California Gov. Gavin Newsom, a Democrat, vetoed a bill Sunday that would have required greater student input and transparency regarding campus protest rules at the California State University system and requested similar measures from the University of California.
Assembly Bill 2551, authored by Sade Elhawary, a Democratic member of the California State Assembly, was amended in June through a “gut-and-amend” process to address the campus protest policies implemented in 2024 following anti-Israel protests within both university systems. An earlier version would have repealed provisions of a 2024 law, SB 1287, that require CSU campuses to establish and enforce content-neutral time, place and manner restrictions on protests and to prohibit violent, harassing, intimidating or discriminatory conduct. The law requests that UC adopt similar policies.
Following opposition from a coalition of more than 40 Jewish organizations, including Jewish California and Hillel, the repeal provision was removed. Jewish California subsequently moved from opposing the bill to a neutral position.
The final version of AB 2551 would have required CSU to hold an open forum by the end of 2027 to gather student feedback on content-neutral time, place and manner restrictions. It also would have expanded annual reports to the Legislature to include protest-related student code of conduct violations, descriptions of disciplinary actions and demographic information disaggregated by race and gender. The bill asked UC to implement similar measures.
In his veto statement, Newsom said that “given the numerous ways that the campus community can already provide perspective to policy leaders, it is unnecessary to require an additional forum outside these established processes.”
David Bocarsly, CEO of Jewish California, told JNS that “time, place and manner restrictions have made universities safer for all students, including Jewish students.”
“We’re happy to work with Assemblymember Elhawary to protect these policies and ensure their fair and equitable enforcement,” he said.
Tammi Rossman-Benjamin, director of the AMCHA Initiative, stated that time, place and manner restrictions are “what allow robust protest to take place without permitting protesters to trample the rights of everyone around them.”
“After everything California campuses experienced following Oct. 7, weakening those protections would have been a serious step backward,” she said. “California’s universities now have the responsibility to enforce these protections consistently so that no student is again forced to choose between participating fully in campus life and protecting themselves from harassment and intimidation.”
