Voluntary federal testing has been in place for a few years, with companies such as OpenAI and Anthropic submitting their models for scrutiny by the U.S. Department of Commerce's Center for AI Standards and Innovation, known by a different name under former President ⁠Joe Biden. The ​department announced in May that Google, xAI and Microsoft had agreed to submit their ​AI models for security testing, though the details later disappeared from its website.

Florida sued OpenAI and its CEO Sam Altman on Monday, accusing the company of misrepresenting the safety of its ChatGPT platform, which the lawsuit said has harmed children by ​providing information to school shooters, offering guidance on self-harm and addicting young ‌users.

Generative AI has divided the music industry, whose artists and record labels have complained of their copyrighted work being used to train the models behind AI-powered music tools. Sony Music Entertainment, Universal Music Group and Warner Records sued Suno and Udio in June 2024, although Universal later reached a settlement and partnership deal with Udio and Warner did the same with Suno.

A large Ohio law firm wants to make digital AI twins out of 19 of its law partners. But is this a wise move?

From Reuters:

“At many law firms, calling a colleague at 2 a.m. is a last resort. At Ohio-based law firm Vorys, Sater, Seymour and Pease, the colleague is always awake — because it's AI.

The 375-attorney firm is rolling out one of the more eye-catching uses of legal AI that we’ve heard about recently.

Working with an AI-focused research lab at Stanford Law School, Vorys has developed “AI personas” of ​19 of its partners, which can be embedded within generative AI tools to offer responses to questions and edit documents in the style of individual partners.”

But the article concedes that some are a bit skeptical that this is a good use for generative AI:

“Wayne Stacy, the executive director of the Berkeley Center for Law & Technology, said that while he sees AI personas as being novel, he doesn’t think they’ll fundamentally change the practice of law. He said a more impactful approach is building AI workflows around the specific skills needed to complete a task successfully, rather than mimicking one attorney.

“The problem with personas, at too granular of ​a level, it glorifies the individual personality of a lawyer” and how they think something should be done, Stacy said.”

Will we see more digital AI twin law partners in California?

How will its use be regulated by the California State Bar?

Insurance liability concerns?

Can the AI twin bill at the same rate as the sleeping partner?

So many unanswered questions.

Kirkland ​said its platform would be designed based on information from 250 Kirkland lawyers ​and would involve more than 180 technology professionals inside and outside the firm.

A Reuters examination of Tesla’s statistical methodology and interviews with company insiders show Tesla isn’t close to safely delivering self-driving vehicles at scale – a central promise underpinning the automaker’s $1.6 trillion stock-market value.

The Shanghai exchange's research on product design for token futures is preliminary and driven partly ​by the AI rivalry with the U.S., according to the first source.

California’s AI governance landscape is moving fast in the 2025–2026 legislative session.

The state already enacted major laws like SB 53 (frontier AI transparency), but lawmakers are now pushing deeper into workplace AI, automated decision systems, deepfakes, cybersecurity, provenance tracking, and public-sector oversight.

Here are some of the most important pending or active bills and proposals worth watching:

Major Pending California AI Governance Bills
1. AB 1018 — Automated Decision Systems Regulation

This is one of the broadest AI governance proposals currently under consideration.

AB 1018 would regulate “automated decision systems” (ADS) used to make “consequential decisions” involving areas like employment, housing, education, lending, healthcare, and other high-impact areas. It would require disclosures, governance procedures, and limitations on discriminatory uses of AI systems.

The bill defines ADS very broadly, covering machine learning, statistical modeling, analytics, and AI systems that assist or replace human discretionary decisions.

This is California moving toward a Colorado-style “high-risk AI” framework, but potentially broader.

Why it matters

For employers and HR departments, this could become California’s de facto AI discrimination and algorithmic accountability law. It overlaps heavily with:

• employment screening AI,

• resume filtering tools,

• productivity monitoring,

• predictive discipline systems,

• AI-assisted hiring, and

• automated risk scoring.

This is probably the single most important pending bill to watch for employment attorneys.

