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Yahoo
09-04-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Top 20 most influential players in California tech
SAN FRANCISCO — The birthplace of Big Tech is at a crossroads. Never has California seen so many business leaders from its own backyard playing such a crucial role in shaping national — and international — policies, all while competing to see which of their inventions take off. Yet that also creates tension within a state where influential labor leaders, privacy advocates and mental health experts warn of the potential risks of letting innovations advance untethered. As a first-mover on AI laws and the only state with a dedicated privacy agency, California must decide how to continue to cement its unique position as both a pioneer of the cutting-edge technology that fuels its economy, and the guardrails that keep it in check. The people on this list could either foster — or foil — those efforts. It includes rule-makers seeking to define the principles of an ever-changing game; disruptors attempting to upend the status quo; watchdogs sounding the alarm over the social consequences of technology; influencers working overtly or behind-the-scenes to make an impact from the outside; and spenders, whose deep pockets or well-connected organizations move the needle through significant funds. While not exhaustive, this list aims to paint a picture of the broad range of players who help to define the politics and policy of the tech world in the state where it continues to evolve. With Silicon Valley's standing in Sacramento in flux in recent years, Newsom's importance to the industry has only grown. A former San Francisco mayor with longstanding personal ties to prominent CEOs and investors, Newsom is an innovation enthusiast with an abiding belief that California's competitive edge — and its tax receipts — depend on a thriving Silicon Valley. These days, if tech wants a major bill stopped, Newsom is often their best bet: The threat of his veto has shadowed major debates over artificial intelligence and autonomous vehicles last year. Newsom's tech-friendliness is all the more important in contrast to the increasingly aggressive stance taken by other California politicos. Legislative Democrats and their allies in organized labor have come to see major tech firms as bad actors who undermine stable jobs and endanger kids online. Their combative approach has produced a flurry of bills to rein in tech as companies increasingly plunge into ballot fights and legislative races. — Jeremy B. White The detail-oriented East Bay Democrat and environmental attorney of more than a decade oversees many of the Legislature's most ambitious tech regulations as chair of the Assembly Privacy and Consumer Protection Committee. That's given her broad authority, which she's wielded to bolster reproductive health privacy and restrict companies from using AI to exploit deceased actors' digital likenesses. She literally defined AI in California — legally speaking, at least, through a law passed in 2024. Still, some of her more ambitious proposals, like her push to prohibit 'algorithmic discrimination,' have failed to make it over the finish line. Bauer-Kahan, undeterred, is putting her influence to the test again this year with high-profile efforts to slap tobacco-style health warning labels on social media and identify copyrighted works used to train AI. — Tyler Katzenberger San Francisco's state senator has made a name for himself in Sacramento with his willingness to take on major tech issues, from net neutrality to AI regulation. Wiener's legislative efforts do not shy away from controversy and aren't always successful, like an AI safety bill last year that grabbed national attention — and opposition from Democratic leaders like Nancy Pelosi. Win or lose, the senator has a way of pushing the conversation forward, including through his influential roles chairing both the Senate Budget and Fiscal Review and Legislative Ethics committees as well as with his measures on housing, public transit and LGBTQ rights. Wiener is willing to engage critics and supporters alike, and has picked up where he left off on his AI safety bill, SB 1047, which Newsom vetoed last year. While Wiener has scaled back his ambitious AI bill from last year, the tech industry is still watching closely to see where his latest efforts will go. — Chase DiFeliciantonio The Oakland Democrat and former Obama staffer has wide-reaching power to kill or advance bills as the Assembly Appropriations Chair. She's leveraged that authority to shepherd through ambitious measures, like a landmark newsroom funding deal with Google, and the nation's first social media law requiring companies to take users' age into account, passed in 2022. Some of her efforts have attracted the ire of Big Tech, including the social media law, which is still facing an ongoing legal challenge in court over First Amendment complaints. But Wicks hasn't let up. She's now pushing new online safety measures like age verification for app downloads, plus bills on AI watermarking and quantum computing. And never doubt her commitment to the grind: Wicks went viral in 2020 for showing up to vote with her newborn child after being denied a proxy. —Tyler Katzenberger How best to describe California's relationship with clean car entrepreneur turned MAGA paragon Elon Musk? In a word: it's complicated. Tesla's success has both buoyed California's climate agenda and rested on billions of dollars in state subsidies. Its Fremont plant has generated manufacturing jobs and spurred clashes over Covid-19 restrictions and labor practices. His rocket company SpaceX is nurturing California's aerospace industry and fomentingstrife with a coastal regulator. After enjoying years of attention from California Democrats — Newsom in particular — Musk's conversion to Trump loyalist has made him anathema to liberals as he leads DOGE's cost-slashing crusades while fomenting fights over the state's policies on immigrants, AI deepfakes and transgender people. Electric cars are indispensable to California's climate goals,but many California politicians wish they could dispense with Musk. — Jeremy B. White As president and CEO of the famed startup accelerator Y Combinator, Tan coined the term 'Little Tech' to describe the scrappier, startup-driven side of the industry that's increasingly asserting itself in policy debates. In the past year, Tan has gone from a San Francisco Democrat to one of the most recognizable Silicon Valley figures lobbying Washington, particularly on issues of AI and antitrust. Under his watch, Y Combinator has pushed the line that good policy should promote innovation, stand up to Big Tech's deep pockets and avoid kneecapping the startups trying to compete. His group waded into Sacramento's fight last year over AI safety, and Tan raged against a proposed California law that would have banned after-work communications. He's equally active in San