also require employers and employees to navigate overlapping eligibility rules, potentially producing disputes about whether leave should run concurrently. Finally, the statute’s accommodation duties are constrained by the undue‑hardship standard and workplace safety duties, leaving judgment calls about what measures employers must take and when those measures become an undue hardship.
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