Union leaders’ support for Newsom hinges on AI’s position

from Dan WaltersCalMatters

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National union leaders and those from California and the early presidential primary are gathering in Sacramento this week to bluntly warn Gavin Newsom that union support for his 2028 presidential campaign depends on protecting jobs from artificial intelligence.

The event, organized by the California Federation of Labor Unions, called AI “the greatest existential threat facing working Americans today.” The group wants Newsom “or any candidate looking forward to the 2028 election” to know “loud and clear” that “our members want a leader who works with organized labor to protect jobs and create artificial intelligence guardrails.”

The event clearly singled out Newsom because of his favorite status in very early pre-campaign polls, as well as the leading role California’s high-tech industry is playing in AI development and Newsom’s somewhat ambivalent attitude to AI’s potential effects.

“The spread of artificial intelligence in recent years has been nothing short of explosive,” a paper on the event said. “Employers have embraced AI for everything from using it to monitor and track workers to determining worker wages to replacing workers entirely.

“Artificial intelligence is a multi-billion dollar industry that continues to grow unchecked, without common sense, leaving workers’ livelihoods ruined and even lost in its wake.”

The briefing paper specifically cited Newsom’s veto from last year Senate Bill 7a union-backed bill banning employers from using AI to make employee discipline and termination decisions. In rejecting itNewsom said the measure was “overbroad” and would prevent even harmless uses of AI.

Newsom’s veto is an example of his efforts, as the AI ​​industry explodes, to satisfy both the tech industry, with which he has decades of political ties, and those worried about AI’s societal and economic impact.

It’s the bill one of many introduced to address these impacts. In general, Newsom has tended to favor attempts to protect children and other vulnerable groups from AI, while opposing measures that could slow the industry’s growth. Taxation of profits from AI investments is an important source of income for a country with a chronic budget deficit.

During his final state of the state address told the Legislature last month, Newsom said, “It goes without saying that no technology holds more promise and more danger to jobs, to our economy, to our way of life than artificial intelligence. The technology genie, it’s out of the bottle. So the question is not whether change is happening; it is. The question is: What values ​​are going to guide us to this new frontier?”

Newsom lauded “landmark legislation to create the first national rules for the responsible, ethical and safe use of AI, regulations that provide guardrails that balance risk and opportunity.”

He called it a “template for the nation” recently emulated by New York, but did not mention measures like SB 7, which he directly or indirectly blocked.

It is not easy to determine whether artificial intelligence is the threat that worries union leaders. If one plugs “AI effect on jobs” into an internet search engine (powered by AI, of course), a plethora of studies and reports immediately pop up.

While they all acknowledge that there will be impacts, there is a wide range of opinion about which industries and job categories will be affected, and whether those effects will be evolutionary or revolutionary, positive or negative.

Unions have taken the negative as seen by 148-day strike by Hollywood screenwriters in 2023 about the impact of AI on their craft. It is also notable—and ironic—that Silicon Valley tech companies are laying off workers as they use AI to do the coding work that was done by humans.

Uncertainty about the future creates fear, and fear is a huge motivator in political campaigns, as Newsom will be reminded this week.

This article was originally published on CalMatters and is republished under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivatives license.