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      Museums to Visit in California This Year

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      A special section of The New York Times on museums highlights art across the state.A Yuri Suzuki installation at SFMOMA’s “Art of Noise” exhibition. The work, titled “Arborhythm,” collects, remixes and broadcasts sounds from the streets of San Francisco from the balcony of the museum.Jim Wilson/The New York TimesHappy Monday.The New York Times published a special section on museums over the weekend, with more than two dozen articles about how institutions across the country are striving to offer their visitors more to see, do and feel.I highly recommend browsing the full series. One of the articles covers the ways that museums are making better use of their outdoor spaces; another highlights a museum dedicated to the history and science of nuclear weapons; and there is a profile of a joint show mounted by two museums, one on each side of the U.S.-Mexico border.There’s also a long list of American museums to visit this year, including several on the West Coast, as well as a guide to new and exciting museum programs for children.And, of course, there is a lot going on in the art world in California. Here are some of the highlights:The Broad in Los Angeles will open a sweeping exhibition on May 25 covering 20 years of work by Mickalene Thomas, an artist who was exploring the Black female figure well before it became so popular.“It’s difficult to understand, from where we are now, how radical her work was when I first showed it,” Susanne Vielmetter, a Los Angeles gallerist who gave Thomas one of her first solo shows in 2007, told my colleague Robin Pogrebin. “I cannot think of a single artist who at that time was making portraiture of female Black figures from a perspective of female desire.”The artist Mickalene Thomas in front of her work “Portrait of Maya No. 10” (2017).Mickalene Thomas/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York; Amy Harrity for The New York TimesAn unusual collaboration among 10 large public universities, including U.C.L.A., will bring shows focused on democracy to campus museums across the country. It’s part of an effort to reduce political polarization and increase student voter turnout.From May 4 through Aug. 18, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art will be showcasing visual and technological artifacts from the world of music, including early listening devices and iconic album covers, in its “Art of Noise” exhibition. But, as Chris Colin explains, what the show really explores is humans’ relationship to music.At the Huntington Library, Art Museum, and Botanical Gardens in Los Angeles County, a new installation by the artist Betye Saar manipulates light to simulate the stages of nightfall. It’s one of many shows across the country in which artists are playing with darkness.Museums dedicated to the natural sciences have long been associated with dark spaces and nature dioramas, but that may be changing. At the Natural History Museums of Los Angeles County, a new area will soon be opened that features a theater, a cafe and new seating and exhibition spaces. “There is nature in L.A., and we believe that if you have a better understanding of what’s in your backyard and your neighborhood, you’ll have a much better appreciation of life on our planet,” Lori Bettison-Varga, the museum’s president and director, told The Times.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      How a New Trial for Harvey Weinstein Could Again Test the Legal System

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      A new jury would hear from only one or both of the women whom he was convicted of assaulting, in what analysts say will be a much narrower and weaker case.As one of Harvey Weinstein’s key accusers took the witness stand during his trial in New York, she broke down in tears, sobbing uncontrollably. After a brief break, she still could not compose herself. The trial was adjourned for the day. Hyperventilating, the woman was ushered out and her piercing screams bellowed out from a back room.The episode was one of many tense moments in the highly publicized, weekslong trial of the former Hollywood titan in 2020. Now, they may happen all over again.On Thursday, New York’s highest court ruled that the trial judge who presided over the sex crimes case in Manhattan erred when he let several women testify that Mr. Weinstein had assaulted them, even though their accusations were not part of the charges brought against the producer. The appeals court ordered a new trial.But the original trial in 2020 against Mr. Weinstein was about much more than one man’s guilt. It had morphed into something more, as his accusers sparked the global #MeToo movement: Prosecutors were trying to prove not only that Mr. Weinstein was a sexual predator, but also that the justice system was both willing and able to hold powerful men accountable for their treatment of women.The new ruling may do little to change the public’s perception of Mr. Weinstein, who is still notorious and behind bars and was sentenced to 16 years in prison for sex crimes in California.For some, however, it raised new doubts about the legal system’s ability to hold influential people like him responsible.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      I left my suit in San Francisco: thieves swipe bags from Adam Schiff’s car

