California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a law earlier this month that could make child abduction from school easier by expanding the definition of a “caregiver” allowed to withdraw a child from school with an affidavit.
The law, AB 495, was passed in response to concerns that children could be separated from parents who are being deported by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) due to President Donald Trump’s energetic enforcement of immigration law. But critics warned that it has almost no safeguards against strangers trying to abduct children, other than threatening them with perjury if they lie on an affidavit provided to a school.
The official summary of the bill, the “Family Preparedness Plan Act of 2025,” says that it “would revise the definition of relative
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