California's 2025–26 legislative session ended where the state constitution says it must: with the Governor's last signature or veto on September 30, 2026. Standing on the Golden Gate Bridge that afternoon, he signed SB 895, a measure placing a $7.5 billion science and health research bond before voters in March 2028, and with it closed the session (Governor's office). As reported, it was the last of 1,160 bills he acted on during the session (Newsroom America).
For the health desks of this site, the closing weeks were unusually dense. Across the Governor's September 27 and September 30 releases alone, more than seventy health-relevant measures were signed or vetoed, touching physician licensure, health-plan conduct, Medi-Cal, behavioral health, medical privacy, public health and artificial intelligence (September 27 release; September 30 release). Every measure KPS Gill, MD tracked now has a final executive outcome. None of them is pending, and the site's California pages no longer describe any 2026 bill as awaiting a decision.
What became law that physicians will feel first
Primary recordThe measures with the most direct effect on medical practice include AB 1199 on medical-staff credentialing; AB 1637 on physicians' medical records; AB 1703 on unauthorized practice and use of titles in osteopathic medicine; SB 849 on reinstatement of a physician's certificate surrendered after sexual misconduct; AB 2499 and SB 1049 on claims payment and reimbursement; AB 2011 on nonquantitative treatment limitations; AB 1770 on arbitration with health plans; and AB 2292, which the Governor's office describes as barring physicians from charging unnecessary fees to complete paid family and medical leave forms. The health-care AI pair, AB 1979 and SB 503, is examined separately on this site.
Coverage mandates signed in the final week extend to fluoride treatments, scalp cooling, home test kits, dental care, hearing aids, prescription drugs for rare diseases, dose adjustments and dementia care. Behavioral-health measures include peer-support certification, CARE Court amendments, involuntary-commitment changes and suicide-prevention duties in recovery facilities.
What was vetoed
Primary recordAmong the health measures the Governor returned unsigned were AB 2575, which would have protected clinicians who override artificial-intelligence recommendations; SB 903, on artificial intelligence and mental-health professionals; AB 539, which would have kept approved prior authorizations valid for at least a year; AB 220, which would have barred Medi-Cal managed-care plans from applying their own medical-necessity criteria to subacute care; SB 1037, on information required in health-plan rate filings; AB 2571, which would have set a floor for Medi-Cal pharmacist reimbursement; two Medi-Cal acupuncture bills; and two Central Valley workforce measures, a feasibility study for a medical-school branch in Kern County (AB 1547) and a community-college nursing baccalaureate pilot (AB 2301).
Three patterns in the record
AnalysisFirst, where veto messages are available in text, they repeatedly cite costs that were not in the budget: new Medi-Cal rate floors, new grant programs and new administrative duties. Second, coverage mandates that add a defined benefit were largely signed, while bills that would have limited a health plan's or an institution's operational discretion were largely vetoed. Third, in vetoing AB 2593 on prison health care, the Governor wrote that the bill could make clinicians reluctant to question another provider's treatment decision. Whether similar reasoning informed the AB 2575 veto will be reported when that message, posted only as an image, has been transcribed. These are observations about the record, not claims about motive.
When the new laws actually bind
A signature is not an operative requirement. Under California's default rule, a statute enacted in a regular session takes effect on January 1 of the following year unless it is an urgency measure or names another date. For nearly every 2026 health measure on this site, the presumptive operative date is January 1, 2027. Each bill's page states its operative date once the chaptered text has been confirmed.
The case study: health-care AI
The session's sharpest single test of where human judgment must remain was the health-care AI package. California now requires that licensed professionals retain their judgment when clinical decision tools inform care, and that developers look for foreseeable bias. It declined to protect the clinician who overrides the machine. That gap is the subject of this site's lead analysis, and the wider architecture of the September 30 AI laws is set out in a companion piece.
What changes next
Three things follow from the closed record. The operative dates arrive on January 1, 2027, and practices, plans and facilities will have obligations they did not have in 2026. A new Governor takes office in January 2027 and will propose the first budget under the federal Medicaid financing changes that took effect on October 1, 2026. And the research bond created by SB 895 will not be decided until voters see it in March 2028.
The complete table of every tracked measure, with author, title, final action, date and operative date, is in the site's California 2026 Final Legislative Ledger.