California is the fourth-largest economy in the world, the birthplace of tech, and the top pipeline for tech talent, and has demonstrated its ability to responsibly advance innovation and safeguards – helping everyone from the nation’s largest valued tech companies to pre-seed startups to thrive.

California’s tech leadership

The Trump administration and congressional Republicans have proven themselves incapable of passing even the most basic consumer protections when it comes to AI, and giving them sole control over AI’s implementation in practice would mean no AI safeguards. Trump and his cronies are too busy making corrupt deals to actually turn their attention to protecting the public and creating jobs. 

Meanwhile, Governor Newsom has been more out front on advancing AI than any other state governor:

• Directing the state to responsibly integrate AI into state operations, including directing the development of innovative new procurement mechanisms, AI sandboxes to pilot the technology, new cybersecurity assessments, and new guidelines to ensure safe and ethical use.
• Advancing cutting-edge policy by commissioning a report from world-leading AI academics and experts to help advance responsible AI governance.
• Leading with efficiency, issuing an executive order to solicit input from state employees and partnering with executive and tech leaders to expand the use of efficiency tools, including AI, into state government.
• Making Californians’ lives better through GenAI, reducing highway congestion, improving roadway safety, enhancing customer service in a state call center, and improving wildfire detection, among other new initiatives. 
• Leveraging industry partnerships with Nvidia, Google, Adobe, IBM, and Microsoft to help prepare the current and future generation to lead an AI-ready workforce, including expanding access to AI trainings for over two million students and faculty in public high schools and universities across California, including community colleges and California State Universities.

California’s innovation economy dominates

• California is home to 33 of the top 50 privately held AI companies around the globe and leads with 25% of all AI patents, conference papers, and companies. 
• The Bay Area captured a majority of U.S. AI startup funding in the past year. From Q3 2024 to Q2 2025, the Bay Area attracted 51% of ALL U.S. AI startup funding on Carta’s platform — far ahead of the entire state of New York (11%) and Boston (5.5%).
• California leads U.S. demand for AI talent. In 2024, 15.7% of all U.S. AI job postings were in California — #1 by state, well ahead of Texas (8.8%) and New York (5.8%), per the 2025 Stanford AI Index.
• In 2024, more than half of global VC funding for AI and machine learning startups went to companies in the Bay Area.
• California is home to three of the four companies that have passed the $3 trillion valuation mark. Each of these California-based companies — Google, Apple, and Nvidia — are tech companies involved in AI and have created hundreds of thousands of jobs.

Birthplace of modern tech

California works closely to foster tech leadership and create an environment where industry and talent thrive. This is why California is home to the most tech companies in the nation. California is the global leader in technology and is balancing its work to advance AI with commonsense laws to protect the public, while also embracing the technology to make our lives easier and make government more efficient, effective, and transparent.

Today’s executive order threatens to preempt state laws that protect the public, including children and seniors. California currently has laws that help: