Victims of the January wildfires in Los Angeles County urged Gov. Gavin Newsom on Thursday to call for the resignation of California Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara, saying the regulator has allowed insurers to run roughshod over them.

Lara, an independently elected state official, was accused at an Altadena news conference of being too closely aligned with the interests of insurers who homeowners say have delayed, denied and lowballed claims, forcing victims to tap retirement accounts and max out credit cards as they fight for their benefits.

“Gov. Newsom, we need your help. Your Palisades constituents have your back. Now is the time for you to have ours,” said Jill Spivack, 59, a Pacific Palisades resident whose home of 25 years burned down but who has yet to start rebuilding.

“You made promises when the cameras were rolling,” Spivack added. “Now we need to see your actions behind those words. Commissioner Lara has proven he won’t protect consumers. Please replace him with someone who will.”

The event, attended by several dozen Altadena and Pacific Palisades fire victims, was held by the Eaton Fire Survivors Network and attended by other groups, including the Los Angeles insurance advocacy group Consumer Watchdog, which called on Lara to resign last year.

Joy Chen, executive director of the network, cited recent surveys that found 70% of insured survivors have encountered delays and denials, while 8 in 10 Eaton and Palisades fire survivors are still displaced. The fires damaged or destroyed nearly 13,000 homes.

“We have an unprecedented housing crisis on our hands, which grew out of the insurance crisis on our hands,” Chen said. “That is why it is so urgent that Gov. Newsom act now.”

Newsom’s press office did not immediately respond to a request for comment. A spokesperson for Lara —whose term expires in 2026 — rejected any suggestion he would resign.

“The facts are Commissioner Lara has moved quickly and decisively to respond to the fires, including using every tool available to ensure wildfire survivors receive all the benefits they are entitled to under current law,” said Michael Soller, the department’s deputy commissioner of communications.

On Saturday, Lara had posted on X, “I’m here to finish the job — and leave the next Commissioner in a stronger position than I inherited.”

To advance its goals, the Eaton network established a website — lararesign.org — where fire victims and others can send emails to the governor and Lara asking for the commissioner’s resignation and leaving comments.

Much of the anger from fire victims has been directed at State Farm General, California’s largest home insurer, which dropped tens of thousands of policyholders in recent years and has been the target of complaints about its claims handling.

Spivack, who said her home on Aderno Way has been insured by State Farm for decades, said that it has been a full-time job getting her personal property claims paid amid changing adjusters and other issues.

Meanwhile, she has been haggling with the insurer for months after getting an estimate of only $250 a square foot to rebuild her home, less than a third of the going rate.

“At first we thought, thank goodness we have insurance. We’ve been loyal State Farm customers for 25 years,” Spivack said. “We trusted their promise to help us rebuild like a good neighbor. But what we faced instead is confusion, lowball estimates and a delay at every turn.”

Altadena resident Branislav Kecman, 64, who lost his Crescent Drive home of 12 years in the fire, said he was dropped by State Farm in July 2024 and forced onto the FAIR Plan where his coverage dropped from $1.5 million to $1 million but got more expensive.

“We really feel betrayed by our system, especially our commissioner that’s supposed to fight for our interest instead of, so to speak, being in bed with the insurance companies,” he said.

Bob Devereux, a State Farm spokesperson, said the insurer has handled more than 13,500 claims and paid almost $5 billion to January wildfire victims, with nearly 200 claim adjusters still on the ground.

“State Farm is committed to paying customers what they’re owed. We’re here every step of the way and working with elected officials to build a more sustainable insurance market in California,” he said.

Chen and Carmen Balber, executive director of Consumer Watchdog, also accused Lara of exacerbating the state’s insurance crisis through loopholes in his Sustainable Insurance Strategy, which was backed by the governor.

The regulatory changes gave insurers concessions, including the right to charge homeowners for reinsurance, in exchange for a pledge to write more policies in fire-prone neighborhoods.

However, since the deal was announced in 2023 insurers have dropped hundreds of thousands of homeowners onto the FAIR Plan’s rolls, as The Times has reported.

Soller said the department is currently reviewing rate filings submitted by five insurers that will commit the companies “to stay and grow” in the state, and it expects more to enter the market.

Chen advocated for a new insurance commissioner to adopt a five-point plan developed by the Eaton group to improve the insurance market and oversight of insurers.

That plan includes finishing an investigation into State Farm’s claims practices started this year by the department within 60 days — and freezing any rate hikes for the insurer until the claims issues are resolved. (Lara’s stance has been that the two issues are legally separate matters.)