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      San Francisco has earned an unwelcome national reputation for car burglaries, which Adam Schiff was reminded of the hard way: the Democratic representative had his luggage swiped from his car while it was parked in a downtown garage.With his formal clothing gone, Schiff ended up at a fundraising dinner Thursday for his US Senate campaign dressed like he was headed to a Los Angeles Dodgers game – in shirtsleeves and an insulated vest. Others who attended the event were mostly decked out in suit jackets and ties.Schiff’s campaign confirmed the burglary and declined further comment, citing an ongoing investigation.“Yes, they took my bags,” the representative lamented to the San Francisco Chronicle.Statistically, reported auto break-ins are down in San Francisco, but vehicles with busted windows leaving sprinkles of broken glass remain a common sight in the city. Visitors and residents are constantly reminded to remove valuables from parked cars.It was advice Schiff neglected to follow.In August, the city’s police chief announced a crackdown on auto smash-and-grabs. The San Francisco police department reported nearly 900 break-ins in February, down from 1,850 in July. There were more than 3,000 reported thefts in September 2022. More

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      USC vetoed a Muslim student’s graduation speech for her pro-Palestinian views. Why? | Mohammed Zain Shafi Khan

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      When Asna Tabassum, a hijab-wearing Muslim, was announced as the valedictorian for the University of Southern California class of 2024, my initial reaction was the thought of my south Asian mother saying, “What are you doing? Why aren’t you valedictorian?” But what followed was pride.Then the university announced last week that it would no longer allow Tabassum to speak at commencement. After pro-Israel groups mischaracterized Tabassum’s pro-Palestinian views as “antisemitic”, the USC administration claimed that security concerns made her speech untenable.“I am not surprised by those who attempt to propagate hatred,” Tabassum, a friend of mine, wrote in a statement. “I am surprised that my own university – my home for four years – has abandoned me.”USC has not just abandoned an accomplished student, but also nearly 1,000 Muslims on campus. I happen to be one of them.Right now, the reality of being a Muslim student is intertwined with the university’s decision to rescind Tabassum’s well-earned honour. We were teased by our institution, taunted even, as they refuse to publicly stand by their choice.As a Muslim, the lack of support scares me. My hijab-wearing friends have been called terrorists and spat at; my Palestinian peer has had their car broken into and their Qur’an torn and I am judged for wearing a keffiyeh to class or having a sticker on my laptop that reads “Free Palestine”.When Arab and Muslim students are directly affected, the university’s silence makes its position clear.When the office of the president can release a statement condemning Hamas’s attack on Israel on 7 October, but not one condemning Israel for killing tens of thousands of Palestinians, it makes the university’s position clear.And when the university refuses to publicly support its choice for valedictorian, again the school’s position is clear.Understandably, students and faculty are upset and angry. Last Friday, 11 members of the USC advisory committee on Muslim life resigned “in protest against the university administration’s decision to revoke Asna Tabassum’s valedictory address at commencement”.This committee was convened by the president “to consider a number of tangible solutions to support Muslim students, faculty and staff”. But now, when USC cannot support one student, I doubt it wants to support any of us.This is what it is to be Muslim at a college campus: enraged, scared and robbed of the hope that Tabassum represents. As a student, I placed my trust in this institution that has taught me, but that trust has waned.As a journalist, I am also alarmed. This profession, this institution, and its foundation are based upon the free exchange of ideas and the freedom to share those ideas. The cowardice of hiding behind the veil of “safety concerns” is appalling. Furthermore, California’s Leonard Law stipulates that even private universities like USC are obliged to uphold speech protected by the first amendment.USC seems to not just be above the law, but also hypocritical. Just last semester, the Turkish ambassador and Azerbaijani consul-general were on campus as part of an event hosted by the university during the height of Azerbaijan’s military campaign against the majority-Armenian region of Artsakh, also known as Nagorno Karabakh. The Armenian community on campus was facing tragedy, watching their people being starved and mourning their loss.When students demanded that the university, especially at such a time, rescind its invitation to the delegation, the university refused, arguing that doing so would infringe the delegation’s freedom to speak.The provost’s office sent out an email about USC’s commitment to academic freedom, writing: “These freedoms are outlined within the USC policy on free speech and serve to protect the viewpoints – no matter how controversial or unpopular – of all members of our community.” In response to the protests, the university also increased security for the delegation – an option the university failed to provide Tabassum.Freedom of speech was protected then. Just not now.While the university may have made its decision, the students have made one for themselves too: “Let her speak.” Over 300 students recently marched in solidarity with Tabassum, demanding that the USC administration reinvite the valedictorian to speak at commencement. The university did just the opposite. With a decision that has enraged the class of 2024, USC has instead “released” all its outside speakers from speaking during the main commencement ceremony. This means that keynote speaker Jon M Chu will not be speaking at commencement. Tabassum will not be speaking at commencement. The only person who will be speaking is Carol Folt, USC’s president. And, respectfully, no graduate who has worked tirelessly for four years wants to just hear from the president.Instead of emailing students about this change, the administration simply updated the commencement website and posted an Instagram story.If the aim of the university is to maintain the safety and security of its 65,000 graduation attendees, it may have achieved that. Because, in all fairness, who is going to attend this graduation now, and for what? Graduating students are not represented, they are not excited and right now they are angry – even more so given that many of them never had their high school graduation, due to Covid.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionBut all of the above is moot at this point. The university has now gone further and announced that it has simply canceled the main stage graduation ceremony – again citing unnamed safety concerns following a day of peaceful protest that only turned violent with the university-sanctioned introduction of law enforcement.But if the university can promptly expel hundreds of non-violent protesters from campus less than 24 hours after their occupation began, how is it possible that the best a university that charges nearly $70,000 per year could do is cancel the entire event?I refuse to believe these choices were about security. From the start, it’s been about restricting Tabassum from speaking. It’s been about USC failing to stand up for its Muslim, Arab and Palestinian students.The university has chosen to be on the wrong side of history. It can start repairing some of the harm done by prioritizing the needs of its students over protecting its president.USC hasn’t listened to its Muslim students, its Arab students or its Palestinian students when we asked for the university to figure out a way to let Asna Tabassum speak safely. By ignoring our voice, as it did Tabassum’s, USC has silenced us all.For this and many other hasty decisions taken by the university these past two weeks, it’s clear what the next decision should be: let Carol Folt go.
      Mohammed Zain Shafi Khan is a journalist and student at the University of Southern California studying international relations and journalism More

