Although freelancers' anger with AB 5 spans the political spectrum, Sacramento lawmakers voted in near party-line lockstep on AB 5: all state Senate Democrats (locally including Lena Gonzalez and Tom Umberg) voted "yes"; all state Senate Republicans voted "no." All Assembly Democrats voted "yes" (locally including Patrick O'Donnell, Mike Gipson and (Speaker) Anthony Rendon) and all Assembly Republicans voted "no" except Assemblyman Tyler Diep (Huntington Beach-Fountain Valley) who joined Democrats in voting "yes" and Assemblyman Jordan Cunningham, a Republican from CA's central coast who was "no vote recorded."
Assembly concurrence in Senate amendments: (61-16-2)
Ayes: Aguiar-Curry, Arambula, Bauer-Kahan, Berman, Bloom, Boerner Horvath, Bonta, Burke, Calderon, Carrillo, Cervantes, Chau, Chiu, Chu, Cooley, Cooper, Daly, Diep (R), Eggman, Frazier, Friedman, Gabriel, Cristina Garcia, Eduardo Garcia, Gipson, Gloria, Gonzalez, Grayson, Holden, Irwin, Jones-Sawyer, Kalra, Kamlager-Dove, Levine, Limón, Low, Maienschein, McCarty, Medina, Mullin, Muratsuchi, Nazarian, O'Donnell, Petrie-Norris, Quirk, Quirk-Silva, Ramos, Reyes, Luz Rivas, Robert Rivas, Rodriguez, Blanca Rubio, Salas, Santiago, Smith, Mark Stone, Ting, Weber, Wicks, Wood, Rendon
Noes: Bigelow, Brough, Chen, Choi, Flora, Fong, Gallagher, Gray, Kiley, Lackey, Mathis, Melendez, Obernolte, Patterson, Voepel, Waldron
No vote recorded: Cunningham (R), Mayes (independent)
Senate floor on final passage
Ayes: Allen, Archuleta, Atkins, Beall, Bradford, Caballero, Dodd, Durazo, Galgiani, Glazer, Lena Gonzalez, Hertzberg, Hill, Hueso, Hurtado, Jackson, Leyva, McGuire, Mitchell, Monning, Pan, Portantino, Roth, Rubio, Skinner, Stern, Umberg, Wieckowski, Wiener
Noes: Bates, Borgeas, Chang, Dahle, Grove, Jones, Moorlach, Morrell, Nielsen, Stone, Wilk
AB 5's supporters argue it protects workers from misclassification by some employers (in ways that prevent coverage of labor and minimum wage laws.) AB 5's primary author, Assemblywoman Lorena Gonzalez-Fletcher (D, San Diego) has continued to defend the law while acknowledging she's considering offering amendments to it. A former union organizer, she was considered a shoo-in for Assembly re-election in 2020 but now faces the prospect of a statewide backlash over AB 5 as she pursues a run for CA Secretary of State in 2022.
In response to backlash on AB5, on Feb.6 Assemblywoman Gonzalez-Fletcher transmitted a sometimes legalistic Tweetstorm describing amendments she considering and interpretations she seeking.
A number of other Democrats and some Republicans have introduced bills to tweak or add exceptions to AB 5. Lawsuits are pending against it. And some have said a statewide petition initiative is appropriate to repeal AB 5 if Sacramento doesn't do so,
AB 5 has been challenged in federal court by the CA Trucking Association (which argued some drivers opted to operate as independent contractors setting their own schedules and profiting from owning their own vehicle).
The American Society of Journalists and Authors and the National Press Photographers Association have also sued in federal court, alleging that AB 5 unconstitutionally limits the amount of work they can perform on a freelance basis for a single publisher unlike any other job category it lists as "professional services." Uber and Postmates have also filed suit arguing AB 5 denies them equal protection based on what types of jobs it does or doesn't exempt.
Goovernor Newsom's proposed FY21 state budget asks state lawmakers to allocate $21 million for investigations and enforcement of AB 5 (meaning state Senators and Assembymembers will casts vote on this on or before June 30, 2020.):
