California lawmakers are calling for emergency legislation and criminal penalties for creators of rogue AI systems after top AI executives publicly claimed that their technology poses existential threats to humanity.
After Anthropic Chief Executive Dario Amodei wrote in a Sept. 12 essay that they “must slow the pace” of the technology, Silicon Valley congressman Ro Khanna (D-Fremont) blasted him for not going “nearly far enough” to make sure artificial intelligence was erected with guardrails.
The answer, Khanna argued, was simple: Make the companies liable for the harm executives say looks increasingly inevitable.
“If you’re creating an AI that is doing illegal things, you should either face liability or criminal sanction,” Khanna said in a video posted to X on Saturday. “That is what we need to protect humanity.”
In July, officials from OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT, disclosed that, unbeknownst to them, its AI models had hacked into rival startup Hugging Face.
Amodei said he believed that, within the next year, “given the accelerating rate of AI capability development,” a similar incident could lead to AI “taking over the entire internet.”
Amodei warned in his essay that AI was rapidly improving itself, through a process known as recursive self-improvement, which threatened to outpace humans’ ability to control it. Khanna argued that banning this capability was the “most obvious” thing Anthropic could do.
“We need to stop, ban self-improving AI,” Khanna said. “You can not have recursive self-improving AI that basically is able to improve itself and exceed human capability.”
Rep. Ted Lieu (D-Torrance) expressed similar outrage over the weekend, calling on House Speaker Mike Johnson to call lawmakers back to Washington to pass guardrails on the technology now that he said multiple AI companies had conceded “what they are creating is not safe.”
xAI Chief Executive Elon Musk and OpenAI Chief Executive Sam Altman joined Amodei’s call for a slowdown of the breakneck development Saturday.
The statements come after Jacob Coxon, who worked as a researcher at both Anthropic and OpenAI, said in a widely circulated post that he resigned from the company in protest after becoming convinced the tech giants were “racing straight to self-improving superintelligence and gambling with our lives.” Neither company immediately responded to a request for comment.
“This is a direct result of the trump Administration letting the AI industry run wild,” Lieu wrote on X. “That mistake has harmed America, harmed the industry and harmed the American people. November is coming.”
Former President Barack Obama urged Democrats this week to make AI oversight the core of their agenda and said presidential candidates in 2028 should have a “clear plan” for responding to concerns about the technology, the New York Times reported. Americans appear increasingly alarmed by the technology with seven in 10 polled in March opposing local construction of data centers that power AI technology, according to a Gallup survey.
During a Sunday appearance on CNN, Johnson rebuffed the idea that lawmakers should rush into an emergency session to consider erecting industry guardrails. Instead, he said lawmakers needed to be careful to “not smother American innovation.”
“We will lose the race to China, and that is a threat to every single American,” he said on CNN’s “State of the Union.” “We don’t need everyone to panic right now.”
Trump said earlier this week that he is not concerned with the pace of AI progress, telling one reporter, “It’s going to be fine.” American AI companies have long argued too much government regulation would shackle them in a race with China.
Calls for a federal fix were echoed this week by California Gov. Gavin Newsom, who has argued the Trump administration needs to move on national legislation to prepare for fallout from the technology.
Newsom signed bills this week aimed at creating a pathway for outside audits of the top AI companies, many of which are based in California, and a registry for AI auditors.
“The scale and potential consequences of this technology demand sustained action from every level of government,” Newsom said in a statement. “The federal government must step forward with robust, national regulations that match the urgency of this moment.”
Efforts to impose state-level regulations have been mixed, with critics echoing Johnson’s fears that they will stifle innovation.
Late last month, California lawmakers passed sweeping new safeguards around social media, artificial intelligence and data centers, including the ones Newsom signed last week.
Newsom will now decide the fate of the rest of the bills. He has previously vetoed some bills aimed at restricting big tech.
Newsom’s signal that he supports creating some regulation for AI comes two years after he vetoed SB 1047, an AI safety bill that would have required developers to submit safety protocols to the state attorney general, who could hold companies liable if the AI model they directly controlled were to threaten public safety. That legislation would also have required tech firms to be able to turn off the models they directly control if things went awry.
Newsom said at the time the bill would give the public a “false sense of security,” without making a sufficient distinction between the kinds of uses for which AI is deployed.
