(The Center Square) - After survivors and advocacy groups campaigned for California to ban child marriage for roughly a decade, California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a bill into law banning the practice.
Newsom signed Assembly Bill 1267 into law on Wednesday. The law sets the minimum marriage age of 18 without exception. It also closes a loophole that allowed minors of any age to marry with written consent from one parent, including a non-custodial parent, and judicial approval.
“The victory is a milestone for girls' rights and for advocates who watched reform efforts repeatedly falter for almost a decade,” Equality Now, Unchained At Last, child marriage survivors and others who championed AB 1267, said in a joint statement.
“Seeing this legislation finally cross the finish line after nine years of advocacy will bring tears of both joy and pain,” Sara Tasneem, a child marriage survivor, said. “Reliving our trauma year after year has been exhausting, but survivor advocates have poured their hearts and souls into this fight to ensure the next generation is protected from the harms of child marriage. This historic milestone is a testament to the relentless, collaborative efforts of everyone who refused to give up on protecting children."
The effort to ban child marriage in California began in 2017.
Then state Sen. Jerry Hill, D-San Mateo, introduced a bill to amend state law to match the legal marriage age to the age of consent. In 2018, it was amended to include a loophole allowing child marriage to continue. Subsequent attempts over the years to close the loophole failed. Opponents, primarily led by Planned Parenthood and the American Civil Liberties Union, argued a child marriage ban would limit access to abortion and medical care.
Unchained At Last, a survivor-led nonprofit organization dedicated to ending forced and child marriage, continued advocacy efforts nationwide. Since 2017, 17 states have enacted child marriage bans with no exceptions.
In 2018, Delaware and New Jersey were the first two states in the country to ban child marriage under age 18 with no exceptions, The Center Square reported. In 2019, Nevada attempted to pass a total ban but limited the ban to under age 17 with a requirement for parental or judicial consent for 17-year-olds.
The majority of states, 32, allow minors to marry with parental or judicial permission. Until AB 1267 was signed into law, California was one of three states with no minimum marriage age. Mississippi and New Mexico still don’t have one, The Center Square reported.
Determined to get AB 1267 enacted, Unchained At Last established The California Coalition to End Child Marriage, developed legislative materials, raised public awareness and worked directly with state lawmakers “to build understanding of the need for an absolute minimum age,” the group explained. Survivors were also central to the campaign.
Unchained At Last’s founder and executive director, Fraidy Reiss, said in an emailed statement, “I admit, I was starting to think California would be the last state in the union to ban child marriage. But every setback over the last nine years taught us something, strengthened the coalition and made us better advocates. We refused to give up because we knew that millions of girls in the Golden State were relying on us.”
Child marriage survivor and activist Courtney Stodden said, “A child marriage ban in California means that no child has to grow up and realize the law failed to protect them the way it failed to protect me. I’ve spent years turning one painful chapter of my life into purpose, and seeing California finally put children before loopholes would be proof that survivors’ voices can help change the future.”
Another child marriage survivor and advocate, Christina Sutton, said, “Because of what was done to me as a child, I carry pain and abandonment that defies explanation. By passing AB-1267, California has finally vindicated child marriage survivors like me. Every day I work to be the voice I never had, protecting children from abuse. This is a win, but more work remains.”
According to a 2025 Unchained At Last report, an estimated 34,875 children were married in California between 2000 and 2021. Nationwide, nearly 315,000 children were during this period. The vast majority, 86%, were girls wed to adult men, according to the report. It also found that 66,415 marriages in the U.S. involved a minor under the age of consent or the marriage age gap constituted statutory rape under state law.
Prior to AB 1267 being enacted, California law stipulated an exception for statutory rape in marriage, “effectively shielding adults from prosecution for engaging in otherwise criminal sexual activity with children,” the advocacy groups argue. AB 1267 voids this exception for future marriages, but it doesn’t apply to children in existing marriages.
The groups also hope AB 1267 will curtail child marriage abuse related to immigration.
“Because federal spousal and fiancé visa requirements defer to the marriage age of the couple’s intended state of residence, a California visa could be approved for a child of any age," they said. "This opened a pathway for trafficking disguised as marriage, letting U.S. citizen adults bring foreign child spouses into California and non-U.S. citizen adults to marry California minors to gain legal status."
At the federal level, the Trump administration has been cracking down on visa abuse, including marriage fraud, The Center Square reported. Advocates are also calling on Congress to pass the Child Marriage Prevention Act to protect minors through visa exploitation or “proxy marriages,” including on U.S. military bases overseas.
“For the past decade, state legislators have worked across the aisle to strengthen state marriage-age laws and enact complete bans on child marriage. That progress demonstrates that legislators from across the political spectrum agree that children should not be placed at risk of abuse, trafficking, or exploitation under the guise of marriage,” Tahirih Justice Center Policy Director Casey Carter told The Center Square.
