Governor Newsom rejects California's contentious AI legislation, SB 1047.

California Governor Gavin Newsom has vetoed SB 1047, a significant bill aimed at regulating AI development. Authored by State Senator Scott Wiener, the bill sought to make companies responsible for implementing safety measures to prevent "critical harms" in AI models. These regulations would have applied to AI systems with training costs over $100 million and processing power exceeding 10^26 FLOPS (floating point operations).

The bill faced opposition from Silicon Valley, including companies like OpenAI, AI experts like Meta’s chief scientist Yann LeCun, and Democratic figures like Congressman Ro Khanna. Although it was passed by California’s legislature, Newsom had already expressed concerns about the bill. In his veto statement, he acknowledged the bill's good intentions but argued that it imposed overly strict standards on large-scale systems, regardless of the risks or sensitivity of the environment in which they are deployed. He did not believe it was the best way to address potential dangers of AI technology.

Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi had also criticized the bill, calling it “well-intentioned but ill-informed.” After the veto, she praised Newsom for recognizing the need to support small entrepreneurs and academia over large tech companies. Newsom’s office highlighted that, within the past month, he has signed 18 AI-related regulatory bills and consulted with experts like Fei-Fei Li and others to help establish practical guidelines for generative AI deployment. Li, a renowned AI expert, had previously expressed concerns that SB 1047 would negatively impact California’s growing AI sector.