California's Legislature has until Aug. 31, 2026 to pass every bill still in play. That date is fixed by the state Constitution (art. IV, sec. 10(c)) and Joint Rule 61(b)(17), and final recess begins the moment the houses adjourn. The Governor then has until Sept. 30 to sign or veto anything passed before Sept. 1. Whatever gets signed without an urgency clause becomes law on Jan. 1, 2027, under art. IV, sec. 8(c).
That is the calendar, and it is real. The framing that has traveled with it is not. The story circulating this month says California is about to enact its biggest impaired-driving overhaul in decades and that anything passing now lands on drivers in January. Both halves need correcting. Most of the package is already dead, and the single bill that would touch the most drivers does not take effect on Jan. 1, 2027 under any scenario.
The bill everyone is talking about is not a January 1 change
AB 1830 (Petrie-Norris) is the marquee item: it would require an ignition interlock device after a first alcohol-related DUI conviction, giving the driver a six-month restricted license with an IID requiring maintenance every 60 days, and stripping the judicial discretion that currently governs first-offense interlock orders. Drug-related violations would suspend the driving privilege without an IID pathway. The Assembly passed it 74-0 on May 27, 2026.
Read the Legislative Counsel's Digest and the timeline collapses. The digest states that beginning on January 1, 2031, the bill would reorganize and recast the penalties and sanctions for alcohol- and drug-related driving offenses. A first-offense driver convicted in 2027 would not be governed by this scheme. It is a five-year runway, not a January deadline.
AB 1830 also carries an urgency clause, which is worth understanding because it cuts the other way from what most readers assume. An urgency statute takes effect immediately on enactment rather than waiting for the next January 1, and it requires a two-thirds vote in each house instead of a simple majority. So AB 1830 would never have been a Jan. 1, 2027 law even without the 2031 operative date. Its administrative provisions would switch on the day it is chaptered, and its recast penalty structure would switch on in 2031.
There is a second problem. AB 1830 is not comfortably alive. Its last recorded action, on 08/13/26, is "In committee: Referred to APPR. suspense file." The Senate Appropriations agenda for that day listed it under regular order of business, expressly labeled "Ignition interlock devices. (Urgency)." The next day, Aug. 14, was the deadline for fiscal committees to meet and report bills to the floor under Joint Rule 61(b)(14). That deadline has passed and the bill has not moved. Reaching a floor vote by Aug. 31 now requires a rules waiver or another procedural revival.
Cost is the live objection. Sen. Kelly Seyarto (R-Murrieta), the Senate Appropriations vice-chair, defended the bill against affordability arguments a day before the referral: "This notion that somebody can't afford the $54 to rent this thing for the six months...they spend more than that on the alcohol." The bill landed on suspense anyway.
What already died, and when
Much of the spring coverage that still circulates describes bills that no longer exist.
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AB 1686 (Lackey) would have expanded felony DUI charging by amending Veh. Code secs. 23540 and 23546, the provision behind headlines about felony exposure on a second or third offense. Status: Inactive Bill, Died, lapsed from committee under Joint Rule 62(a) on 04/21/26.
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AB 1747 (Sanchez), amending Penal Code sec. 191.5 on vehicular manslaughter while intoxicated: died 04/27/26, same rule.
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AB 1748 (Sanchez), which would have rewritten license suspension and revocation across Veh. Code secs. 13352, 13352.1, 13352.4 and 23575.3: died 04/21/26.
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AB 1605 (Ransom), the "NO ALCOHOL SALE" driver's license notation bill touching Bus. & Prof. Code secs. 25655, 25657.5 and 25659, was held under submission in Assembly Appropriations on 05/14/26 and missed the May 29 house-of-origin deadline. Leginfo still carries it under an "Active Bill" tag, which is why secondary trackers disagree about whether it is finished. The status history is the better guide.
The felony-expansion story and the alcohol-sales-restriction story, the two angles that drove the most coverage, are describing legislation that stopped moving four months ago.
Aug. 13 was the hinge
One committee day sorted the rest of the package. At the Senate and Assembly Appropriations suspense hearings on Aug. 13, SB 1156 (Caballero) and SB 953 (Niello), the remaining alcohol-purchase-restriction vehicles, were held in Assembly Appropriations. AB 1662 (Wilson), on misdemeanor diversion reporting, was held under submission in Senate Appropriations. AB 1830 went onto suspense. AB 1546, AB 1685 and AB 1687 came off suspense and were ordered to third reading.
Because the fiscal-committee reporting deadline fell the following day, that hearing effectively drew the line between what can still reach a floor vote and what cannot.
What is actually still moving: the repeat-offender tier
Every surviving bill targets drivers with priors, and all of them would take effect Jan. 1, 2027 if signed, because none carries an urgency clause or a special operative date.
SB 907 (Archuleta) is the heaviest of them. It would add a new Veh. Code sec. 23583 imposing a consecutive three-year term for each prior DUI conviction within 10 years. It would make certain hit-and-run violations felonies when committed within 10 years of a prior conviction for DUI, reckless driving, or gross vehicular manslaughter. And it would amend sec. 23635 to require courts to advise defendants of murder-charge exposure when dismissing DUI allegations or accepting pleas to lesser offenses, which reaches directly into plea negotiations. Status as of 08/13/26: read second time, ordered to third reading in the Assembly.
