California pushes back on renewed federal plan to block state AI rules
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THE AI FIGHT RE-EMERGES
The federal government is once again exploring ways to limit states’ regulatory authority over artificial intelligence, and California is asserting itself.
In two separate letters, Attorney General Rob Bonta and six Democratic state lawmakers urged congressional leaders to reject language in the National Defense Authorization Act that would bar states from regulating AI.
“Preemption of the states’ authority in this rapidly evolving area would undermine the federalist system that has allowed states to respond swiftly and effectively to emerging technologies and in order to protect their residents’ health, safety, and welfare,” Bonta wrote in his Nov. 21 letter.
The NDAA is a package of bills that passes every year that sets the annual budget and expenditures of the U.S. Department of Defense.
California assembly members Rebecca Bauer-Kahan, D-Orinda, Marc Berman, D-Menlo Park, and Jacqui Irwin, D-Thousand Oaks, and state senators Steve Padilla, D-Chula Vista, Tom Umberg, D-Villa Park, and Scott Wiener, D-San Francisco, signed onto a Nov. 24 letter from over 200 legislators from around the nation pushing back on the proposals.
“We appreciate congressional engagement on AI and stand ready to collaborate on thoughtful national policy,” the letter reads. “But after years without comprehensive federal action on privacy and social media harms, a broad preemption of state and local AI laws until Congress acts would set back progress and undercut existing protections.”
Earlier this year, lawmakers were eyeing the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, H.R. 1, for a 10-year moratorium on AI legislation at the state level. That provision was removed in the Senate by a 99-1 bipartisan vote.
President Donald Trump has said state regulation is hampering the growth of AI.
“Investment in AI is helping to make the U.S. Economy the ‘HOTTEST’ in the World, but overregulation by the States is threatening to undermine this Major Growth ‘Engine,’” he said in a Truth Social post last week.
Congress, which is off this week, is expected to pass the NDAA before the end of the year.
Bonta urged leaders to “focus on the national defense” and “not allow this bill to become a vehicle to allow the AI industry to evade commonsense state law protections.”
CALIFORNIA LEADS IN … UNEMPLOYMENT FILINGS
Via David Lightman…
Unemployment reports have been delayed because of the Washington shutdown, but recent numbers from the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics offer strong clues about how California’s job market is doing.
The state’s unemployment rate, 5.5% in August, the latest month with state data, was the highest of the states and well above the national average. The national figure for September, reported by BLS Thursday, was 4.4%.
“There have been no indications that California’s rate will not continue to be the highest or near-highest,” said Michael Bernick, former EDD director and now an employment attorney at Duane Morris LLP.
He noted that in the latest U.S. Department of Labor’s unemployment claims report, California had more than 21% of all new claims filed nationwide.
And, Bernick said, “California’s private sector industries, with the exception of leisure and hospitality, have shown little or no growth for more than a year.”
Nationally, Sung Won Sohn, president of SS Economics in Los Angeles, said the fairly healthy national picture “requires understanding the deeper structural changes shaping the workforce.”
He found that demographic forces, notably an aging population and a lot of retirements, are “constraining the growth of the labor force.” Also impacting the labor force is the immigration crackdown.
“With fewer workers arriving, employers are operating with tighter staffing levels, and the economy no longer needs extraordinarily large monthly job gains to maintain a stable unemployment rate,” Song said. “This scarcity of labor is one reason the current slowdown in payroll growth has not resulted in a meaningful rise in joblessness.”
QUOTE OF THE DAY
“I may have had an audible gasp when I saw the final legal bill.”
– California Attorney General Rob Bonta, speaking with KCRA 3 reporter Ashley Zavala about the almost $500,000 in campaign funds he spent on legal fees amid a federal probe
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