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California Legal Protections for Reservists and Active Duty Servicemembers

If you are in the military in any way, you’re likely entitled to various legal protections under California law that — at least in theory — are meant to make it easier for you to perform your military service. These laws allow, for instance, may allow you to resume your old health insurance when your active duty service ends. It may allow you to enjoy a reduced interest rate on loans and other debts when you’re on active duty. There are housing-related benefits as well related to rental agreements and mortgages. In this post, I’m going to describe California’s laws in this area in a very general or high-level way. There are a lot of laws so I can’t go over all of them because if I did, this post would be enormous. As I make follow-on posts over time, however, I will probably hit a lot of these topics anyway. I am going to start this process by describing some common themes or ideas that all of these laws have that hopefully make it so all who are entitled to these benefits actually receive them. When working on cases in this area of California law, the first thing I ask is what kind of military member am I working with? By that, I mean is this person an active duty service member (e.g. Lance Corporal in the Marines), a member of the California National Guard, or a member of the Naval Reserves who has been called to active duty? As with anything in the law, technicalities and definitions like this can be important. The benefits provided are similar,...