A San Diego Republican is asking the Trump administration's Justice Department to block a California privacy law that Gov. Gavin Newsom signed over the weekend — a law written by East Bay Assemblymember Mia Bonta, aimed at people who dox immigration nonprofit workers, and one that does not become operative until Oct. 1, 2027.

Assemblymember Carl DeMaio, R-San Diego, announced he had petitioned the U.S. Department of Justice's civil-rights arm to stop the implementation of Assembly Bill 2624, which he brands the "Stop Nick Shirley Act" and calls a First Amendment violation. But the statute he wants halted extends a 28-year-old California confidentiality program to a new class of workers, requires proof of a "specific intent" to incite violence before anyone is penalized, and won't be in force for more than a year — and the federal office DeMaio petitioned has no power to void a state law on its own. The fight is less about what the measure does than about who it protects: immigrant-service organizations that told Sacramento about threats of violence.

One day after Newsom announced he had signed the bill, DeMaio said he asked the DOJ's Office of Civil Rights to block it, arguing that California Democrats are punishing citizen journalists and trampling free-speech rights. He has attached to the measure the name of Nick Shirley, a conservative influencer who went viral filming Somali daycare operators in Minnesota and later claimed to have found fraud in California.

What DeMaio is asking the federal government to stop is narrow, and it is not yet in effect. The chaptered bill text↗ (external source, opens in a new tab) — signed Aug. 22 and entered as Chapter 117 — adds "designated immigration support services" providers, employees and volunteers to the state's Safe at Home program and becomes operative Oct. 1, 2027. Safe at Home, run by the Secretary of State since 1998, gives people at risk of targeted violence a substitute mailing address that agencies must accept in public records. It already covers domestic-violence survivors and, more recently, reproductive and gender-affirming health workers.

The anti-doxxing piece DeMaio objects to mirrors language already on the books for health care workers. It penalizes posting a covered worker's home address or image only when the poster acts with what the statute calls the "specific intent" to trigger imminent violence against that person. Fines attach only when that intent is present. Jim Wagstaffe, a First Amendment attorney, told KQED↗ (external source, opens in a new tab), which first reported DeMaio's request, that free-speech protections do not shield threatening, stalking, or weaponizing someone's private information.

There is also a mismatch between DeMaio's remedy and his target. The federal civil-rights office he petitioned enforces federal statutes and would have to persuade a court; it cannot by itself strike down or freeze a California law. With no operative date until late 2027, there is also nothing yet to put into effect.

The bill's origin matters more than its nickname. Bonta, D-Alameda, introduced AB 2624 and has framed the hostility now facing immigrant-service workers as the core reason for it. Angelica Salas, executive director of the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights, told lawmakers at an assembly committee that her organization had experienced threats of violence, some in which she was named personally, according to KQED. Bonta's office has rejected the "Stop Nick Shirley" framing↗ (external source, opens in a new tab), arguing the bill would not stop journalists from investigating fraud and that press freedom and the safety of immigrant workers are not in conflict.

DeMaio's letter lands the bill inside a broader pattern of California Republicans routing state disputes to a sympathetic federal DOJ. Neither DeMaio nor the department responded to KQED's request for comment. What comes next is not a federal veto — there is no such thing — but the possibility of litigation, on a timeline that stretches past the 2026 election and toward a law that immigrant-service workers won't be able to use for more than a year.