Fact check: What are the key provisions of AB 495 and how do they differ from similar laws in other states?

1. Why AB 495 Changes Who Can Sign Off — A Practical Shift for Families

The core legal change in AB 495 is the broadening of persons authorized to execute caregiver authorization affidavits to include nonrelative extended family members, which legally empowers those adults to authorize school-related medical care for minors in their care. This expands a historically narrower roster of permissible caregivers, and directly affects school administrative practice by creating a legally recognized route for caregivers who lack formal guardianship or biological relation to make health decisions for children at school. The bill’s language, as summarized, aims to reduce gaps in care when parents are unavailable, while creating new administrative verification responsibilities for school staff ^[1].

2. How AB 495 Tightens Protections Around Immigration Enforcement at Schools

AB 495 revises the information-disclosure framework for local educational agencies, limiting what details schools must provide to immigration authorities and updating model policies intended to restrict school assistance with immigration enforcement. This aligns with a broader California policy trend toward insulating schools as safe spaces for immigrant communities, explicitly reducing the risk that a caregiver affidavit or school records will trigger enforcement contact. The legislative change updates existing model policies rather than creating novel enforcement mechanisms, but it formalizes expectations for school responses to federal immigration inquiries ^{[1] [4]}.

3. What This Means Compared with Non-California State Laws — Limited Direct Parallels in the Packet

The supplied analyses do not present direct counterparts to AB 495 from other states, so comparative claims must be cautious. The packet includes discussions of unrelated state frameworks — worker-classification law (AB 5) and comprehensive privacy bills — which underscore that AB 495 operates in a different policy domain (family caregiving and school safety) than those cited comparative examples ^{[2] [3]}. Consequently, the most defensible comparison using available material is that AB 495 joins California’s existing suite of laws prioritizing immigrant protections in public institutions, rather than reflecting a national standard evident in the provided sources ^[4].

4. How AB 495 Aligns with California’s Immigration-Sensitive Policy Trajectory

AB 495’s disclosure and model-policy revisions continue California’s documented approach of carving out limited cooperation with federal immigration enforcement in public services, particularly schools. The packet’s immigration-focused analysis highlights a legislative pattern favoring immigrant-friendly criminal and public-safety reforms, and AB 495’s specific school-focused measures are consistent with that pattern by protecting minor access to care and privacy from enforcement-driven disclosure ^[4]. The bill was summarized in July 2025, reflecting a contemporaneous legislative posture in California toward minimizing enforcement impacts on families ^[1].

5. Administrative and Operational Impacts on Schools — New Duties and Potential Frictions

Implementing AB 495 will require schools to update intake and documentation processes, train staff on expanded acceptable signatories for caregiver affidavits, and adhere to the updated disclosure limits regarding immigration enforcement. These operational changes may produce transitional frictions, such as verifying nonrelative extended family relationships and reconciling local practice with state-model policies. The provided summary underscores that the law’s success depends on local educational agencies receiving clear guidance and resources to operationalize new verification and privacy requirements ^[1].

6. Potential Stakeholder Agendas Visible in the Material

The packet’s framing and selective inclusion of comparative documents suggest distinct stakeholder lenses: advocates for immigrant access and child welfare emphasize practical access to care and noncooperation with enforcement, while materials about worker classification and privacy laws point to broader policy debates in California. The analyses do not include opponent perspectives or fiscal analyses, so absent viewpoints (school-district fiscal concerns, federal-enforcement priorities) are not addressed in the provided dataset, limiting a full multi-stakeholder comparison ^{[1] [2] [3]}.

7. What the Provided Evidence Does Not Tell Us — Key Gaps to Note

The source packet lacks direct comparisons with other states’ caregiver-affidavit or school-medical-consent statutes, omits legislative text and fiscal impact statements, and does not include implementation guidance or litigation risks. These absences mean claims about uniqueness or national precedent cannot be fully substantiated from the provided material. For a complete cross-state comparison, one would need statutory texts and implementation reports from multiple states — items not included in the supplied analyses ^{[1] [3]}.

8. Bottom Line: AB 495 Is a California-Centered Expansion of Caregiver Authority and School Privacy Protections

Based solely on the provided analyses, AB 495 is a 2025 California law that expands who may execute caregiver authorization affidavits, grants authorization rights for school-related medical care to nonrelative extended family members, and tightens limits on school cooperation with immigration enforcement by revising disclosure requirements and model policies ^[1]. The packet supports situating AB 495 within California’s broader immigration-sensitive policy arc, but it provides no direct multi-state law comparisons; such comparisons would require further targeted source collection beyond the material supplied ^[4].