There is no single statute called the California Human Rights Act. California’s civil rights protections sit in two laws that work together: the Fair Employment and Housing Act (FEHA), at Government Code section 12900, and the Unruh Civil Rights Act, at Civil Code section 51. Between them, they cover discrimination in employment, housing, and public accommodations, and they generally reach further than federal law in both who is protected and what a successful claim is worth.1California Legislative Information. California Code Gov 12900 – California Fair Employment and Housing Act
The Two Laws Behind California’s Civil Rights Protections
FEHA is the broader of the two. It governs employment and housing, and in the employment context it applies to private and public employers with five or more employees.2California Legislative Information. California Code Gov 12926 Religious nonprofits are excluded from the definition of “employer.” The harassment provisions, however, apply regardless of employer size, so even a one-employee business can face a harassment claim. The law is enforced by the California Civil Rights Department (CRD), which investigates complaints, runs free dispute resolution, and in some cases files suit itself.3Civil Rights Department. California Civil Rights Department
The Unruh Civil Rights Act covers businesses rather than employers. It guarantees everyone in California “full and equal accommodations, advantages, facilities, privileges, or services in all business establishments of every kind whatsoever.”4California Legislative Information. California Code Civ 51 – Unruh Civil Rights Act That reaches retail stores, restaurants, hotels, hospitals, entertainment venues, and digital platforms such as websites and apps. Any violation of the federal Americans with Disabilities Act is automatically a violation of the Unruh Act, which lets California-level remedies attach to accessibility failures that would otherwise only carry federal consequences.
Who and What California Protects
FEHA has one of the longest protected-characteristic lists in the country. In employment, it prohibits discrimination and harassment based on race, color, national origin, ancestry, religious creed, physical or mental disability, medical condition, genetic information, marital status, sex (including pregnancy, childbirth, and breastfeeding), gender, gender identity, gender expression, age (40 and older), sexual orientation, veteran or military status, and reproductive health decisionmaking.5California Legislative Information. California Code Gov 12940 The definition of race now includes hair texture and protective hairstyles such as braids, locs, and twists.6Civil Rights Department. CRD Settles Race-Based Hairstyle Discrimination Case
Housing law under FEHA covers most of the same categories and adds two more: familial status, which protects families with children, and source of income, which protects tenants paying rent with housing vouchers or other government assistance.7California Legislative Information. California Code Gov 12955
In practice, the employment protections cover the entire arc of a job. An employer cannot let a protected characteristic influence hiring, firing, promotion, pay, or any other term of employment, and cannot publish job ads expressing a preference based on a protected trait. Employers must provide reasonable accommodations for a known disability and for an employee’s religious beliefs unless doing so would create undue hardship, and they must take reasonable steps to prevent discrimination and harassment in the first place through written policies, training, and prompt responses to complaints. Retaliation against anyone who complains, opposes discriminatory practices, or participates in an investigation is a separate violation.
On the housing side, landlords cannot refuse to rent, set different terms, make discriminatory background inquiries, or run ads indicating a preference against a protected group. The ban also reaches banks and mortgage companies in the terms of financing for purchasing, refinancing, or constructing housing.
What You Can Recover
California’s remedies are among the most generous in the country. A successful FEHA employment plaintiff can recover back pay from the date of the discriminatory act through trial, front pay for projected future lost earnings when reinstatement is not practical, compensatory damages for emotional distress with no statutory ceiling, punitive damages when the employer acted with malice or reckless disregard (also uncapped under state law), attorney’s fees and costs, and reinstatement or other injunctive relief. The absence of a damages cap is the single biggest difference from federal law.
Under the Unruh Act, each violation carries a statutory minimum of $4,000, even when actual damages are lower, plus up to three times actual damages and attorney’s fees.8California Legislative Information. California Code Civ 52 Because the minimum applies per occurrence, a repeated pattern of discriminatory conduct can produce substantial combined penalties.
How California Goes Beyond Federal Law
Workers often have both state and federal claims, and the differences matter.
Title VII of the federal Civil Rights Act applies only to employers with 15 or more employees. FEHA applies at five.2California Legislative Information. California Code Gov 12926 Workers at small businesses with no federal remedy can still have a viable state claim. California also expressly protects characteristics federal law does not, including reproductive health decisionmaking, gender identity, and gender expression.
Federal law caps combined compensatory and punitive damages based on employer size, from $50,000 for employers with 15 to 100 employees up to $300,000 for employers with more than 500.9U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. Remedies for Employment Discrimination FEHA has no cap, which is why high-profile California discrimination verdicts sometimes land in seven or eight figures.
If your claim fits under both systems, you do not have to choose. The EEOC and the CRD share charges through a worksharing agreement, so filing with one agency automatically dual-files with the other.10U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. How to File a Charge of Employment Discrimination Watch the federal deadline, though: 300 calendar days from the discriminatory act, shorter than FEHA’s three-year window.11U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. Time Limits for Filing a Charge
How to File a Complaint
Before you can sue under FEHA, you have to file an administrative complaint with the CRD. This step is not optional. A court will dismiss a FEHA lawsuit if it was skipped.
Deadlines differ by claim. Employment discrimination and harassment claims under Government Code section 12940 must be filed with the CRD within three years of the last discriminatory act. Unruh Act claims under Civil Code section 51 must be filed within one year of the violation.12California Legislative Information. California Code Gov 12960 Limited extensions exist, including for discrimination you did not discover until after the deadline and for violations that occurred when you were a minor.
Once a complaint is filed, the CRD investigates and requires all parties to participate in free dispute resolution. If the matter does not resolve and the CRD does not take the case itself, it issues a right-to-sue notice. You then have one year from the date of that notice to file in Superior Court.13Civil Rights Department. Instructions for Obtaining a Right-to-Sue Notice That one-year clock pauses while CRD dispute resolution is ongoing.
What Happens to Your Award at Tax Time
Winning or settling a discrimination case can create a tax bill that surprises people. The IRS treats different parts of an award differently.
Back pay and front pay are taxable wages. The employer withholds income and payroll taxes as it would from a regular paycheck, and you report the amount as wages.14Internal Revenue Service. Publication 4345 – Settlements Taxability Emotional distress damages that do not stem from a physical injury are also taxable, though you can reduce the taxable amount by any medical expenses you paid to treat the distress that you did not already deduct on an earlier return. Punitive damages are always taxable, regardless of the underlying claim. Emotional distress and punitive damages are reported as other income on Schedule 1 of Form 1040.
Damages for physical injury or physical sickness are generally excluded from income, but in most employment discrimination cases the bulk of the recovery falls into taxable categories. If you are negotiating a settlement, how the payment is allocated among these categories can meaningfully change your net recovery, and it is worth running the allocation past a tax professional before you sign.