Gov. Gavin Newsom has signed Assembly Bill 2017, officially adding Eid al-Fitr and Eid al-Adha to California’s list of state holidays. The move makes California the second state in the country, after Washington, to recognize both Muslim holidays statewide.
The law does not force schools, courts or businesses to close on those days. Courts are specifically required to stay open. Instead, it allows public schools and colleges to close if they choose, and makes state employees eligible to take the days off.
Newsom signed AB 2017 on Sunday. Before that, he had been holding several other religious-holiday bills on his desk, including measures affecting Jewish observances, and did not sign them until Wednesday, just ahead of a midnight deadline.
One of those bills, AB 395, writes Jewish holidays including Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur into state law and directs state agencies and schools to “make every reasonable effort” not to schedule major events on those dates. Another, AB 1763, guarantees K-12 students excused absences for religious holidays. A third, SB 1387, recognizes Jewish identity as an ethnicity under state law.
The gap between when Newsom signed the Muslim holiday bill and when he signed the Jewish holiday measures drew criticism from Republican figures. Elizabeth Barcohana, chair of Jewish engagement for the California Republican Party, told Cleveland Jewish News the sequencing was telling.
“The fact that Newsom chose to sign the Eid law before the law that protected other religious observance speaks volumes about the direction he is moving as he eyes a 2028 run for the presidency,” Barcohana said.
Barcohana also argued the new law gives Muslim holidays privileges, such as the option to close schools, that other religions haven’t received.
“People may think this is alarmist, but this is an example of American laws adopting a Sharia law framework,” she told JNS. “Special protections no other religious observance receives, the option to shut down public institutions to observe the holiday that, until now, only Christian holidays received and curriculum in public schools that is religious in nature notably about a religion that emphasizes conversion.”
Not everyone shared that view. David Bocarsly, CEO of Jewish California, said his organization welcomed all three bills regardless of the order they were signed.
“With more than 1,000 bills in front of him this past month, we aren’t concerned with the sequencing of Assembly Bill 395 and Assembly Bill 1763, as long as they got signed, and they did. We’re thrilled to see these two critical religious freedom protections become law and to recognize three Jewish holidays in California statute for the first time,” Bocarsly said.
Fox News Digital reported that it reached out to Newsom’s office for comment but did not immediately receive a response.
