Passed in 2024, California’s SB 428 took effect on January 1, 2025. As a reminder, prior to SB 428, employers had the ability to seek a temporary restraining order (TRO) to protect employees and their immediate family members from a person who has engaged in violence or posed a credible threat of violence. However, when workplace threats fell outside the limited scope of misconduct related to violence or threats of violence, employers had few options for court intervention.  

SB 428 addresses this limitation by expanding existing TRO protections to include harassment.  Under the statute, harassment is defined as: “a knowing and willful course of conduct directed at a specific person that seriously alarms, annoys, or harasses the person, and that serves no legitimate purpose. The course of conduct must be that which would cause a reasonable person to suffer substantial emotional distress and must actually cause substantial emotional distress.” 

Now that the statute is in effect, a workplace TRO may be obtained if an employer can successfully show: 

• Reasonable proof that an employee has suffered unlawful violence or a credible threat of violence by the respondent, and that great or irreparable harm would result to an employee; or 

• Clear and convincing evidence that an employee has suffered harassment by the respondent, great or irreparable harm would result to an employee, the course of conduct at issue served no legitimate purpose, and issuance of the TRO is not prohibited under the statute.  

SB 428 will not permit courts to issue TROs for actions constituting constitutionally protected speech, actions protected by the National Labor Relations Act or other laws governing the communications of exclusive representatives of public employees, or other provisions of law.