Francisco — mixing political donations with pointed X commentary on the city's future, while encouraging other tech leaders to get more involved, framing civic engagement as just another kind of systems design. — Christine Mui From his perch at one of the most influential venture capital firms, Andreessen has poured billions into the AI boom and lobbed takes on everything from climate change to AI risk, often with the air of an above-the-fray oracle who thinks government mostly gets in the way. His widely circulated techno-optimist manifesto staked out a political identity that is hyper-bullish on emerging technology, deeply skeptical of regulation and openly dismissive of caution. You can hear less aggressive echoes of that worldview in the way some state officials and Sacramento lawmakers discuss AI, not wanting to stifle California's innovation. Andreessen was a major contributor to Fairshake PAC's crusade to oust crypto-skeptic candidates in California, including Democratic Rep. Katie Porter — a populist whose viral takedowns of corporate execs clashed with Andreessen's techno-utopian ideology. His firm a16z jumped into the tech world's backlash against SB 1047, even launching a website to sound the alarm on its potential to chill investment and smother the open-source startup scene. Andreessen personally used his mic at an event to slam the legislation as Orwellian. He's now among the faces of the so-called tech right, a movement of VCs and company leaders openly aligning with Trump policies and rejecting the old liberal consensus that once dominated the Valley. — Christine Mui Kemp is the newly minted (and second-ever) leader of America's only dedicated privacy rights enforcement agency since its creation in 2020. His arrival as top privacy cop comes at a critical moment for the CPPA: Republicans in Washington — and even some traditionally tech-skeptical EU leaders in Brussels — are on a deregulation kick, right as the agency ramps up investigations of businesses accused of violating California's privacy laws. The CPPA also has five board members: Drew Liebert, Alastair MacTaggart, Brandie Nonnecke, Jennifer Urban and Jeffrey Worthe. They wield broad regulatory powers on data privacy but must tread carefully to fend off efforts from Congress to pass a federal law that would undermine their authority. That dynamic already has the board divided over how to draft potentially sweeping new rules for automated decision-making in the face of strong backlash from Big Tech. — Tyler Katzenberger When it comes to AI technology, autonomous vehicles are where the rubber hits the road. And in California and the Bay Area, Teamsters Joint Council 7 President Peter Finn is the one making sure that doesn't mean his union drivers and workers are put out of business. Finn rose through the ranks as a member and steward in the union's San Francisco outfit, now leading a combined 18 local unions with 100,000 members across Northern California, the Central Valley and Northern Nevada. His group continues to back measures that would place limits on autonomous delivery trucks and aim to keep union drivers in the cab. Though such efforts haven't always been successful, twice being thwarted by Newsom's veto pen, Finn's persistence has shown up in other ways. A push to protect his members' jobs at San Francisco's airport resulted in AVs sticking to carrying passengers and not parcels, and could become a blueprint for the technology expanding statewide, and beyond. — Chase DiFeliciantonio Steyer (not to be confused with his younger, billionaire brother and once presidential candidate Tom) is the high-energy founder and CEO of Common Sense Media, a youth-focused media and tech nonprofit. His group is often a launchpad for innovative kids' online safety policy ideas, like California's first-in-the-nation student data privacy law passed in 2014. Steyer also plays a major role in supporting other ambitious social media and privacy efforts, having sponsored the Golden State's sweeping 2020 Consumer Privacy Rights Act and Wicks' Age-Appropriate Design Code law. Steyer boasts a close relationship with Hillary Clinton and an antagonistic one with Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, both of which he's leveraged to spread his argument that Big Tech companies aren't doing enough to fight misinformation and protect young users' mental health on their platforms. — Tyler Katzenberger In their own right, Li, Chayes and Cuéllar would each be a force unto themselves in the world of AI policy. When they were tasked last year by Newsom to produce a roadmap on how best to regulate the rapidly expanding AI industry, their efforts quickly set the agenda in the technology's home state. As a co-founder of Stanford's marquee Human-Centered AI lab and a startup founder as CEO of World Labs, Li is a world-renowned expert on not just the inner workings of a complex technology, but its broader societal implications. Often referred to as 'The Godmother of AI,' Li previously served as the chief scientist focused on AI and machine learning at Google Cloud. Her public sector work includes previously advising a governor's commission on the future of work, and the administration of former President Joe Biden. Chayes is the first dean of the two-year-old UC Berkeley College of Computing, Data Science, and Society, bringing unique industry and academic experience to bear in the policy arena. A longtime researcher at Microsoft, she founded and managed three labs for the computing giant during her more than 20-year career there, focusing on core computing and AI. Chayes was previously a professor of mathematics at UCLA. Many Californians may recognize Cuéllar as a former justice of the Supreme Court of California and in his current role as president of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. He has also served three different White House administrations, previously leading Stanford's Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies. Cuéllar also serves on the boards of Inflection AI and Harvard University. — Chase DiFeliciantonio The brother and sister team behind the Claude family of chatbots have been deeply involved in the AI safety agenda since they founded the company in 2021. Both former OpenAI researchers and Bay Area natives, the Amodeis have pushed the technological and policy envelope when it comes to safe, secure and transparent AI systems. They're both regular fixtures at major tech events, from standing onstage with Hillary Clinton at this year's Common Sense summit in San Francisco, to rubbing elbows with foreign leaders at the AI Action Summit in Paris this past February. Their company was also engaged in Wiener's AI safety bill last year, suggesting amendments to strike a balance between industry and safety concerns. Anthropic was the first to grant the UK's AI Safety Institute early access to one of its models for safety testing, and has committed to safety measures even before the training of new models. Their