California SB 574 (Chapter 858), Signed 30 September 2026, Sets Generative AI Duties for Lawyers, Court Filings and Arbitrators From 1 January 2027

What Governor Newsom signed on 30 September 2026

California Senate Bill 574, by Senator Thomas Umberg, became Chapter 858 of the Statutes of 2026 when the Governor approved it on 30 September 2026. It is a short statute with four working parts. A new section 6068.1 of the Business and Professions Code forbids an attorney to delegate the practice of law to generative AI and sets the conditions for using it: no confidential or personal identifying information in tools whose access is not restricted to the attorney and persons the attorney has authorized under confidentiality obligations, reasonable steps to verify every output and every case and statutory citation, and disclosure of generative AI use to the court for documents submitted to it. An amended Code of Civil Procedure section 128.7 provides that a brief, pleading, motion or other paper filed in court may not contain a citation the responsible attorney has not personally verified; under subdivision (g), section 128.7 does not apply to discovery papers.

Why arbitrators and the State Bar are in the same bill

A new section 1282.1 forbids an arbitrator to delegate any part of the decision to a generative AI tool, and the Judicial Council must revisit its standard on judges' use of the technology. Read together, the provisions make generative AI in legal practice a question of professional duty enforced through discipline and sanctions, with citation verification as the test every litigator will meet first. Absent an urgency clause, the law takes effect on 1 January 2027. This post reads the chaptered text section by section and asks what it changes for clients, patients, courts and the vendors who sell AI tools to law firms.