The bill was supported by a host of prominent AI researchers, but was opposed by Meta, OpenAI and industry groups.
A TRAVEL firm has been forced to close down after going bust and plunging into liquidation.
The company had previously said it had experience in “crafting journeys that turn moments into lasting memories,” but has now cancelled all trips.
London-based holiday firm Immaculate Travel has been ordered to close after seven years in business.
The travel firm offered holidaymakers “expertly arranged tours” on its private hire mini buses and coaches.
Immaculate Travel lists a host of UK landmarks and Europe holiday favourites as its coach trip destinations, from Rome and Amsterdam, to Stonehenge and Windsor Castle.
Its website also states it is available for a host of events, including school trips, attending festivals and travelling to sports events.
Now, following a court order, all holidays and trips will be cancelled and the business will not be operational.
Yesterday, A notice in the public record revealed that the High Court issued the company a winding up order, instructing them to end all business affairs.
The decision to wind up the business came from a petition issued in May by business loan firm Bizcap Limited, which was later heard before a judge in July.
Prior to closing down, the firm shared a five-star review for a trip to Bath, Somerset, encouraging customers to get in touch to plan their next trip.
Companies House records now show that Immaculate Travel is in liquidation after the winding up order under the Insolvency Act 1986 was issued.
The Sun has approached Immaculate Travel for comment.
Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images News
Companies and special interest groups with some of the diciest issues expected to land on California’s next governor’s desk are among the top financial backers of Democrat Xavier Becerra, the gubernatorial front runner.
Money from Big Tech, the healthcare industry, labor unions and tribes helped propel Becerra’s bid for governor, which languished at the outset then took off just months before the June primary. All are major players in national and state politics and have a major financial stake on the policies of California’s next governor.
Meta, which has contributed nearly $1.2 million to groups backing Becerra’s campagin, has faced mounting scrutiny by lawmakers and the courts. The Menlo Park-based company, which operates social media and communication platforms such as Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, just agreed to a landmark $17.1 billion settlement to resolve multi-state claims that its apps endanger children.
The state Legislature in August also passed a measure to bar social media platforms from providing an “addictive feature” to lure children, as well as bills to shield Californians from threats posed by the boom in artificial intelligence and data centers. The fate of these measures is now in the hands of Gov. Gavin Newsom, and the next governor likely will have to decide whether approve even stricter controls on Big Tech.
Meta is among eight donors that wrote seven-figure checks supporting Becerra’s gubernatrial campaign, with most of he money funneled to independent committees backing the Democrat that are not allowed to legally coordinate with the candidate. Campaigns often find back doors to do so.
Former state Sen. Steve Glazer, a Democrat who ran Jerry Brown’s successful 2010 gubernatorial campaign, said such spending is not surprising.
“Look, millions and billions of dollars are at stake, and the governor is the central point for all of that in California,” Glazer said. “It’s not a gamble anymore. You’re not picking a winner or a loser, right? So the floodgates open up for a runaway winner like Xavier Becerra.”
Becerra, the former secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and a longtime congressman, won one of the top two spots in the chaotic June primary. Republican Steve Hilton, a conservative media commentator and strategist who was endorsed by President Trump, won the other slot to advance to the Nov. 3 election. Becerra is considered a heavy favorite to win, given that Democratic voters in California outnumber Republicans nearly 2 to 1.
Becerra has the financial edge in the race, raising at least $30 million while also receiving significant support from the independent committees. Donors have contributed $48.8 million to Becerra’s campaign committee as well as outside efforts supporting his bid, according to a Times analysis of contributions through Sept. 3.
A Becerra spokesman said that although the campaign welcomed support from any donor, he would not weigh their contributions as he makes policy decisions if elected
“Xavier Becerra is laser-focused on making California work for working people — lowering costs, building housing, and making this state affordable again,” said Jonathan Underland, a spokesman for the Democrat. “Anyone willing to stand with us in that fight is welcome to join it, and we won’t hesitate to challenge anyone who gets in the way of that goal.”
His GOP rival raked in $18.8 million, including a $90,100 contribution from the candidate himself. Hilton’s top donors are billionaires and business executives including manufacturer Donald Friese and his wife Andrea, Silicon Valley billionaire Tim Draper, former Fox Corp. Chairman Rupert Murdoch, Google co-founder Sergey Brin, Los Angeles real estate magnate Geoffrey Palmer and the founder of defense contractor Anduril Industries, Palmer Luckey.