different backgrounds in both politics and industry have helped shape their approach to both: Daniela Amodei previously worked for former Rep. Matt Cartwright (D-Pa.) before joining OpenAI and becoming the company's vice president of safety and policy, while Dario Amodei held positions at Baidu and Google before becoming vice president of research at OpenAI. — Chase DiFeliciantonio Meta's ace California lobbyist is charged with defending the company from agitated Sacramento lawmakers' barrage of bills aimed at regulating Big Tech firms and social media platforms. But she's more of a ninja than a gunslinger: the well-connected former Democratic operative and state cabinet official leverages her ties to quietly dismantle bills that would tie Meta's platforms, like Facebook and Instagram, in expensive regulatory knots. Meta has notched plenty of wins with her behind-the-scenes strategy. For example, a 2024 bill from Assemblymember Josh Lowenthal threatening fines of up to $1 million per child for social media platforms that harmed young users faltered after the Long Beach Democrat was strong-armed into accepting changes nearly identical to Meta's demands. She'll likely run the gauntlet again this year against a revived social media harms bill and Bauer-Kahan's proposal to slap 90-second, unskippable warning labels on social media. — Tyler Katzenberger Prieto has what every California lobbyist wants: a massive war chest at her command. As Uber's West Coast policy and communications chief, Prieto oversees the company's 'Uber Innovation PAC,' which had $30 million to spend on state candidates and ballot measures in the Golden State last year. That money has made Uber (and by extension, Prieto) a massive player in California's political arena with unparalleled reach to fight lawmakers who try to regulate its business model. So what's Prieto doing with all the money? Uber was a major benefactor for pro-business candidates in last year's legislative campaign, according to state campaign finance records, donating hundreds of thousands of dollars to successful Assembly candidates like Democrat Patrick Ahrens and Republican Steven Choi. The PAC also dropped more than a million dollars countering labor groups' bid to oust now-former state Sen. Josh Newman, a moderate Democrat. And as avid California Playbook readers might have noticed, the company is running a seven-figure ad campaign to protest California's mandatory insurance costs for rideshare services — fees it argues benefit predatory injury lawyers while inflating ride prices and eating into drivers' incomes. — Tyler Katzenberger The veteran Democratic strategist has spent years helping tech firms navigate the state's bruising policy fights. A former Clinton White House aide and Airbnb's political fixer, Lehane now leads global affairs at OpenAI — where he's applying his signature blend of bare-knuckle campaign tactics and insider savvy to steer the company through a rising tide of AI regulation in the states. In Sacramento, Lehane has emerged as the strategist-in-chief for an industry desperate to shape the rules before they're written. Nowhere is that clearer than in last summer's fight over Wiener's landmark AI safety proposal, SB 1047. As lawmakers pushed to impose first-of-their-kind safety mandates on advanced models, Lehane orchestrated a full-court press to block it. At the same time, Lehane has capitalized on a shift in Washington, where the AI conversation has moved from warnings about the technology's risks to bullish talk of dominating the field. OpenAI is now promoting national policy ideas akin to an industrial strategy to sustain the growth of American AI — and Lehane has styled himself and his firm as key players in the tech arms race against China. — Christine Mui Within the tech industry, the leather-jacketed CEO of chipmaker Nvidia has long been known to draw crowds like no other — but his influence in California's political circles is also growing impossible to ignore. As Nvidia has become the undisputed kingmaker in the AI hardware race, Huang has cultivated an image as a visionary technologist whose company holds the keys to the future. At the federal level, Nvidia's market dominance makes Huang's voice unavoidable in conversations about export controls, national competitiveness and even environmental policy. Behind the scenes, Nvidia has started to grow its lobbying footprint and spend, while Huang took his first meeting with Trump at the White House in January. It's in California though where his influence runs deepest, as Sacramento scrambles to respond to both the economic opportunity and geopolitical stakes of AI. State leaders are eager to cozy up to the industry's rising stars, and Huang is at the top of their list. Nvidia's role as a top employer, source of tax revenue and R&D powerhouse gives it a firm seat at the table. Last year, its blockbuster market performance helped prop up California's budget, earning a shoutout from Newsom in his State of the State address. The two also inked a first-of-its-kind deal to ramp up AI education for the state and its community colleges. — Christine Mui Benioff's influence is anchored in San Francisco, both literally in terms of its namesake tower and as the CEO of the city's largest private employer. The Bay Area native's roots also run deep, with his grandfather Marvin Lewis serving on the San Francisco Board of Supervisors. Benioff himself is godfather to one of Newsom's children, and the CEO has been deeply involved in San Francisco politics and philanthropy. He was the driving force behind San Francisco's Prop C homelessness tax on big businesses, including his own, and has given more than $100 million of his multi-billion-dollar fortune to Bay Area schools. But Benioff's reach goes beyond the City by the Bay. Salesforce's technology undergirds much of the modern business software on the market, serving as essentially the default customer relationship management program across industries and forming the substrate layer for countless other companies and websites. — Chase DiFeliciantonio Another Bay Area native, Conway — and his investments — are hugely responsible for shaping the Silicon Valley startup ecosystem into what it is today. The noted angel investor's career stretches back decades to his time as co-founder of Altos Computer Systems, which he took public in the 1980s. Conway went on to sink early cash into the likes of Google, Facebook and PayPal and is currently the founder and managing partner at SV Angel, whose portfolio includes Airbnb, Anthropic, Brex and many other companies. The investor also has close ties to San Francisco politics, working with former Mayor Ed Lee to orchestrate a tax break for what was then Twitter to put down roots in downtown. Philanthropically, Conway serves on the board of the Salesforce Foundation and is a donor to UCSF Benioff Children's Hospital and UCSF Medical Center, among other causes. He also founded to increase the tech community's