Assembly BillPassed first houseGovernment
AB 1916: Courts: court interpreters.
What AB 1916 does, verified August 15, 2026
This bill aims to amend the law regarding court interpreters. It would make the existing provisions, which govern the employment and compensation of certified and registered trial court interpreters, applicable to sign language interpreters as well. This means that sign language interpreters would be covered under the same rules and regulations as other court interpreters.
Bill journey
✓IntroducedComplete
✓In CommitteeComplete
✓First Chamber FloorComplete
4Second ChamberCurrent
5GovernorPending
6ChapteredPending
Last action: In committee: Held under submission. (2026-08-13)Alert me
Author and sponsors
Full contact details, staff, and committees with Connect, $16/moUnlockRecent actions13 total · showing 5
| Aug. 13, 2026 | In committee: Held under submission. |
| Jun. 29, 2026 | In committee: Referred to APPR. suspense file. |
| Jun. 17, 2026 | From committee: Do pass and re-refer to Com. on APPR. (Ayes 10. Noes 1.) (June 16). Re-referred to Com. on APPR. |
| Jun. 04, 2026 | From committee chair, with author's amendments: Amend, and re-refer to committee. Read second time, amended, and re-referred to Com. on JUD. |
| May. 06, 2026 | Referred to Com. on JUD. |
Latest bill textAmended version, June 4, 2026 · 693 words
| Amended IN Senate June 04, 2026 |
CALIFORNIA LEGISLATURE— 2025–2026 REGULAR SESSION
Assembly Bill
No. 1916
| Introduced by Assembly Member Lee |
February 12, 2026 |
An act to amend Section 71801 of the Government Code, relating to courts.
LEGISLATIVE COUNSEL'S DIGEST
AB 1916, as amended, Lee. Courts: court interpreters.
The Trial Court Interpreter Employment and Labor Relations Act (the act) establishes procedures governing the employment and compensation of certified and registered trial court interpreters and court interpreters pro tempore employed by the courts. courts to perform spoken language interpretation. Under existing law, these provisions do not apply to sign language interpreters.
This bill would make the provisions of the act applicable to sign language interpreters. The bill would specify that spoken language includes American Sign Language for purposes of these provisions.
The people of the State of California do enact as follows:
SECTION 1.
Section 71801 of the Government Code is amended to read:71801.
For purposes of this chapter, the following definitions shall apply:(a) “Certified interpreter” and “registered interpreter” have the same meanings as in Article 4 (commencing with Section 68560) of Chapter 2. This chapter applies to sign language interpreters.
(b) “Court proceedings” has the same meaning as subdivision (a) of Section 68560.5.
(c) “Cross-assign” and “cross-assignment” refer to the appointment of a court interpreter employed by a trial court to perform spoken language interpretation services in another trial court, pursuant to Section 71810.
(d) “Employee organization” means a labor organization that has as one of its purposes representing employees in their relations with the trial courts.
(e) “Intermittent, part-time interpreter” is a court interpreter who works as an intermittent employee on a day-by-day basis as described in Section 71803.
(f) “Local compensation” means any amounts paid to employee interpreters by an individual trial court that are not paid pursuant to the regional memorandum of understanding and are not calculated on an hourly basis.
(g) “Mediation” means effort by an impartial third party to assist in reconciling a dispute regarding wages, hours, and other terms and conditions of employment between representatives of the trial court or regional court interpreter committee and the recognized employee organization through interpretation, suggestion, and advice.
(h) “Meet and confer in good faith” means that a trial court or regional court interpreter committee or those representatives it may designate, and representatives of a recognized employee organization, shall have the mutual obligation personally to meet and confer promptly upon request by either party and continue for a reasonable period of time in order to exchange freely information, opinions, and proposals, and to endeavor to reach agreement on matters within the scope of representation. The process shall include adequate time for the resolution of impasses where specific procedures for resolution are contained in this chapter, or when the procedures are used by mutual consent.
(i) “Personnel rules,” “personnel policies, procedures, and plans,” and “rules and regulations” mean policies, procedures, plans, rules, or regulations adopted by a trial court or its designee pertaining to conditions of employment of trial court employees, subject to meet and confer in good faith.
(j) “Recognized employee organization” means an employee organization that has been formally acknowledged to represent the court interpreters employed by the trial courts in a region, pursuant to this chapter.
(k) “Regional court interpreter employment relations committee” means the committee established pursuant to Section 71807.
(l) “Regional transition period” means the period from January 1, 2003, to July 1, 2005, inclusive, except that the transition period for the region may be terminated earlier by a memorandum of understanding or agreement between the regional court interpreter employment relations committee and a recognized employee organization.
(m) “Relay interpreting” is the process by which two interpreters with different language pairs work in tandem to communicate between the target language and English.
(n) “Spoken language” includes American Sign Language.
(n)
(o) “Transfer” means transfer within the trial court as defined in the trial court’s personnel policies, procedures, and plans, subject to meet and confer in good faith.
(o)
(p) “Trial court” means the superior court in each county.
(p)
(q) This section shall become operative on January 1, 2025.
Text of AB 1916 as amended, from the official record. Connect Plus keeps every version and highlights what changed.Compare versions