California’s next workplace lesson comes with an uncomfortable question: When does a religious belief become “hate speech”?
Gov. Gavin Newsom signed Assembly Bill 1803 on September 27. Beginning Jan. 1, 2028, employers covered by California’s harassment-training law must teach workers to recognize, report, and confront certain workplace remarks.
The legislation gives employers a new assignment but leaves a contentious phrase open to interpretation.
The law addresses workplace speech that “vilifies, humiliates, or incites hatred” based on protected characteristics, including religion, sexual orientation, and gender identity. Existing training already covers harassment involving gay and transgender employees. AB 1803 adds no separate course or mandatory hours, and employers may write their own lessons. It even says training on unlawful harassment and abusive conduct can satisfy the new requirement.
Those limits matter, but so does the lack of a precise statutory definition of the speech the bill names.
Consider two employees at a California business. One is a Christian who says their church teaches marriage is between a man and a woman. The other is Muslim and expresses the same religious conviction.
A colleague objects, calling the statements humiliating. Would a trainer treat both remarks alike? Would either amount to unlawful harassment without threats, repeated targeting, or mistreatment? Nothing in AB 1803 supplies that practical distinction. The answers depend partly on how its lessons are written and administered.
Religious conservatives have challenged the measure for precisely that uncertainty. The California Family Council warns that traditional teachings on sexuality and gender could be labeled hateful. Pastor Jack Hibbs argues that the state is stepping into territory belonging to churches. Those critics haven’t shown that California has punished a church under the new law, which won’t take effect for more than a year. They’re asking how the government intends to draw a line before employers must teach it.
From Fox News:
But Christian churches that base their teachings on biblical passages stating that homosexual acts or same-sex relationships are contrary to biblical teaching, are not explicitly exempt from the new training requirements.
The California Family Council and pastors from several traditional churches across the state say the law poses a significant problem. They warn that traditional Christian teachings on sexuality, marriage and gender could become entangled in workplace disputes over what constitutes hateful speech.
"California has gotten excited about their ability to retrain the entire population regarding what they believe about gender and sexual orientation," Greg Burt, vice president of the California Family Council (CFC), told Fox News Digital regarding the legislation. "... But California’s Civil Rights Department put together some curriculum that is explicitly condemning anyone who has a conservative view."
Even identifying which religious institutions must comply is harder than the bill’s supporters sometimes suggest. California Government Code Section 12926 generally excludes nonprofit religious associations from its definition of “employer.”
Yet Section 12950.1, the harassment-training statute amended by AB 1803, provides a separate definition that covers employers with five or more workers and doesn’t expressly exempt churches. Whether the broader exemption carries over remains disputed. Religious schools, ministries, and affiliated employers need a clear answer, not competing readings of two statutes.
The bill’s sponsor, Democrat Assemblyman Josh Lowenthal, argues that employees need practical ways to respond to racial slurs, antisemitism, and other hostile workplace speech. Protecting workers from unlawful harassment has long been a government responsibility.
Yet training about illegal mistreatment and training against unpopular ideas become very different undertakings. In 2017, the Supreme Court rejected viewpoint discrimination against offensive expression in Matal v. Tam. That ruling doesn’t automatically settle a workplace-training challenge, but it explains why the distinction deserves attention.
The comparison involving Islam deserves the same scrutiny. California’s protected categories include religion, so the text doesn’t single out Christians for different treatment. There is no established record of AB 1803 being enforced more gently toward Muslim employers or more aggressively toward Christian ones.
A fair test of enforcement would examine whether officials applied identical standards to identical workplace conduct and identical complaints.
Before January 2028, California officials will have to answer practical questions. Is a respectful statement of religious doctrine something an employee must “confront”? Does a mandatory lesson distinguish doctrinal disagreement from sustained personal harassment? Can covered religious organizations teach compliance without being required to affirm beliefs they reject?
Employers need instructions grounded in enforceable law, and employees need to know what conduct crosses that line. Vague words make a poor substitute for clear rules when livelihoods and religious freedom may be at stake.