civic engagement, and which advocates for immigration reform. — Chase DiFeliciantonio Hoffman helped launch LinkedIn, but these days he's just as focused on launching Democrats. In a state where tech billionaires are picking sides, he's emerged as the consigliere for the industry-friendly wing of the party. As a partner at VC firm Greylock, Hoffman's portfolio is basically a greatest hits of Silicon Valley influence — featuring Airbnb, Facebook and OpenAI — and so is his donor list. He's quick to cut the first check for anyone pushing his particular brand of tech optimism and has poured millions into super PACs like Future Forward. Hoffman gravitates toward pro-AI, center-left figures who champion pragmatic regulation, casting himself as a foil to both GOP Big Tech-bashing and progressive techlash. He's called for thoughtful guardrails around issues like misinformation and safety, while warning against overly broad or premature rules that could slow progress. — Christine Mui Google shattered records in 2024 by spending more on California lobbying than any other company that summer and more than it had for the last 20 years combined — a sign of where the search giant's real policy fights are heading. It poured over $10 million into a single quarter's campaign to kill Wicks' California Journalism Protection Act, a bill that would've forced it to pay news outlets for using their content. Google ultimately struck a side deal with the state to create a taxpayer-funded journalism sustainability fund, dodging the tens of millions in annual payouts the bill could have required. That eye-popping figure capped a two-year surge in statehouse influence as Google ramped up efforts to fend off not just the CJPA, but also recruited California's small businesses to oppose data privacy legislation. Waymo, the self-driving provider owned by Google parent Alphabet, also went on a pricey San Francisco lobbying blitz last year to get its robotaxis into the city's airport, parking itself in a standoff with labor unions. At the center of these efforts is Kent Walker, Alphabet's top legal mind and global policy chief. Walker, a Stanford Law grad and veteran litigator, started his career in the '90s at San Francisco's Howard Rice (now Arnold & Porter). Google's man in Sacramento is Jon Ross, the first outside lobbyist retained by the company way back in 2006 and a partner leading KP Public Affairs' technology practice. — Christine Mui
Politico
09-04-2025
- Business
- Politico
Top 20 most influential players in California tech
SAN FRANCISCO — The birthplace of Big Tech is at a crossroads. Never has California seen so many business leaders from its own backyard playing such a crucial role in shaping national — and international — policies, all while competing to see which of their inventions take off. Yet that also creates tension within a state where influential labor leaders, privacy advocates and mental health experts warn of the potential risks of letting innovations advance untethered. As a first-mover on AI laws and the only state with a dedicated privacy agency, California must decide how to continue to cement its unique position as both a pioneer of the cutting-edge technology that fuels its economy, and the guardrails that keep it in check. The people on this list could either foster — or foil — those efforts. It includes rule-makers seeking to define the principles of an ever-changing game; disruptors attempting to upend the status quo; watchdogs sounding the alarm over the social consequences of technology; influencers working overtly or behind-the-scenes to make an impact from the outside; and spenders, whose deep pockets or well-connected organizations move the needle through significant funds. While not exhaustive, this list aims to paint a picture of the broad range of players who help to define the politics and policy of the tech world in the state where it continues to evolve. With Silicon Valley's standing in Sacramento in flux in recent years , Newsom's importance to the industry has only grown. A former San Francisco mayor with longstanding personal ties to prominent CEOs and investors, Newsom is an innovation enthusiast with an abiding belief that California's competitive edge — and its tax receipts — depend on a thriving Silicon Valley. These days, if tech wants a major bill stopped , Newsom is often their best bet : The threat of his veto has shadowed major debates over artificial intelligence and autonomous vehicles last year. Newsom's tech-friendliness is all the more important in contrast to the increasingly aggressive stance taken by other California politicos. Legislative Democrats and their allies in organized labor have come to see major tech firms as bad actors who undermine stable jobs and endanger kids online . Their combative approach has produced a flurry of bills to rein in tech as companies increasingly plunge into ballot fights and legislative races . — Jeremy B. White The detail-oriented East Bay Democrat and environmental attorney of more than a decade oversees many of the Legislature's most ambitious tech regulations as chair of the Assembly Privacy and Consumer Protection Committee. That's given her broad authority, which she's wielded to bolster reproductive health privacy and restrict companies from using AI to exploit deceased actors' digital likenesses . She literally defined AI in California — legally speaking, at least, through a law passed in 2024 . Still, some of her more ambitious proposals, like her push to prohibit 'algorithmic discrimination,' have failed to make it over the finish line. Bauer-Kahan, undeterred, is putting her influence to the test again this year with high-profile efforts to slap tobacco-style health warning labels on social media and identify copyrighted works used to train AI. — Tyler Katzenberger San Francisco's state senator has made a name for himself in Sacramento with his willingness to take on major tech issues, from net neutrality to AI regulation. Wiener's legislative efforts do not shy away from controversy and aren't always successful , like an AI safety bill last year that grabbed national attention — and opposition from Democratic leaders like Nancy Pelosi. Win or lose, the senator has a way of pushing the conversation forward, including through his influential roles chairing both the Senate Budget and Fiscal Review and Legislative Ethics committees as well as with his measures on housing, public transit and LGBTQ rights. Wiener is willing to engage critics and supporters alike , and has picked up where he left off on his AI safety bill, SB 1047, which Newsom vetoed last year. While Wiener has scaled back his ambitious AI bill from last year, the tech industry is still watching closely to see where his latest efforts will go. — Chase DiFeliciantonio The Oakland Democrat and former Obama staffer has wide-reaching power to kill or advance bills as the Assembly Appropriations Chair. She's leveraged that authority to shepherd through ambitious