Law / United States / 
California
AB 2839, election materially deceptive deepfake disclaimer law
A citation is an address, not a summary. The first part names the law; what follows narrows it to the exact section, article or paragraph.
What follows is LexLint's own research summary of this law, not legal advice.
Enjoined: enforcement paused by a court, effective 17 September 2024.
An AI transparency rule binding public and private bodies.
As of 14 August 2026.
What it requires
- Enforcement is enjoined on First Amendment grounds, with the State's appeal pending, so read this as context rather than a live duty
- As enacted it barred knowingly distributing materially deceptive AI-generated election media, with actual malice, inside specified windows around an election
- It required a conspicuous manipulation disclaimer for satire or parody content to qualify for that exemption
If you get it wrong
Criminal exposureNo
Private right of actionYes
Who enforces it
Enforcement body
No regulator; as enacted, enforced only by the recipient of the content, a candidate or committee participating in the election, or an elections official, through a private civil action. Enforcement of the whole section is currently enjoined; see status.
What it reaches
Obligation class
Content labelling, Prohibition
What this law does
Drafted with AI from the cited sources under the direction of UnGovr staff. UnGovr holds editorial responsibility for this page.
As enacted, prohibited knowingly distributing, with actual malice, materially deceptive AI-generated election media within specified windows around an election, and required a conspicuous manipulation disclaimer for satire or parody content to qualify for that exemption.
A federal district judge (Senior District Judge John A. Mendez, E.D. Cal.) granted summary judgment for the plaintiffs on First Amendment grounds and permanently enjoined enforcement on 29 August 2025; multiple independent secondary sources (Global Freedom of Expression / Columbia, EPIC's docket summary) consistently describe the injunction as running against enforcement against the named plaintiffs (Kohls, The Babylon Bee, Rumble, X Corp.), not as an explicit facial or statewide bar, though no source reviewed quoted the order's own injunctive-relief paragraph verbatim.
The State's appeal to the Ninth Circuit (Babylon Bee, LLC v. Bonta, No. 25-6138, consolidated with the AB 2655 claims) had briefing complete as of 11 March 2026 with no decision issued as of the date shown (14 August 2026). This is litigation-aware status: the statute does not bind today.
When LexLint raises it
generates_content
Read the law
official California Legislative Information (leginfo) chaptered bill text, for the statute
secondary litigation-tracker reporting for the 2025-08-29 ruling and pending appeal, not an independently pulled court order
Every line above is drawn from the primary source linked here, read on the date shown. This is a research summary, not legal advice.