Executives and employees at Lighthouse Worldwide Solutions Inc., a company that makes contamination monitoring systems, contributed more than $474,000 to Hilton’s campaign.
A small handful of donors gave to both candidates. Uber and its employees gave nearly $42,000 to Hilton, while the company and an affiliated political action committee spent $1,039,200 supporting Becerra. Vlad Tenev, founder of the financial trading platform Robinhood, gave $289,000 to Becerra and $15,000 to Hilton.
A committee ostensibly established to oppose Hilton, an effort that effectively propped him up among Republican voters before the June primary, raised $2.5 million through large donations from the California Nurses Assn., the Service Employees International Union, the Democratic Governors Assn. and wealthy businessman Bill Bloomfield, an unsuccessful congressional candidate and Republican-turned-Democrat.
Hilton said Becerra’s financial backers are unsurprising and illustrate the “corruption” created by one-party rule in Sacramento.
“All these businesses and organizations assume he’s going to be the next governor, so they’re trying to bribe him,” Hilton said in an interview. “You can call it donations if you want, but it’s actually legalized bribery. … Big business and special interests are shoveling cash into his mouth in the hope that they can bribe him to do their bidding.”
Becerra, who served in public office for nearly 35 years, has a long history of support from powerful industries, labor unions and others with business before the government. During his 24 years in Congress, donors spent roughly $11 million supporting Becerra, according to the Times analysis and Open Secrets, a nonprofit, nonpartisan tracker of campaign fundraising. While he served as California attorney general for four years, contributors spent nearly $9.4 million backing him.
Among the former Biden Cabinet secretary’s top financial backers in the governor’s race are labor unions, healthcare groups, tech companies and Native American tribes that own some of the state’s splashiest casinos. All will probably be affected by decisions made by the next governor.
The Laborers’ International Union of North America and local affiliates and political arms, focused on infrastructure projects and the creation of union jobs, has contributed nearly $3.2 million. A committee associated with the California Assn. of Realtors that is focused on housing, real estate policy and property rights has spent nearly $2.8 million backing Becerra.
The Pechanga Band of Indians chipped in more than $2.3 million to efforts supporting Becerra at a time that gaming issues continue to be scrutinized.
A Pechanga representative said the tribe’s leader was unavailable due to travel but pointed to a statement he made before the primary.
“Secretary Becerra has stood with Indian Country for decades and understands Tribal sovereignty. When tribal healthcare was on the line, he was there,” said Tribal Chairman Mark Macarro. “This experience comes from a lifetime of public service, not a checkbook.”
The California Medical Assn. has spent nearly $1.5 million backing Becerra at a time of deep impending federal healthcare funding cuts and efforts by the state to backfill that lost financial support.
Dr. René Bravo, president of the California Medical Assn., which represents more than 50,000 physicians, said their spending was spurred by the their belief that Becerra is the best candidate to take on impending federal healthcare funding cuts that will harm millions of Californians access to care.
“Xavier Becerra understands healthcare and the challenges facing patients and physicians. The next governor will make critical decisions on MediCal, the physician workforce, affordability and access to care,” Bravo said. “We’re investing in this race because those decisions will directly affect California patients and physicians.”
Meta declined to comment on its contributions, and the Realtors and the Laborers did not respond to requests for comment.
Becerra, asked about the Realtors’ large donations supporting his campaign, noted that most of the money was contributed to committees outside his control. But he argued that his policy priorities have long been clear, including when he was an afterthought in the gubernatorial race.
“I was pretty clear in the primary, where I wasn’t getting as much support from a lot of different folks,” Becerra said Fridayat a news conference in north Long Beach supporting Proposition 1, a proposed $11.25-billion bond measure on the November ballot to boost affordable housing construction around the state.
“What I will tell you is this: Take a look at my record. Take a look at what I’ve said, and rather than look to inflated promises, look at what I’ve done in my record,” Becerra said, standing in front of Laborers’ International Union of North America members clad in orange safety vests. “And I will tell you, I have built, not just as a public servant, but when I was wearing myself that orange vest as a construction worker, as a laborer for Local 185, in my younger years, I was out there helping build. And so what we’re going to do is we’re going to do what we need to do, regardless what the voices say. We’re doing it because the people demand it.”