Other elements of the plan include ending denials by the FAIR Plan of smoke damage claims — another issue the department is investigating — and preventing “illegal cuts’’ in temporary housing benefits while survivors rebuild.

Soller said the department is already working on the various matters raised.

California’s tech companies, the epicenter of the state’s economy, sent politicians a loud message this year: Back down from restrictive artificial intelligence regulation or they’ll leave.

The tactic appeared to have worked, activists said, because some politicians weakened or scrapped guardrails to mitigate AI’s biggest risks.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom rejected a bill aimed at making companion chatbots safer for children after the tech industry fought it. In his veto message, the governor raised concerns about placing broad limits on AI, which has sparked a massive investment spree and created new billionaires overnight around the San Francisco Bay Area.

Assembly Bill 1064 would have barred companion chatbot operators from making these AI systems available to minors unless the chatbots weren’t “foreseeably capable” of certain conduct, including encouraging a child to engage in self-harm. Newsom said he supported the goal, but feared it would unintentionally bar minors from using AI tools and learning how to use technology safely.

“We cannot prepare our youth for a future where AI is ubiquitous by preventing their use of these tools altogether,” he wrote in his veto message.

The bill’s veto was a blow to child safety advocates who had pushed it through the state Legislature and a win for tech industry groups that fought it. In social media ads, groups such as TechNet had urged the public to tell the governor to veto the bill because it would harm innovation and lead to students falling behind in school.

Organizations trying to rein in the world’s largest tech companies as they advance the powerful technology say the tech industry has become more empowered at the national and state levels.

Meta, Google, OpenAI, Apple and other major tech companies have strengthened their relationships with the Trump administration. Companies are funding new organizations and political action committees to push back against state AI policy while pouring money into lobbying.

In Sacramento, AI companies have lobbied behind the scenes for more freedom. California’s massive pool of engineering talent, tech investors and companies make it an attractive place for the tech industry, but companies are letting policymakers know that other states are also interested in attracting those investments and jobs. Big Tech is particularly sensitive to regulations in the Golden State because so many companies are headquartered there and must abide by its rules.

“We believe California can strike a better balance between protecting consumers and enabling responsible technological growth,” Robert Boykin, TechNet’s executive director for California and the Southwest, said in a statement.

Common Sense Media founder and Chief Executive Jim Steyer said tech lobbyists put tremendous pressure on Newsom to veto AB 1064. Common Sense Media, a nonprofit that rates and reviews technology and entertainment for families, sponsored the bill.

“They threaten to hurt the economy of California,” he said. “That’s the basic message from the tech companies.”

Advertising is among the tactics tech companies with deep pockets use to convince politicians to kill or weaken legislation. Even if the governor signs a bill, companies have at times sued to block new laws from taking effect.

“If you’re really trying to do something bold with tech policy, you have to jump over a lot of hurdles,” said David Evan Harris, senior policy advisor at the California Initiative for Technology and Democracy, which supported AB 1064. The group focuses on finding state-level solutions to threats that AI, disinformation and emerging technologies pose to democracy.

Tech companies have threatened to move their headquarters and jobs to other states or countries, a risk looming over politicians and regulators.

The California Chamber of Commerce, a broad-based business advocacy group that includes tech giants, launched a campaign this year that warned over-regulation could stifle innovation and hinder California.

“Making competition harder could cause California companies to expand elsewhere, costing the state’s economy billions,” the group said on its website.

From January to September, the California Chamber of Commerce spent $11.48 million lobbying California lawmakers and regulators on a variety of bills, filings to the California secretary of state show. During that period, Meta spent $4.13 million. A lobbying disclosure report shows that Meta paid the California Chamber of Commerce $3.1 million, making up the bulk of their spending. Google, which also paid TechNet and the California Chamber of Commerce, spent $2.39 million.

Amazon, Uber, DoorDash and other tech companies spent more than $1 million each. TechNet spent around $800,000.

The threat that California companies could move away has caught the attention of some politicians.

California Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta, who has investigated tech companies over child safety concerns, indicated that despite initial concern, his office wouldn’t oppose ChatGPT maker OpenAI’s restructuring plans. The new structure gives OpenAI’s nonprofit parent a stake in its for-profit public benefit corporation and clears the way for OpenAI to list its shares.

Bonta blessed the restructuring partly because of OpenAI’s pledge to stay in the state.

“Safety will be prioritized, as well as a commitment that OpenAI will remain right here in California,” he said in a statement last week. The AG’s office, which supervises charitable trusts and ensures these assets are used for public benefit, had been investigating OpenAI’s restructuring plan over the last year and a half.

