On
August 20, 2026 the plaintiffs in the multi-state challenge to SB 54 filed a motion for a preliminary injunction and an amended complaint, asking the court to stop CalRecycle and the Circular Action Alliance from enforcing SB 54 while the case proceeds. The amended complaint adds a
due process vagueness count built directly on the SB 343 ruling: it argues that SB 54’s 2032 recyclability mandate leans on the same recyclability standard that a federal court preliminarily enjoined as unconstitutionally vague on July 14, 2026 in California League of Food Producers v. Bonta. The other counts pleaded are dormant Commerce Clause, Import-Export Clause, First Amendment compelled association with and funding of CAA’s speech, extraterritorial regulation, and unconstitutional delegation of fee-setting to a private organization with a financial interest.
What this means for you: nothing changes today. No court has granted anything. Registration, reporting and the 2026 early fee schedule all remain in force, and a motion is not an order. What makes this one worth watching is that it is the first attempt to halt SB 54 as a whole rather than one piece of it, and it is the first time the two California cases have been formally linked. One thing we cannot yet tell you: whether the requested injunction would reach every producer or only NAW’s members. That distinction decided who was covered in Oregon and it is the question to ask when a ruling comes.
Evidence label: signaled. The docket is reported sealed and we were not able to read the filing itself, so this rests on the parties’ own announcement and trade coverage rather than the court record. Source:
NAW (August 20, 2026) and
Packaging Dive (August 21, 2026).