Fossil fuel and renewable energy firms have also supported Becerra, notably Chevron and affiliated groups and employees, spent more than $1.1 million boosting his bid — money that his Democratic rivals in the governor’s race and other critics, including climate activist Jane Fonda, pounced upon before the primary.
Billionaire hedge fund founder Tom Steyer deployed mobile billboards touting Becerra saying “You need Chevron, I need Chevron,” a clip from a longer comment about how every Californian doesn’t drive an electric car.
Chevron did not respond to a request for comment.
Earlier this year, Becerra was a single-digit polling afterthought in the crowded race to replace Newsom, who is termed-out. But after a dizzying primary that included a potential front-runner, then-Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Dublin), dropping out amid allegations of rape and sexual assault, Becerra took the lead in the Democratic field and placed first in the June election.
Becerra, 68, has a long career in elected office, serving two years in the state Assembly, 24 years in Congress, four years as California’s attorney general, and four years in the Biden administration.
While he was in Congress, donations to his federal campaign committee grew dramatically, according to an analysis of Federal Election Commission documents provided by Open Secrets.
In the early 1990s, Becerra was receiving donations in the low six figures, but by the end of his time in Congress, he was receiving well over $1 million during each two-year electoral cycle.
Finance, insurance and real estate firms and trade groups, such as Charles Schwab, the National Assn. of Insurance and Financial Advisors, the New York Life Insurance Co., Merrill Lynch and Pacific Life Insurance, were major supporters of Becerra, who served on the powerful House Ways and Means Committee, which regulates taxation. Such donors contributed more than $2.6 million to his congressional bids, according to Open Secrets.
Healthcare interests came in a close second, contributing more than $2.4 million to his congressional campaigns in the years before he was nominated and confirmed as Biden’s secretary of Health and Human Services, according to Open Secrets. Among the groups that supported Becerra’s federal campaigns included organizations representing physical therapists, anesthesiologists, podiatrists, assisted living and long term care facilities, and dietitians. While in Congress, Becerra was a strong advocate and supporter of the Affordable Care Act, a landmark healthcare overhaul championed by former President Obama.
Labor donated more than $1.7 million to Becerra’s congressional bids, a trend that continued when he ran for attorney general. Unions representing laborers, electrical workers, pipe fitters and firefighters donated $1 million, according to the Times analysis. The number has spiked to $6.3 million for Becerra’s gubernatorial bid.
Lorena Gonzalez Fletcher, president of the powerful California Labor Federation, said Becerra’s personal and political resume are significant at a time when the next governor will need to tackle artificial intelligence and the potential resulting job losses, the state’s volatile budget and federal funding cuts to MediCal and Medicare.
“He comes from a union family,” she said. “He has a long history of being on the right side of working people in a lot of different roles — in Congress, as attorney general and as secretary of Health and Human Services.”
Fox Corp.’s $22-billion acquisition of San José-based Roku, operator of streaming services and seller of hardware devices, seemed like a straightforward deal when it was announced in June: A growing media company was looking to bolster its presence in the fast-growing streaming industry.
But, on Wednesday, the Trump administration weighed in.
Fox Corp. and Roku said that the companies received requests from the Justice Department on Tuesday for additional information in connection with its review of the merger.
While Fox and Roku downplayed the requests, saying that they had expected the outreach, the timing of the move raised eyebrows among some analysts, who said it could signal further scrutiny of the transaction by the Justice Department.
“The president has been outspoken on the fact that he will take retaliatory action against networks that say things that he doesn’t agree with, or they do things that he doesn’t agree with,” said Rob Enderle, principal analyst at advisory services firm Enderle Group.
The action follows President Trump’s surprise over Fox’s ouster of anchor Maria Bartiromo. She was pushed out after she had shared internal company texts with the White House, which sources told The Times may have been the breaking point.
Trump said on social media that he couldn’t believe that Bartiromo will no longer have her shows on Fox. “Her fans, of which there are many, will not be happy,” he wrote on Truth Social on Sept. 3.
Associate Atty. Gen. Stanley Woodward said the Justice Department could not comment on pending matters but said in a statement: “We can affirm that this DOJ under President Trump’s leadership will continue to prioritize affordability for all Americans across our economy.”
