Jay Leno’s garage has hosted plenty of rare cars over the years, but it just hosted something rarer still: a California governor. Governor Gavin Newsom drove out to Burbank to sign SB 1392, which everyone is now calling Jay Leno’s Law, and it’s a well-earned victory to a fight that took over a decade to win. California has long let cars from 1975 and earlier skip smog checks entirely. Everything after that has been stuck in an endless loop of biennial testing, no matter how rarely the car left the garage.
Now with the passing of Leno’s Law, that line finally starts creeping forward, starting January 1, 2028. As per the wording from the Governor’s office, cars need to be at least 35 years old, used mostly for shows, parades or preservation rather than the daily commute, and either carry collector insurance or stay under 1,000 miles a year. One model year gets added annually until 2033, when the cutoff lands at 1985. Then it stops. It’s clearly not a rolling exemption forever, but it’s good enough for scores of enthusiasts in the Golden State.
Leno has been the face of this campaign since he first drove his own 1976 Trans Am around the Capitol in April 2025, with Republican senator Shannon Grove riding shotgun, ahead of an earlier and more ambitious bill that died quietly months later. That bill, SB 712, wanted a full 35 year rolling window with no end date. Lawmakers weren’t ready for that. They were however ready for this narrower version, sponsored by SEMA and championed relentlessly by Leno through 2026. Opposition came from environmental groups worried about air quality creeping backward. Support came from museums, restoration shops and classic car clubs who sent well over a thousand letters.
Leno’s argument was simple: a classic car rarely is used to commute, if ever. A car like that gets driven to car shows or for evening cruises. Treating that car like a daily-driver that needs to be smog-tested a couple of times a year doesn’t make sense, and enough legislators eventually agreed. It helps that Leno’s own collection, somewhere around 180 cars and 160 bikes depending on who you ask, gives him more than enough credibility on the subject.
Ironically Leno’s 1986 Lamborghini Countach, reportedly a genuine 70,000 mile driver once upon a time, misses the new window by exactly one model year. For now, though, California’s classic car scene gets to breathe a little easier, quite literally.