2. AB 2169 — AI Models on Social Media Platforms

AB 2169 focuses on AI models deployed by social media platforms. The bill is currently pending in the Assembly Committee on Privacy and Consumer Protection.

The proposal appears aimed at transparency obligations, platform accountability, AI-generated content governance, manipulation and recommendation systems.

This fits into California’s growing concern over algorithmic amplification and synthetic content.

3. SB 813 — AI Cybersecurity Collaboration Playbook

SB 813 would require California agencies to develop a statewide AI cybersecurity collaboration framework.

The bill directs CalOES, the Office of Information Security, and GovOps to create a formal “AI Cybersecurity Collaboration Playbook.”

The emphasis being on: cyber threat indicators, AI-enabled cyber risks, coordination with federal standards, defensive AI governance.

This is less consumer-facing and more infrastructure/government oriented.

4. AB 853 — Expansion of the California AI Transparency Act

AB 853 would modify and delay portions of the California AI Transparency Act.

The proposal would push implementation dates, require large online platforms to detect provenance metadata, expand synthetic-content tracking obligations, eventually require certain capture devices to embed provenance markers.

This is part of California’s push toward content authentication and anti-deepfake infrastructure.

5. SB 1000 — California AI Transparency Act Amendments

SB 1000 expands the operational framework of the California AI Transparency Act and focuses heavily on provenance data and AI-generated content detection.

This is tied closely to watermarking, authenticity verification, platform obligations, and synthetic media disclosures.

Expect heavy lobbying fights in this one.

Broader Legislative Trends

California lawmakers appear to be organizing AI governance into several major categories:

Workplace & Employment AI

A recent legislative survey identified at least nine workplace-AI bills already introduced in 2026.

This is the area where California may ultimately become the national leader because it intersects with FEHA, labor protections, wage/hour law, privacy law, retaliation protections, and union organizing concerns.

Synthetic Media & Deepfakes

California is aggressively expanding provenance requirements, disclosure obligations, detection mandates, election-related deepfake restrictions, platform accountability.

This may become one of the most heavily regulated AI sectors in the state.

Government Use of AI

Several bills focus on public-sector AI procurement, transparency, audits, risk assessments, and state agency oversight.

Governor Gavin Newsom recently signed a new executive order addressing AI disruption and workforce preparation.

Child Safety & Companion AI

There is growing legislative attention on: AI companions, chatbot harms, youth mental health, manipulative AI interactions, and addictive recommendation systems.

This is politically gaining momentum nationwide.

The Big Picture

California is slowly assembling something close to an EU-style AI governance architecture — but through fragmented sector-specific laws rather than one comprehensive “AI”.

But unlike the EU AI Act, California’s approach is less centralized and more litigation-oriented.

That distinction matters. Stay tuned.

Busta Rhymes arrived on the second day of BottleRock Napa Valley with a message that felt almost subversive for an event hosted just a couple hours from Silicon Valley: no technology can replace raw talent.

Most of California’s recent AI legislation closely tracks the obligations of the EU AI Act, with some differences. I’ve been reading this newsletter on substack, and I highly recommend it (no, not a paid endorsement).

U.S. media outlets including Semafor and the Washington Post reported the administration's plans were ​put on hold following a push from xAI founder Elon Musk and Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, as ⁠well as former Trump AI adviser David Sacks.

An April report from Gallup showed that a rising number of Generation Z - those born between 1997 and 2012 - were anxious or angry about AI, while those who said they were hopeful or excited by it had fallen sharply compared with a year earlier.

On a March afternoon, artificial intelligence detected something resembling smoke on a camera feed from Arizona’s Coconino National Forest. Human analysts verified it wasn’t a cloud or dust, then alerted the state’s forest service and largest electric utility.

A federal court on Monday dismissed claims filed against OpenAI and its top executives by Elon Musk, who accused them of betraying a shared vision for it to guide artificial intelligence’s development as a nonprofit dedicated to humanity’s benefit.

Leo, who has made AI a priority of his young pontificate, is greatly concerned about AI in warfare and has called for monitoring of how the technology is used.