Amy Reichert had a few days notice to pack her bags and catch an early morning flight from San Diego to Sacramento.
“I just felt like I needed to be here physically,” she said.
Reichert traveled to California to protest against Assembly Bill 495, or the Family Preparedness Plan Act, on Tuesday in front of the state Capitol.
The bill is intended to aid migrant children of deported parents but the policy has a few holes, Reichert said.
Proponents of the bill say it will help migrant parents, while opponents say it will strip parents of their rights to decide who cares for their children.
The bill expands who is allowed to sign a caregiver’s authorization affidavit, a legal form to give an adult authority over a child’s schooling and healthcare decisions, allowing an adults to become a caregiver to a child without a requirement that parents sign the form.
It also expands the definition of a caregiver to a relative or a nonrelative, which could include anyone, from a family friend to a teacher.
The proposed bill relies on the caregiver’s declaration and does not mandate any sort of background checks.
What are critics saying?
The mobilization efforts against the bill are growing. Among the people making opposed to the bill is Steve Hilton, a British-American political Republican commentator who is running for governor. In a video on X, he said the bill “legalized kidnapping.”
Critics, like Reichert, argue the bill will have negative consequences for American families and could lead to child exploitation.
She hadn’t seen any major red flags in an earlier version of the bill but then learned about the changes.
“There were more safeguards on it. Those safeguards were taken off and it was frightening because I do have a school aged child myself,” Reichert said.
“Remember — we all have different living situations,” she said, adding that the bill could legally embolden one parent to make decisions without considering the other or going through the court system, should the couple be divorced or separated.
Reichert, the founder of Restore San Diego, who also pushed for the reopening of schools and businesses in 2020, spoke to the Deseret News on her walk from the Hyatt Regency, where she attended a meeting to organize lobbying efforts against the bill, to the Capitol steps.
She was tasked with leading people to Sen. Steve Padilla’s office to ask him to vote against the bill, which passed the Assembly and is now being considered in the California State Senate.
As Reichert arrived at the protest ahead of time, she switched to FaceTime, giving the Deseret News a peek into the scene on the ground. Live gospel music played in the background as hundreds of people held signs that said “STOP AB 495″ and “Don’t Gamble with Child Safety,” as they stood scattered around the steps and the lawn waiting for the programming to begin.
Legal precedent against AB 495
Will Estrada, the senior counsel at the Homeschool Legal Defense Association, who was also at the protest, chatted with the Deseret News ahead of attending and speaking at the rally.
Estrada was at a hotel across the street, alongside a crowd of people with signs gathered in the atrium.
“As people have dug into this, they’ve realized that this is not just in an immigration context. This is a bill that really comes between the parent-child relationship,” he said.
“The family is the foundation of society,” Estrada said. Whether found in religious scriptures, from Jewish, Christian to Islamic, or Greek philosophy — most cultures are in agreement about this foundation, he said.
The Supreme Court has protected this relationship for 102 years, he added. Beginning with Meyer v. Nebraska (1923) and Pierce v. Society of Sisters (1925), the courts have asserted a child doesn’t belong to the state.
And “just earlier this year, Mahmoud v. Taylor, the Supreme Court case regarding parental opt-outs of certain curriculum in the public schools,” reaffirmed parental rights as fundamental, as Estrada put it.
He said he is optimistic California Gov. Gavin Newsom will listen to reason. He’s a dad to four children himself, the legal counsel noted, adding, “Parental rights are for everyone and the government should not come between that.”
Proponents of the bill argue it will help ease disruptions for children when families are separated because of immigration issues.
Parents facing tough situations, like sudden deportation because of their undocumented immigration status, are often faced with “impossible choices,” Alliance for Children’s Rights said in a statement. Incarceration, military service or illness are other reasons where such an affidavit comes into play.
“Some make the difficult choice to suspend their parental rights through the complicated probate guardianship process, others opt to use a caregiver’s authorization affidavit for a more informal arrangement.”
The statement noted these affidavits are already an existing route for caregivers who aren’t the parent or legal guardian. This paperwork doesn’t transfer over the custody of the child — a court order would still be required.