measures, like a landmark newsroom funding deal with Google , and the nation's first social media law requiring companies to take users' age into account, passed in 2022. Some of her efforts have attracted the ire of Big Tech, including the social media law, which is still facing an ongoing legal challenge in court over First Amendment complaints. But Wicks hasn't let up. She's now pushing new online safety measures like age verification for app downloads, plus bills on AI watermarking and quantum computing. And never doubt her commitment to the grind: Wicks went viral in 2020 for showing up to vote with her newborn child after being denied a proxy. — Tyler Katzenberger How best to describe California's relationship with clean car entrepreneur turned MAGA paragon Elon Musk? In a word: it's complicated . Tesla's success has both buoyed California's climate agenda and rested on billions of dollars in state subsidies . Its Fremont plant has generated manufacturing jobs and spurred clashes over Covid-19 restrictions and labor practices . His rocket company SpaceX is nurturing California's aerospace industry and fomenting strife with a coastal regulator . After enjoying years of attention from California Democrats — Newsom in particular — Musk's conversion to Trump loyalist has made him anathema to liberals as he leads DOGE's cost-slashing crusades while fomenting fights over the state's policies on immigrants, AI deepfakes and transgender people . Electric cars are indispensable to California's climate goals,but many California politicians wish they could dispense with Musk. — Jeremy B. White As president and CEO of the famed startup accelerator Y Combinator, Tan coined the term 'Little Tech' to describe the scrappier, startup-driven side of the industry that's increasingly asserting itself in policy debates. In the past year, Tan has gone from a San Francisco Democrat to one of the most recognizable Silicon Valley figures lobbying Washington, particularly on issues of AI and antitrust. Under his watch, Y Combinator has pushed the line that good policy should promote innovation, stand up to Big Tech's deep pockets and avoid kneecapping the startups trying to compete. His group waded into Sacramento's fight last year over AI safety, and Tan raged against a proposed California law that would have banned after-work communications. He's equally active in San Francisco — mixing political donations with pointed X commentary on the city's future, while encouraging other tech leaders to get more involved, framing civic engagement as just another kind of systems design. — Christine Mui From his perch at one of the most influential venture capital firms, Andreessen has poured billions into the AI boom and lobbed takes on everything from climate change to AI risk, often with the air of an above-the-fray oracle who thinks government mostly gets in the way. His widely circulated techno-optimist manifesto staked out a political identity that is hyper-bullish on emerging technology, deeply skeptical of regulation and openly dismissive of caution. You can hear less aggressive echoes of that worldview in the way some state officials and Sacramento lawmakers discuss AI, not wanting to stifle California's innovation. Andreessen was a major contributor to Fairshake PAC's crusade to oust crypto-skeptic candidates in California, including Democratic Rep. Katie Porter — a populist whose viral takedowns of corporate execs clashed with Andreessen's techno-utopian ideology. His firm a16z jumped into the tech world's backlash against SB 1047, even launching a website to sound the alarm on its potential to chill investment and smother the open-source startup scene. Andreessen personally used his mic at an event to slam the legislation as Orwellian. He's now among the faces of the so-called tech right , a movement of VCs and company leaders openly aligning with Trump policies and rejecting the old liberal consensus that once dominated the Valley. — Christine Mui Kemp is the newly minted (and second-ever) leader of America's only dedicated privacy rights enforcement agency since its creation in 2020. His arrival as top privacy cop comes at a critical moment for the CPPA: Republicans in Washington — and even some traditionally tech-skeptical EU leaders in Brussels — are on a deregulation kick, right as the agency ramps up investigations of businesses accused of violating California's privacy laws. The CPPA also has five board members: Drew Liebert, Alastair MacTaggart, Brandie Nonnecke, Jennifer Urban and Jeffrey Worthe. They wield broad regulatory powers on data privacy but must tread carefully to fend off efforts from Congress to pass a federal law that would undermine their authority. That dynamic already has the board divided over how to draft potentially sweeping new rules for automated decision-making in the face of strong backlash from Big Tech. — Tyler Katzenberger When it comes to AI technology, autonomous vehicles are where the rubber hits the road. And in California and the Bay Area, Teamsters Joint Council 7 President Peter Finn is the one making sure that doesn't mean his union drivers and workers are put out of business. Finn rose through the ranks as a member and steward in the union's San Francisco outfit, now leading a combined 18 local unions with 100,000 members across Northern California, the Central Valley and Northern Nevada. His group continues to back measures that would place limits on autonomous delivery trucks and aim to keep union drivers in the cab. Though such efforts haven't always been successful, twice being thwarted by Newsom's veto pen, Finn's persistence has shown up in other ways. A push to protect his members' jobs at San Francisco's airport resulted in AVs sticking to carrying passengers and not parcels, and could become a blueprint for the technology expanding statewide, and beyond. — Chase DiFeliciantonio Steyer (not to be confused with his younger, billionaire brother and once presidential candidate Tom) is the high-energy founder and CEO of Common Sense Media, a youth-focused media and tech nonprofit. His group is often a launchpad for innovative kids' online safety policy ideas, like California's first-in-the-nation student data privacy law passed in 2014. Steyer also plays a major role in supporting other ambitious social media and privacy efforts, having sponsored the Golden State's sweeping 2020 Consumer Privacy Rights Act and Wicks' Age-Appropriate Design Code law . Steyer boasts a close relationship with Hillary Clinton and an antagonistic one with Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, both of which he's leveraged to spread his argument that Big Tech companies aren't doing enough to fight misinformation and protect young users' mental health on their platforms. — Tyler Katzenberger In their own right, Li, Chayes and Cuéllar would each be a force unto themselves in the world of AI policy. When they were tasked last year by Newsom to produce a roadmap on how best to