California Fails to Fix Warning System for Teacher Misconduct

Here are the morning’s top stories on Tuesday, August 4, 2026

• A California bill meant to keep problematic teachers out of the classroom has collapsed. It would have created a database to allow schools to see if teachers applying to work there had previously been fired or resigned over claims of misconduct. But that proposal was dropped after pushback from the state’s teachers licensing agency and unions. They warned it would violate privacy and due process. 
• California is suing the Trump administration in an effort to protect the private information of people on a federal cash assistance program. 
• Washington state is in its most destructive wildfire season on record. It’s been a rough fire summer around the West, but not necessarily in California.

A last-ditch legislative attempt to help California school districts keep problematic teachers out of the classroom has collapsed following opposition from unions and the state teacher licensing agency that a proposed searchable database would violate privacy and subject educators to unfair treatment. 

The proposed database, introduced by a Democratic member of the state Assembly in June, would have allowed schools to see if applicants for public school teaching positions had been reported to the state after they were fired or resigned over claims of misconduct.

The California Federation of Teachers pushed back, warning that teachers could land in the database even if schools had not determined they committed serious misconduct. “We would support legislation that targets substantiated reports of egregious misconduct,” said Tristan Brown, a lobbyist with the California Federation of Teachers. “We live in a state with Silicon Valley. The state should be able to support a system that is up to date and tracking substantiated reports of misconduct.”

Democratic Assemblymember Al Muratsuchi had proposed to make it easier for schools to screen teacher applicants after a KQED-ProPublica investigation published in May. The news outlets revealed how delays and inaction, combined with a lack of transparency, allowed educators to get new jobs after school districts reported them to the state teacher licensing agency for sexual harassment or other misconduct.

A similar effort by Republican lawmakers to address the issue also hit roadblocks earlier this year. “When the safety of a child does not meet a legislative priority, that’s a head-scratcher for me,” said Republican Assemblymember Tom Lackey, who co-authored the first attempt to create the teacher database. “I think being sympathetic to the offender is on the wrong side of this issue.”

Both bills were modeled on a law the Legislature passed in 2025 mandating the creation of a database by next summer that will allow employers to search the names of school support staff, such as bus drivers, custodians and teaching assistants, who are under investigation by their schools or have substantiated complaints of egregious misconduct. The database for school support staff passed after months of tense negotiations. Under that system, employees’ names would be removed from the database if school investigations fail to substantiate claims of egregious misconduct. The bill passed despite opposition from unions, but the system that will be put in place is still being refined. But that law explicitly does not apply to public school teachers.

The system currently in place for public school educators is a patchwork with a fair number of gaps. School districts have long been required to report to the state any teacher who is fired or who resigns due to misconduct. But the state’s teacher licensing agency, which collects all of those reports, is restricted by state law in what information the agency can share while it investigates. The state’s disciplinary process typically takes one year, and teachers could be hired during the investigation period without schools knowing about the claims against them.

More than 20 states, including California, and the District of Columbia sued the Trump administration on Monday to block it from getting wide access to the personal information of millions of recipients of a benefits program for low-income families.

The case is the latest legal action between states and the federal government over the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program, which like other public programs have come under scrutiny from the Trump administration as sources of potential fraud.

The coalition of states sued in federal court in Washington to stop the agency that controls the program from moving ahead with a rule that would allow it to share recipients’ immigration status, Social Security numbers and additional personal information with other parts of government or potentially with private entities, according to the lawsuit.

California Attorney General Rob Bonta said that information is legally protected. “People who are struggling to get by shouldn’t be afraid to turn to their government for support, to feed and clothe their kids, put a roof over their family’s head, or get critical medical care,” he said.

Earlier this year, a judge prevented the Trump administration from withholding Temporary Assistance for Needy Families and other subsidy program funding from a handful of Democratic-controlled states, after the federal government said there was “reason to believe” the states were granting benefits to people in the country illegally. A federal government lawyer later said the move was largely in response to news reports about possible fraud.

In central and eastern Washington, extreme fire weather — with dry winds gusting up to 50 miles per hour — fueled explosive fire growth over the weekend. Three fast-moving fires in the Spokane area have burned through more than 7,000 acres, destroyed at least 700 structures, and forced the evacuation of about 65,000 people.

The historic fire disaster in Spokane looks familiar. As with the Tubbs, Camp, Lahaina or Eaton Fires, neighborhoods upwind from highly-flammable vegetation were destroyed during a hot, dry, windy spell, after severe-to-extreme drought.

California is not in a strong drought right now, unlike much of the rest of the West, and has so far escaped the worst fires. But weather and climate expert Daniel Swain said that could soon change. “I do expect there to be a growing amount of fire activity in the coming days as fuels really dry out, even though I don’t expect there to be any extreme fire weather conditions,” he said.