In summary
Leaders of the AFL-CIO, representing 2.3 million members nationwide, say Gov. Gavin Newsom needs to focus on the harms of technology to win support for his presidential bid.
If Governor Gavin Newsom wants to become president of the United States, he must address the impact of artificial intelligence on workers. This is the message sent today to Sacramento by members of the AFL-CIO, a union which brings together 2.3 million members.
Present at a news conference, held just steps from the California state capitol, were AFL-CIO President Liz Shuler, California Federation of Labor President Lorena Gonzalez, and leaders of four state union federations, including those in traditional early primary states like Iowa and U.S.A. vying for earlier spots in the state’s primary calendar like Georgia and North Carolina.
The California Federation of Labor wants a variety of statewide regulations to protect workers, including limitations on how managers can use predictive AI, advance notice of AI-related job cuts, and restrictions on workplace surveillance. And it showed a willingness to play the game hard.
“I don’t think you’re going to have a lot of motivation to travel precincts for someone who doesn’t want to engage working-class voters on the very things that are taking away their jobs,” Gonzalez said of Newsom’s widely anticipated 2028 presidential campaign.
The pressure campaign on the governor highlights not only how important these protections are to unions, but also how hard Newsom should resist them. The state is facing a Projected budget deficit of $18 billion for next fiscal year and more and more relies on AI for tax revenue. Meanwhile, tech companies like Meta, OpenAI, and early-stage investor Andreessen Horowitz have created political action committees to support pro-AI candidates.
“If we hurt the bottom line, it will also hurt the state and I wouldn’t want to be the governor who caused a recession, especially if I’m running for federal office,” Julie Salley, a consultant to the state Assembly’s Privacy and Consumer Protection Committee, said in comments to a group of students Tuesday.
Last year, several A.I. bills supported by unions Newsom vetoed or failed to approve the Legislature, including a bill that sought to protect truckers from autonomous vehicles that failed after two vetoes from Newsom.
A spokeswoman for the governor, Tara Gallegos, said Newsom has led the state toward the most comprehensive, worker-friendly approach to AI in the country. “No governor has done more than Governor Gavin Newsom to regulate AI in a way that protects workers without killing jobs or innovation,” she wrote in an email.
On Wednesday, union leaders presented AI as an issue where the public largely supports regulation. A national A Gallup poll released in September 2025 showed 80% of Americans want regulation to protect them from AI, even if it means slowing down innovation. Surveys at the end of 2025 by Carnegie California And TechEquity similarly, a large majority of Californians want to be protected from AI. President Trump and some congressional Republicans have moved to discourage regulation of AI at the state level. Meanwhile, some political observers predict that the influence of tech interests will grow rapidly.
“We have this golden moment before it’s too late to pass AI laws at the state level,” she said at the event Wednesday. “Be on the right side of history.”
Gonzalez announced Wednesday that the labor federation intends to sponsor or support two dozen bills this year to address the negative impact of AI on workers and called on Newsom to support them. So far, she said, the governor has failed to deal with what’s coming. The governor’s office did not respond to a request for a response to the accusation.
Iowa Federation of Labor President Charlie Wishman said Newsom should expect to hear questions about his record on protecting workers from AI among union members and voters before his state’s presidential caucuses.
“You are literally the person In the state who can actually help the rest of the nation on this,” he said.
For people with jobs, concerns about AI extend beyond job loss. It is increasingly clear that technology can wage theft for fuelleads to higher injury rates in warehouses, lower a person’s self-esteem, drive people into less qualified rolesor monitor workers to prevent unionization.
This year, the California Federation of Labor plans to support bills including Senate Bill 947a restart of a last year’s bill This law, if passed, would prevent companies from making management decisions about their employees based solely on a prediction made by an AI model. In a nod to Newsom, the new version removes the requirement for companies to notify people before AI is used to decide whether to discipline or fire a worker. The California Federation of Labor also supports bills that require employers to give notice when considering replacing jobs with AIand a bill to prevent AI-based workplace surveillance, which did not receive enough support in a vote last fall.
Governor Newsom, now in his final year in office, has walked a political tightrope on AI, trying to strike a balance between regulating the technology and supporting the business interests that benefit from it. For example, a 2023 executive order that influences how the state treats generative AI. both implore state agencies must take steps to protect against potential harm and find opportunities to use the technology. Border AI task force formed at Newsom’s request last year we introduced recommendations on how to strike a balance between safeguards designed to protect people and innovation that benefits business interests. In his final State of Play speech last month, he declared that “no technology is more promising and more perilous for jobs, for our economy, for our way of life than artificial intelligence”.
AI advocates are moving quickly to push politicians to their side of the line. How much money companies spend lobbying the governor is not detailed in state records, but tech companies are spending more on lobbying in Sacramento. For the first time, Anthropic spent $200,000 to lobby legislators and the governor of Sacramento. last year, follow OpenAI first adventure while defending his position in the state capital. Meta spent $4.6 million lobbying California officials last year, the most ever spent defending their positions in Sacramento and earlier this week. paid $65 million in political action committees to support pro-AI political candidates.
Josh Lowenthal, a Democratic Assemblyman from Long Beach, said he was scared of forming pro-AI PACs because of the potential to create even greater tech wealth.
“The alarm bells should be ringing for all of us, because we have one, two, three years left before this money becomes so deeply ingrained in the current generation of elected officials that it could be devastating for an entire generation,” he said.
Jeremy Kimelman contributed to this report.