regulate the rapidly expanding AI industry, their efforts quickly set the agenda in the technology's home state. As a co-founder of Stanford's marquee Human-Centered AI lab and a startup founder as CEO of World Labs, Li is a world-renowned expert on not just the inner workings of a complex technology, but its broader societal implications. Often referred to as 'The Godmother of AI,' Li previously served as the chief scientist focused on AI and machine learning at Google Cloud. Her public sector work includes previously advising a governor's commission on the future of work, and the administration of former President Joe Biden. Chayes is the first dean of the two-year-old UC Berkeley College of Computing, Data Science, and Society, bringing unique industry and academic experience to bear in the policy arena. A longtime researcher at Microsoft, she founded and managed three labs for the computing giant during her more than 20-year career there, focusing on core computing and AI. Chayes was previously a professor of mathematics at UCLA. Many Californians may recognize Cuéllar as a former justice of the Supreme Court of California and in his current role as president of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. He has also served three different White House administrations, previously leading Stanford's Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies. Cuéllar also serves on the boards of Inflection AI and Harvard University. — Chase DiFeliciantonio The brother and sister team behind the Claude family of chatbots have been deeply involved in the AI safety agenda since they founded the company in 2021. Both former OpenAI researchers and Bay Area natives, the Amodeis have pushed the technological and policy envelope when it comes to safe, secure and transparent AI systems. They're both regular fixtures at major tech events, from standing onstage with Hillary Clinton at this year's Common Sense summit in San Francisco, to rubbing elbows with foreign leaders at the AI Action Summit in Paris this past February. Their company was also engaged in Wiener's AI safety bill last year, suggesting amendments to strike a balance between industry and safety concerns. Anthropic was the first to grant the UK's AI Safety Institute early access to one of its models for safety testing, and has committed to safety measures even before the training of new models. Their different backgrounds in both politics and industry have helped shape their approach to both: Daniela Amodei previously worked for former Rep. Matt Cartwright (D-Pa.) before joining OpenAI and becoming the company's vice president of safety and policy, while Dario Amodei held positions at Baidu and Google before becoming vice president of research at OpenAI. — Chase DiFeliciantonio Meta's ace California lobbyist is charged with defending the company from agitated Sacramento lawmakers' barrage of bills aimed at regulating Big Tech firms and social media platforms. But she's more of a ninja than a gunslinger: the well-connected former Democratic operative and state cabinet official leverages her ties to quietly dismantle bills that would tie Meta's platforms, like Facebook and Instagram, in expensive regulatory knots. Meta has notched plenty of wins with her behind-the-scenes strategy. For example, a 2024 bill from Assemblymember Josh Lowenthal threatening fines of up to $1 million per child for social media platforms that harmed young users faltered after the Long Beach Democrat was strong-armed into accepting changes nearly identical to Meta's demands. She'll likely run the gauntlet again this year against a revived social media harms bill and Bauer-Kahan's proposal to slap 90-second, unskippable warning labels on social media. — Tyler Katzenberger Prieto has what every California lobbyist wants: a massive war chest at her command. As Uber's West Coast policy and communications chief, Prieto oversees the company's 'Uber Innovation PAC,' which had $30 million to spend on state candidates and ballot measures in the Golden State last year. That money has made Uber (and by extension, Prieto) a massive player in California's political arena with unparalleled reach to fight lawmakers who try to regulate its business model. So what's Prieto doing with all the money? Uber was a major benefactor for pro-business candidates in last year's legislative campaign, according to state campaign finance records, donating hundreds of thousands of dollars to successful Assembly candidates like Democrat Patrick Ahrens and Republican Steven Choi. The PAC also dropped more than a million dollars countering labor groups' bid to oust now-former state Sen. Josh Newman , a moderate Democrat. And as avid California Playbook readers might have noticed, the company is running a seven-figure ad campaign to protest California's mandatory insurance costs for rideshare services — fees it argues benefit predatory injury lawyers while inflating ride prices and eating into drivers' incomes. — Tyler Katzenberger The veteran Democratic strategist has spent years helping tech firms navigate the state's bruising policy fights. A former Clinton White House aide and Airbnb's political fixer, Lehane now leads global affairs at OpenAI — where he's applying his signature blend of bare-knuckle campaign tactics and insider savvy to steer the company through a rising tide of AI regulation in the states. In Sacramento, Lehane has emerged as the strategist-in-chief for an industry desperate to shape the rules before they're written. Nowhere is that clearer than in last summer's fight over Wiener's landmark AI safety proposal, SB 1047. As lawmakers pushed to impose first-of-their-kind safety mandates on advanced models, Lehane orchestrated a full-court press to block it . At the same time, Lehane has capitalized on a shift in Washington, where the AI conversation has moved from warnings about the technology's risks to bullish talk of dominating the field. OpenAI is now promoting national policy ideas akin to an industrial strategy to sustain the growth of American AI — and Lehane has styled himself and his firm as key players in the tech arms race against China. — Christine Mui Within the tech industry, the leather-jacketed CEO of chipmaker Nvidia has long been known to draw crowds like no other — but his influence in California's political circles is also growing impossible to ignore. As Nvidia has become the undisputed kingmaker in the AI hardware race, Huang has cultivated an image as a visionary technologist whose company holds the keys to the future. At the federal level, Nvidia's market dominance makes Huang's voice unavoidable in conversations about export controls, national competitiveness and even environmental policy. Behind the scenes, Nvidia has started to grow its lobbying footprint and spend , while Huang took his first meeting with Trump at the White House in January. It's in California though where his influence runs deepest, as Sacramento scrambles to respond to both the