---
title: "California Will Require Big Companies to Disclose Profits From Slavery"
description: "Gov. Gavin Newsom signed the first-in-the-nation measure, covering companies with more than $100 million in worldwide receipts."
author: "rews desk"
published: 2026-10-02T11:55:00Z
modified: 2026-10-02T22:38:19Z
url: https://rews.cc/a/california-will-require-big-companies-to-disclose-profits-fr-a86bcd
language: en
tags: ["reparations", "slavery", "newsom", "corporations", "disclosure", "us"]
publisher: "Rews (https://rews.cc)"
---

# California Will Require Big Companies to Disclose Profits From Slavery

*Gov. Gavin Newsom signed the first-in-the-nation measure, covering companies with more than $100 million in worldwide receipts.*

By rews desk · October 2, 2026 · https://rews.cc/a/california-will-require-big-companies-to-disclose-profits-fr-a86bcd

## In brief

- Newsom signed AB 2599, the first state law requiring companies to disclose profits from slavery
- It covers firms with more than $100 million in worldwide gross receipts; first sworn affidavits are due Jan. 15, 2029
- Filings will be published in a searchable state database and made under penalty of perjury
- The law stems from the reparations task force; economists put the state’s debt to Black residents at $800 billion
- Several insurance companies opposed the bill, citing disclosures they made under a 2000 law

Gov. Gavin Newsom this week signed the nation’s first law requiring large companies to disclose whether they or their predecessor firms profited from chattel slavery, a measure that grew out of California’s reparations task force.

The Truth in Disclosure Act applies to companies doing business in the state with annual worldwide gross receipts of more than $100 million. They will have to search their records and file sworn statements, under penalty of perjury, about any transactions tied to enslavement. The disclosures will be posted in a searchable public database to be built by the state’s Civil Rights Department, with the first affidavits due by Jan. 15, 2029.

The law, Assembly Bill 2599, covers only companies that existed — or whose predecessor company existed — on or before December 1964. No other state requires corporations to account for their historical role in the slave economy, according to the measure’s supporters.

“I’m thinking agriculture. I’m thinking banking, insurance. I’m thinking anything in the financial sector,” said Assemblyman Isaac Bryan, the Culver City Democrat who wrote the bill, describing the industries where he expects companies will have to file.

An example of the kind of company likely to face the requirement is JP Morgan Chase. According to the California Reparations Task Force report, the bank issued a formal apology in 2005 because two banks it had taken ownership of had accepted 13,000 enslaved people as security for loans in Louisiana. When the enslavers could not repay, the banks took ownership of 1,200 people.

“Once the public has this disclosure and we have a full accounting of the impact, then it’s up to us to decide what that means and what we’re going to do about it,” Mr. Bryan said.

Not everyone backed the measure. Several insurance companies opposed it as it moved through the Legislature, saying they had already disclosed their connections to slavery under a 2000 California law that produced a publicly available report.

The signing is the latest step in a slow, uneven effort to act on the task force’s findings. Mr. Newsom created the panel in 2020. After two years of study, it issued a 2023 report detailing California’s history of enslavement and discriminatory policies, with more than 100 recommendations. Economists estimated that the state owes Black residents at least $800 billion for harms in policing, housing and health.

Lawmakers have moved in smaller steps since. In 2024, Mr. Newsom signed six of the Legislative Black Caucus’s 14 priority bills drawn from the report, including a formal state apology. That year the caucus declined to advance two major reparations bills, opening a painful split with grassroots advocates. The disclosure law was a top caucus priority this year.

The California chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations and the Alliance for Reparations, Reconciliation and Truth praised Mr. Newsom and Mr. Bryan for the new law. “California has long been a state that prides itself on justice and equity and AB 2599 moves the needle closer to the transparency that is necessary to recognize and rectify these historical injustices and understand the roots of modern economic disparities,” Hussam Ayloush, CAIR-CA’s chief executive, said in a written statement.