Cal State faculty union seeks law to block AI from replacing professors

Faculty union advances legislation amid AI expansion

California legislators are poised to pass a bill that would prohibit California State University from replacing faculty with generative AI tools, marking one of the first state-level attempts to regulate artificial intelligence in higher education labor.

The legislation, backed by the California Faculty Association, has encountered no opposition in the Legislature and could reach Governor Gavin Newsom's desk as early as this week. The union represents professors, coaches, and mental health counselors across the 23-campus Cal State system, the nation's largest public four-year university network.

Kevin Wehr, a sociology professor at Sacramento State who leads the faculty union's bargaining team, told CalMatters that the measure aims to prevent potential faculty replacement before it becomes widespread. "We're trying to keep ahead of a rapidly changing set of technologies," he said.

Tensions over ChatGPT contract and AI deployment

The push for legislative protection comes as Cal State deepens its commitment to AI tools. The system signed a $17 million contract with ChatGPT in 2025 and recently renewed it for $13 million annually over three years, according to LAist.

That expansion has created friction. A Cal State survey released in spring 2026 found that just over half of faculty reported AI negatively affecting their teaching, while only one-third of students said professors teach them effective AI use, CalMatters reported.

The faculty union filed an unfair labor practice charge in 2025 when the system rolled out its AI initiative without union consultation. A separate complaint alleged that Sacramento State was considering AI chatbots built from faculty course materials, which Cal State disputed.

The union also contested a proposed recommendation that students use AI tools for mental health support when campus counselors weren't available. Cal State and the union settled that dispute in March, with Sacramento State agreeing not to "implement autonomous programs or bots with the primary purpose of performing bargaining unit work" without first negotiating with the union.

Disputed chatbot allegations at Sacramento State

The labor complaint specifically named Alexander "Sasha" Sidorkin, then the campus's chief AI officer, alleging he created a mental health chatbot and a tool to interpret the union contract. Cal State's chancellor's office denied the claims, stating Sidorkin "didn't develop any such bots."

Sidorkin, now a professor of education at Sacramento State, told CalMatters he never created a bot but merely recommended students use ChatGPT if counselors were unavailable. He called the union's allegation "a misstatement of the fact" and said he was unaware he'd been named in the complaint.

The university terminated the chief AI officer position in April 2025 during systemwide layoffs.

Broader workplace AI battles

State Senator Sabrina Cervantes, a Democrat from Riverside who authored the Cal State bill, said at a June hearing that many higher education institutions are integrating AI "without any boundaries or guardrails."

The legislation is part of a broader California effort to regulate AI in workplaces. Other pending bills would prevent employers from using AI alone to discipline workers and ban psychotherapists from offering therapy through chatbots. Business groups including the California Chamber of Commerce oppose those measures.

Cal State has taken no position on the faculty protection bill, though AI's role remains a sticking point in ongoing contract negotiations between the system and the union.

Why it matters

This legislation represents an early test of how states will balance AI adoption in public institutions against labor protections. With Cal State serving more than 460,000 students, decisions about AI's role in instruction could set precedents for public universities nationwide. The outcome may influence whether AI tools augment teaching or begin substituting for human educators—a distinction with implications for both educational quality and academic employment.

These details were first reported by Mikhail Zinshteyn for CalMatters.