economic opportunity and geopolitical stakes of AI. State leaders are eager to cozy up to the industry's rising stars, and Huang is at the top of their list. Nvidia's role as a top employer, source of tax revenue and R&D powerhouse gives it a firm seat at the table. Last year, its blockbuster market performance helped prop up California's budget, earning a shoutout from Newsom in his State of the State address. The two also inked a first-of-its-kind deal to ramp up AI education for the state and its community colleges. — Christine Mui Benioff's influence is anchored in San Francisco, both literally in terms of its namesake tower and as the CEO of the city's largest private employer. The Bay Area native's roots also run deep, with his grandfather Marvin Lewis serving on the San Francisco Board of Supervisors. Benioff himself is godfather to one of Newsom's children, and the CEO has been deeply involved in San Francisco politics and philanthropy. He was the driving force behind San Francisco's Prop C homelessness tax on big businesses, including his own, and has given more than $100 million of his multi-billion-dollar fortune to Bay Area schools. But Benioff's reach goes beyond the City by the Bay. Salesforce's technology undergirds much of the modern business software on the market, serving as essentially the default customer relationship management program across industries and forming the substrate layer for countless other companies and websites. — Chase DiFeliciantonio Another Bay Area native, Conway — and his investments — are hugely responsible for shaping the Silicon Valley startup ecosystem into what it is today. The noted angel investor's career stretches back decades to his time as co-founder of Altos Computer Systems, which he took public in the 1980s. Conway went on to sink early cash into the likes of Google, Facebook and PayPal and is currently the founder and managing partner at SV Angel, whose portfolio includes Airbnb, Anthropic, Brex and many other companies. The investor also has close ties to San Francisco politics, working with former Mayor Ed Lee to orchestrate a tax break for what was then Twitter to put down roots in downtown. Philanthropically, Conway serves on the board of the Salesforce Foundation and is a donor to UCSF Benioff Children's Hospital and UCSF Medical Center, among other causes. He also founded to increase the tech community's civic engagement, and which advocates for immigration reform. — Chase DiFeliciantonio Hoffman helped launch LinkedIn, but these days he's just as focused on launching Democrats. In a state where tech billionaires are picking sides, he's emerged as the consigliere for the industry-friendly wing of the party. As a partner at VC firm Greylock, Hoffman's portfolio is basically a greatest hits of Silicon Valley influence — featuring Airbnb, Facebook and OpenAI — and so is his donor list. He's quick to cut the first check for anyone pushing his particular brand of tech optimism and has poured millions into super PACs like Future Forward. Hoffman gravitates toward pro-AI, center-left figures who champion pragmatic regulation, casting himself as a foil to both GOP Big Tech-bashing and progressive techlash. He's called for thoughtful guardrails around issues like misinformation and safety, while warning against overly broad or premature rules that could slow progress. — Christine Mui Google shattered records in 2024 by spending more on California lobbying than any other company that summer and more than it had for the last 20 years combined — a sign of where the search giant's real policy fights are heading. It poured over $10 million into a single quarter's campaign to kill Wicks' California Journalism Protection Act, a bill that would've forced it to pay news outlets for using their content. Google ultimately struck a side deal with the state to create a taxpayer-funded journalism sustainability fund, dodging the tens of millions in annual payouts the bill could have required. That eye-popping figure capped a two-year surge in statehouse influence as Google ramped up efforts to fend off not just the CJPA, but also recruited California's small businesses to oppose data privacy legislation . Waymo, the self-driving provider owned by Google parent Alphabet, also went on a pricey San Francisco lobbying blitz last year to get its robotaxis into the city's airport, parking itself in a standoff with labor unions. At the center of these efforts is Kent Walker, Alphabet's top legal mind and global policy chief. Walker, a Stanford Law grad and veteran litigator, started his career in the '90s at San Francisco's Howard Rice (now Arnold & Porter). Google's man in Sacramento is Jon Ross, the first outside lobbyist retained by the company way back in 2006 and a partner leading KP Public Affairs' technology practice. — Christine Mui
Politico
14-03-2025
- Climate
- Politico
Yana Valachovic is trying to soften the blow
With help from Alex Nieves and Jeremy B. White FIGHTING FIRE WITH LANDSCAPING: Yana Valachovic is at the forefront of trying to get Californians to adapt to fire. Valachovic, a University of California fire researcher and adviser to two fire-prone Northern California counties, turns into a detective when she visits the aftermath of a wildfire-turned-urban-conflagration, looking for clues on how the fire spread and the ripple effects of small actions people took to protect their property, from new vents to paved entryways. She's now pushing for tighter landscaping rules within the first five feet of a home as part of a working group at the state Board of Forestry, which is picking the previously paused rules back up after a directive from Gov. Gavin Newsom last month. She toured the Eaton and Pacific Palisades fire footprints in January and wasn't particularly heartened by what she saw. POLITICO caught up with her to talk about her observations and the heavy task of climate adaptation. This interview has been edited for length and clarity. Were these fires any different than past fires? Eaton and Palisades had a lot of wind driving the fire behavior, and that's similar to the Tubbs Fire, the Camp Fire, the Marshall Fire, all of which took in its path a lot of homes. I didn't anticipate that there would be as many [firefighting] resources already pre-staged in advance of the weather event. I saw many details that indicate that people had been at the home at some point and tried to do something to prevent fire spread to the structure, or did some amount of suppression, and there was way more of that than I've seen in other fires. What did you see exactly? The clues are pretty prominent. I would see evidence that someone had moved a doormat that might have showed signs of ignition away from the structure. I saw dozens of gates that had been cut, kicked, lifted off their hinges and then the gate thrown off and away from the property. You can also see signs of community members and residents trying to do things, so buckets left in the yard, or a hose reel