Fox announced in June its plans to acquire Roku for $22 billion, which would give the company access to Roku’s 100 million households that use its platform to connect to different streaming services. The deal would benefit Fox’s advertising business, as well as make it less reliant on traditional pay TV platforms.
Fox and Roku said they expect the merger to be done by the first half of 2027, subject to regulatory and shareholder approval, according to a Sept 9 filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.
“FOX and Roku will continue to work cooperatively with the DOJ in its review of the Mergers,” Fox said in its filing.
Some legal experts said it is fairly standard for the Justice Department to make an additional request for information.
“It doesn’t mean that their review is going to be more extensive than usual,” said Ray Seilie, an entertainment attorney at law firm Kinsella Holley Iser Kump Steinsapir.
For example, the Justice Department made a second request for information when it reviewed Paramount Skydance’s deal to buy Warner Bros. Discovery, he said. The merging companies typically send information that helps the government figure out what the market impact will be of a merger, he added.
The Justice Department ultimately approved Paramount’s planned acquisition, despite opposition from some industry stakeholders. State attorneys general and the Writers Guild of America have sued Paramount over the deal, raising antitrust concerns. Others have pointed out close ties between Trump and Larry Ellison, a financial backer of the deal, who has also donated money to a group that supports Trump. Ellison’s son, David, is chief executive of Paramount Skydance.
Legal experts and analysts said they don’t think the combination of Fox and Roku raises antitrust issues because they are not dominant players in streaming and have businesses that complement each other.
But one wild card is Trump.
“You never know what Trump is going to seize on and decide he wants to do,” said Bryan Sullivan, a partner with law firm Early Sullivan Wright Gizer & McRae on whether Trump will take retaliatory action through the Justice Department in the Fox-Roku deal. “It’s chaos in the federal government and it could very well happen because of that reason, but it could also just be a blip and not a big deal.”
Times staff writer Stephen Battaglio contributed to this report.
Workers at “World of Warcraft” video game developer Blizzard Entertainment have ratified union contracts after two years of bargaining.
The ratification vote means all union-represented Blizzard employees — nearly 1,900 people across all units in the company’s games teams and shared services — will have the same contract language in their respective departments, the union said Wednesday.
Blizzard quality assurance workers in Albany and Austin were the first to unionize in 2022, followed by “World of Warcraft” employees in 2024. Last year, workers on the “Overwatch,” “Diablo,” “Hearthstone” and Warcraft Rumble” games teams, as well as the story and franchise development and platform technology units unionized.
“This contract marks the beginning of a new era at Blizzard Entertainment, but it doesn’t stop with us,” “Overwatch” bargaining committee member and quality analyst Simon Hedrick said in a statement. “I believe that the positive change we have won will ripple out and help make the games industry as a whole a better place for workers and players alike.”
The Blizzard contracts include wage increases and a hybrid work week of three days in the office, among other provisions, the union said. The contracts also require Blizzard to discuss and bargain over the use of artificial intelligence in the workplace.
“We appreciate the dedication and engagement of our represented employees and the bargaining committees throughout this process, as well as every Blizzard employee whose work continued alongside it,” Johanna Faries, Blizzard’s president, said in a statement. “The ratification of these agreements marks a significant milestone and reflects our shared commitment to continuing to work together in support of our teams and our players.”
Blizzard is a subsidiary of Santa Monica-based Activision Blizzard. The company was acquired by tech giant Microsoft Corp. in 2023.
In July, Microsoft said it would cut 3,200 jobs in its video game division, or about 20% of that staff, over the next year as the gaming industry continues to face a flagging landscape. The layoffs were part of a larger cost-cutting effort at Microsoft, which is laying off about 2% of its workforce in total.
Blizzard’s union said the planned layoffs, as well as job cuts throughout the video game industry, were a major issue during contract negotiations.
One of the provisions in the Blizzard contracts gives laid-off workers the right to be “recalled” into open jobs across Blizzard’s bargaining units for 14 months after the announcement of their layoff.
“This contract secures a lot of what people already love about working here while adding strong protections around layoffs, job security and remote work,” Daniel Weltz, platform and technology bargaining committee member and principal software engineer, said in a statement. “Blizzard helped shape the gaming industry, and I’m proud that this contract allows us to continue setting new standards for this work.”
