Newsom Vetoes Campus Jobs Bill for Undocumented Students for Second Time in Three Years

Gov. Gavin Newsom vetoed Assembly Bill 713 on Sunday, Sept. 20, blocking legislation that would have barred the University of California, California State University and California's community colleges from disqualifying students from campus jobs because they lack federal work authorization.

The second time in three years Newsom has killed nearly identical legislation. He vetoed a similar bill, AB 2586, in 2024.

AB 713, called the Opportunity for All Act, was sponsored by Assemblymember José Luis Solache, a Democrat from Lakewood. It cleared the Legislature on Aug. 28 and would have taken effect Jan. 6, 2027, according to CalMatters and parriva.

The legal theory at the center of the fight

The bill rested on an untested argument developed by UCLA law professors Ahilan Arulanantham and Hiroshi Motomura: that the 1986 federal Immigration Reform and Control Act, which bars employers from hiring workers without authorization, doesn't apply to state governments because the statute never explicitly names them.

Newsom wasn't willing to bet California's public university system on that theory without a court ruling first. "Given the gravity of this bill's consequences — including potential criminal and civil liability for state employees — the federal courts must resolve the legality of the novel legal theory behind this legislation before we proceed," he wrote in his veto message, according to the Los Angeles Times and CalMatters.

He also pointed to the political climate. "The current federal government has shown it is quick to wreak destruction for political spectacle — attacking California's public higher education institutions and terrorizing immigrant communities, including students, with reckless disregard for consequences and a desire for chaos," Newsom wrote.

Real money is on the line

This isn't an abstract worry. The Trump administration sued Newsom, Attorney General Rob Bonta, the UC Board of Regents, the CSU Board of Trustees and the Community Colleges Board of Governors in November, arguing that California's in-state tuition and scholarship policies for undocumented students are unconstitutional, according to the Daily Bruin. UC receives roughly $17 billion a year in federal support, and Newsom has previously cited fear of losing some or all of it as a reason to hold back, according to lookout.co. California's own Department of Finance recommended a no vote on AB 713 for the same reason.

A state law built on a legal theory no federal court has tested could hand the Trump administration exactly the pretext it's looking for to go after UC's federal funding stream. Newsom, for once, chose fiscal caution over an untested gamble, even though he's a Democrat who otherwise rarely misses a chance to posture against the administration on immigration.

What supporters say

Backers of the bill make a fair point of their own. An estimated 60,000 students without legal status are enrolled across California's public colleges and universities, most of them in community colleges, according to CalMatters. They're ineligible for federal Pell grants, worth up to $7,400 a year, and for federal student loans with stronger borrower protections than private lenders offer. California already gives them tuition waivers regardless of immigration status, so campus jobs — often tailored to coursework or lab research — are one of the few legal ways left for them to cover living costs instead of working off the books.

"While California has a longstanding commitment to expanding access, affordability, and student success in higher education, our undocumented students continue to face significant financial and structural barriers," Solache said at a June hearing, according to CalMatters and HSJ Chronicle.

Arulanantham, the UCLA professor who developed the legal theory and represented plaintiffs in a related lawsuit, called Newsom's veto "misguided." "Rather than stand with undocumented students, the governor asks for another suit," he told the Los Angeles Times.

That lawsuit reference matters. In a separate case, Muñoz v. Regents of the University of California, a state appeals court ruled that UC's policy barring undocumented students from campus jobs "facially discriminates based on immigration status" and ordered UC to reconsider it, according to the Los Angeles Times and parriva. The California Supreme Court declined to hear UC's appeal last October. Despite that ruling, UC has not changed its hiring policy, meaning the state-law question is technically unresolved even as the bigger federal question sits untouched.

What happens next

No federal court has ruled on whether the 1986 law applies to state employers, and Newsom's veto message suggests he wants someone to file that case — through what he called "declaratory relief in federal court" — before Sacramento tries legislating around it again. Nobody has filed that case yet. Until they do, or until a court forces the issue the way the Muñoz litigation forced UC's hand on state law, undocumented students at California's public colleges remain shut out of campus paychecks for a fourth straight year.