from a pump that someone may have had and they were pumping water out of their pool. It shows that set of desperate actions and choices that people were having to make before they left. Did you see any examples of home hardening that made a difference? I'm trying to put it in a positive light. I think people did things for other reasons that have co-benefits associated with fire. Having your roof up-to-date and well-maintained is really important. I saw examples where people replaced their windows [with] tempered glass that has three times the heat resistant properties. I did see a few examples where folks had done some retrofitting to their vents. A new best practice is to upgrade to some vents that meet standards related to both flame and heat resistance, or as an interim step to add an additional layer of smaller metal mesh screening. The zone zero rules, which would ban flammable material within five feet of a structure in fire-prone areas, are back on the agenda. Will they go through this time, and why? I think the time is right. I think there's a lot of interest broadly in changing fire vulnerabilities and trying to help Californians navigate through this new reality of the much higher likelihood of a fire exposure than we've experienced historically, and to help in the insurance space, because if we can reduce some of the hazard, then that will lower the risk and increase the likelihood of a better outcome. California's politicians have been under political heat for overregulation, not underregulation, in light of the fires. Is adding requirements a smart move? I think the biggest thing is you can't unknow something. And we have very strong evidence that what's in the first five feet really impacts whether a building's going to survive or not when you have a wildfire with wind behind it. We can't unknow that, and if politicians do nothing in regard to that, I think that's untenable for them. How do you address concerns about costs? There's a lot that's in the DIY space that's possible. I think the question really is, how do you refinish around the house to meet your aesthetic standards? And that is, to me, where the cost mostly lies. What I think homeowners want to see is that when they come home, there's some beauty, there's some color. Maybe you don't want to see your foundations, but that is this kind of softening between the street and the structure. And I think that can be still done visually by pulling those plants a little farther away from the house. These retrofits and new landscaping are some of California's most prominent physical examples of climate adaptation. How do you bring people along? I think we need to lead with an empathetic heart, but also be honest about communicating what's at risk and what the possibilities are and how we can make a difference to adapt to the fire environment that we're in. Smokey Bear is for forest fires. Do you have a nomination for a new mascot for this era of wildfire education? Maybe a red-tailed hawk? They have exceptional eyesight — maybe we could say visionary — and they are adaptable and thrive in many habitats. In this moment we need to think and live differently. — CvK NEW NEWSLETTER: Are you a transportation nerd curious about the future of autonomous vehicles? A fire techie monitoring Silicon Valley's influence in Washington, D.C.? Or just a friendly POLITICO fan? You'll love our new sister newsletter, POLITICO Pro Technology: California Decoded. You can subscribe here. Did someone forward you this newsletter? Sign up here! SPEAKING OF FIRE: Katie Porter immediately staked some ground on the property insurance problem in her first campaign event after she announced her candidacy for California governor in 2026. Speaking at a big Democratic club in Orange County on Thursday, Porter said 'the next governor is going to have to head-on tackle the home insurance problem.' One of her big ideas: getting the state involved as a backstop. 'I do think that the state may have a role in thinking about wildfire risk,' Porter said in response to a moderator's question. 'Reinsurance, insuring the insurer, that is a way that California could come into some of this.' She added a word of caution about 'learning lessons' from other government backstops, noting that the federal government's National Flood Insurance Program isn't solvent. She also mentioned incentivizing home hardening and recruiting more firefighters to make California a more enticing place for insurance companies. 'We also need to think about bigger umbrella ways to bring in private insurers and keep them here at a rate that makes homeowners insurance affordable,' she said. — CvK, JBW AND DON'T FORGET THE CURRENT COMMISSIONER: Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara provisionally approved a 22 percent emergency rate hike for State Farm today. The state's largest insurer, with 16 percent of the market, had asked for the emergency hike to stave off a credit downgrade after the Los Angeles fires, which it called the costliest disaster in its history. The company has been in deep financial trouble for years, fueling its 2023 decision to stop writing new policies in California. State Farm executives have said that the emergency rate hike wouldn't be enough for the company to start writing new policies again, but that it was probably enough to avoid non-renewals through 2025. Lara scheduled a full rate hearing for April 8, at which State Farm will have to justify its request with more data or else issue refunds. — CvK BUYER'S REMORSE: Arizona Sen. Mark Kelly is ditching his Tesla. The Democrat announced the move today in a post on X, just days after Trump turned the White House lawn into a Tesla showroom to support Elon Musk as the company's stock plummets. Kelly in a one-minute video said he couldn't drive the car without thinking about the damage Musk's Department of Government Efficiency — tasked with slashing federal spending — has done to the government, including the firing of veterans. Kelly is a retired U.S. Navy captain. 'Elon Musk kind of turned out to be an asshole, and I don't want to drive a car built and designed by an asshole,' Kelly said. Trump and his conservative allies like Sean Hannity are trying to boost Tesla, which faces international protests amid Musk's involvement in right-wing politics. U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi said Friday that she's opening an investigation into cases of vandalism at Tesla dealerships. Democrats want their own investigation. Four senators, including California's Adam Schiff, sent a letter to the U.S. Office of Government Ethics on Thursday asking it to probe the White House lawn episode. — AN — California snowpack is still below average, despite this week's storm. — KCRW's Good Food podcast dives into how climate change is upending California's iconic Dungeness crab fishery. — Assemblymember Tasha Boerner wants to go to the ballot to refocus the California Public Utilities Commission on affordability.