OpenAI Chief Executive Sam Altman said he’s glad to stay in California.

“California is my home, and I love it here, and when I talked to Attorney General Bonta two weeks ago I made clear that we were not going to do what those other companies do and threaten to leave if sued,” he posted on X.

Critics — which included some tech leaders such as Elon Musk, Meta and former OpenAI executives as well as nonprofits and foundations — have raised concerns about OpenAI’s restructuring plan. Some warned it would allow startups to exploit charitable tax exemptions and let OpenAI prioritize financial gain over public good.

Lawmakers and advocacy groups say it’s been a mixed year for tech regulation. The governor signed Assembly Bill 56, which requires platforms to display labels for minors that warn about social media’s mental health harms. Another piece of signed legislation, Senate Bill 53, aims to make AI developers more transparent about safety risks and offers more whistleblower protections.

The governor also signed a bill that requires chatbot operators to have procedures to prevent the production of suicide or self-harm content. But advocacy groups, including Common Sense Media, removed their support for Senate Bill 243 because they said the tech industry pushed for changes that weakened its protections.

Newsom vetoed other legislation that the tech industry opposed, including Senate Bill 7, which requires employers to notify workers before deploying an “automated decision system” in hiring, promotions and other employment decisions.

Called the “No Robo Bosses Act,” the legislation didn’t clear the governor, who thought it was too broad.

“A lot of nuance was demonstrated in the lawmaking process about the balance between ensuring meaningful protections while also encouraging innovation,” said Julia Powles, a professor and executive director of the UCLA Institute for Technology, Law & Policy.

The battle over AI safety is far from over. Assemblymember Rebecca Bauer-Kahan (D-Orinda), who co-wrote AB 1064, said she plans to revive the legislation.

Child safety is an issue that both Democrats and Republicans are examining after parents sued AI companies such as OpenAI and Character.AI for allegedly contributing to their children’s suicides.

“The harm that these chatbots are causing feels so fast and furious, public and real that I thought we would have a different outcome,” Bauer-Kahan said. “It’s always fascinating to me when the outcome of policy feels to be disconnected from what I believe the public wants.”

Steyer from Common Sense Media said a new ballot initiative includes the AI safety protections that Newsom vetoed.

“That was a setback, but not an overall defeat,” he said about the veto of AB 1064. “This is a David and Goliath situation, and we are David.”

Unionized Starbucks baristas have voted overwhelmingly to authorize their leaders to call a strike as soon as next week if the coffee giant doesn’t make new proposals or they don’t see real progress in contract talks.

The authorization was approved by 92% of those who voted, Starbucks Workers United said Wednesday morning.

Michelle Eisen, a spokesperson for the union and a former Starbucks worker of 15 years, said the vote follows six months of Starbucks failing to offer new proposals to address workers’ staffing concerns.

The union said baristas were prepared to strike if a contract is not finalized by Nov. 13.

“Union baristas mean business and are ready to do whatever it takes to win a fair contract,” Eisen said in a statement. “If Starbucks keeps stonewalling, they should expect to see their business grind to a halt. The ball is in Starbucks’ court.”

Starbucks did not immediately respond to a request for comment Wednesday.

Starbucks Workers United represents 12,000 workers at some 650 coffee shops. Their membership represents about 5% of Starbucks’ U.S. workforce, according to the company.

The strike authorization vote, just before the critical holiday season, comes as the coffee giant has contended with flat or declining sales in some U.S. stores this year.

Hopes that the two sides would be able to hammer out a deal had been high since early last year, when Starbucks — which had previously been accused by federal regulators of unlawfully firing workers — pledged publicly to work with the union.

But contract talks broke down in December. In February, federal mediators were brought in to resolve the dispute, but little progress was made.

In April, the union voted to reject the coffee chain’s latest proposal that guaranteed annual raises would not fall below 2%.

Since then, the union has regularly asked the company to return to the bargaining table, but has been met with silence for months, Eisen has said.

Unionized workers have also taken issue with recent store closures that have affected dozens of California stores, and new policies such as the updated uniform and requirements for handwritten messages on coffee cups that they say create bigger workloads. They say these policies have been implemented without proper bargaining, and are among the reasons workers are gearing up for a strike.

The company has maintained that the union is to blame for stalled contract talks by walking away from negotiations last winter.

Starbucks spokesperson Jaci Anderson said last month that “allegations by Workers United have all previously been debunked and are without merit.”

“Our commitment to bargaining with Workers United and reaching agreements has not changed,” Anderson said.