AB 1546 (Schultz) restructures the sentencing tiers. A second DUI conviction becomes a wobbler, chargeable as a misdemeanor with 120 days to one year in county jail or as a felony with a 16 months, two years, or three years triad. Three priors is also a wobbler; four or more priors is a felony. License revocation extends to four years at three priors and five years at four or more. Mandatory IID terms extend to 36 months and 48 months respectively. It sits on Senate third reading, File item 304 as of 08/18/2026.
AB 1687 (Lackey) amends Veh. Code sec. 13351 on license revocation and cleared Senate Appropriations 6-0 on 08/13/26. AB 1685 (Lackey and Petrie-Norris, with Archuleta as principal coauthor) amends Veh. Code secs. 1808 and 12810 on driving privilege points, also 6-0 on the same day.
The first-offense tier is essentially empty
If you are facing a first DUI and reading that January brings sweeping change, the record does not support it. The only bill in this package aimed squarely at first offenses is AB 1830, which is sitting on the suspense file after the fiscal deadline and whose penalty scheme is written to begin in 2031. Nothing else still on the floor rewrites first-offense sentencing, first-offense license consequences, or first-offense interlock rules.
The outlier: DUI law reaches automated vehicles
AB 2502 (Pellerin) is the genuinely new idea in the package. It would add Veh. Code sec. 23152.1, extending DUI offenses to operators of vehicles equipped with driving automation technology. It was ordered to third reading on 08/06/26 and sits on the Senate floor. It creates a legal category that does not currently exist in the code, and it is closer to passage than the interlock mandate that has drawn most of the attention.
What this means for a case that is already pending
Frame this by offense date, not conviction date. Sentencing enhancements are generally applied under the law in effect when the offense was committed, and ex post facto principles constrain the retroactive application of increased punishment. That distinction matters because the loose version of this story, that a conviction landing on one side of January 1 carries different consequences than one landing on the other, is not a safe assumption and should be checked with counsel against the specific charge.
The practical takeaway: nothing on the Assembly or Senate floor today changes a case charged under current law for conduct occurring before Jan. 1, 2027. If a bill is signed, its reach is prospective, and the operative question in your case is which statute governed on the date of the alleged conduct.
What is not changing
The 10-year lookback survives intact. It is the spine of every surviving bill: SB 907's three-year enhancement runs off priors within 10 years, AB 1546's wobbler tiers and revocation periods count priors within 10 years, and SB 907's hit-and-run felony trigger uses the same window. None of these bills shortens or repeals the washout period. They lengthen the consequences that attach inside it.
The interlock framework also should not be described as untouched, but for a different reason: it was already reset. AB 366 (Petrie-Norris and Ransom) was chaptered on Oct. 13, 2025 as Chapter 689, extending the statewide IID program that had been set to sunset in January 2026 and narrowing judicial discretion. That change happened before this session opened. Drivers evaluating their interlock exposure are already living under the 2025 law, not waiting on 2026.
The next two weeks, mechanically
From Aug. 17 through Aug. 31 the Legislature is in floor session only. The last day to amend bills on the floor is Aug. 21, which closes the window for negotiating substantive changes into anything still pending. Bills already on third reading, SB 907, AB 1546, AB 1687, AB 1685 and AB 2502, need floor votes and, for the Assembly bills in the Senate and the Senate bill in the Assembly, concurrence where amendments were taken.
For AB 1830, the only route left is a rules waiver or another procedural revival to move it off the suspense file and onto the floor before Aug. 31. Whatever clears both houses goes to the Governor, who has until Sept. 30 to act. Bills signed without an urgency clause take effect Jan. 1, 2027.
That is the honest shape of it. Not the biggest DUI overhaul in decades landing on every driver in January, but a narrower set of repeat-offender sentencing and license bills, one autonomous-vehicle provision, and a first-offense interlock mandate that is stuck, urgency-clause-bound, and written for 2031.
Related reading
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[Waive Your Jury in Louisiana and the DA Can Take Your Judge: HB 310 Took Effect August 1](/news/louisiana-hb-310-act-541-jury-waiver-judge-reassignment)
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[Oklahoma Can Now Turn Two Unproven DUIs Into One Felony: SB 1543 Drops the Conviction Requirement on November 1](/news/oklahoma-sb-1543-aggregated-dui-felony-november-2026)
Sources
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2026 Tentative Legislative Calendar, Office of the Secretary of the Senate and Assembly Chief Clerk (rev. Sept. 29, 2025)
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AB 1830 text and Legislative Counsel's Digest and AB 1830 bill history
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AB 1546 (Schultz), SB 907 (Archuleta), AB 1687 (Lackey), AB 1685 (Lackey, Petrie-Norris), AB 2502 (Pellerin)
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AB 366, Chapter 689, chaptered Oct. 13, 2025
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KALW, Aug. 12, 2026, on AB 1830 and the affordability debate
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Streets Are For Everyone, 2026 DUI legislation roundup (advocacy source; several of its status labels conflict with leginfo and its snapshot predates the Aug. 13 suspense hearing)
Note: This article contains AI-assisted content and has been reviewed by our editorial team.
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