California Governor Gavin Newsom (D) signed a pair of bills Thursday that protects the income of child influencers and expands current laws to provide financial protection for minors working as content creators.
Governor Blue signed SB 764, introduced by.sSen. Steve Padilla (D) will provide legal and financial protections for minors recorded in monetized online videos by requiring parents or guardians to allocate a percentage of the proceeds to a trust account. It is to ensure that.
“As the entertainment industry evolves, our laws must evolve with it to ensure protection for vulnerable young performers,” Padilla said.
Newsom also signed into law AB1880, a bill introduced by Representative Juan Alaniz (R), which expands the existing Coogan Act to include minors working as content creators online. The Coogan Act, signed in 1939, was intended to ensure that a portion of child actors' earnings were held in trust.
Other states are taking similar actions. Illinois became the first state to pass the billlawUnder the law, parents must set aside half of their profits into a fund for their children as long as they appear in at least 30 percent of their screen time in a year.
“A lot has changed since Hollywood's early days, but here in California, our focus remains on protecting children from exploitation. In old Hollywood, child actors were not exploited. “In 2024, we're now child influencers,” Newsom said.said.
“Today, that modern-day exploitation ends with two new laws to protect young influencers on TikTok, Instagram, YouTube, and other social media platforms.”
The bill was supported by signatory Demi Lovato. His recent documentary Child Star explores children through their experiences working in the entertainment industry at a young age.
“To build a better future for the next generation of child stars, we need protections in place for minors working in the digital space,” Lovato said in a statement. “Thank you Governor Newsom for taking action to ensure that these changes to the Coogan Act give children who appear on social media the right of representation as adults and receive appropriate compensation for the use of their names and likenesses. Thank you.”