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      Flojaune Cofer: surprise progressive star in California capital’s mayoral race

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      In an election year in which California’s races have the potential to be among the most consequential in the US, one of the most fascinating contests is shaping up somewhere unexpected: Sacramento.The leading candidate to replace the city’s mayor is a progressive public health expert running for elected office for the first time. Flojaune Cofer has pledged to reject corporate donations, cut police budgets in favor of workers trained to deal with issues such as mental health and tackle the city’s spiraling homelessness crisis.Cofer, a 41-year-old epidemiologist who would be the first Black woman elected as Sacramento mayor, won the most votes of any candidate in last month’s primary with an almost 8% lead over her closest competitor.Her rise comes as political commentators have argued Californians, disheartened by crime, are growing frustrated with progressive policies. In March, the San Francisco Chronicle wrote that the city’s status as a longtime liberal bastion is no more after voters approved a controversial measure that will require welfare recipients to be screened for drugs.Sacramento has struggled with many of the same issues as San Francisco and Los Angeles from a growing unhoused population and unaffordable housing to downtowns that have struggled to rebound after the pandemic. Cofer’s vision for the city, which she hopes will one day serve as a model for dealing with the most pressing problems of the era, has appealed to voters, particularly those in lower-income neighborhoods.“I just feel we are so close to being able to do something powerful,” she said in a recent interview. “We don’t have to live in a city where people don’t have their basic needs met. This can be a city that’s affordable, prosperous, innovative, that’s connected.”Cofer, originally from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, moved to Sacramento 20 years ago for a public health fellowship and decided to make her home in the city after finding a deep-rooted sense of community. “It reminded me a lot of Pittsburgh, with the tight neighborhoods and rivers flowing through it and being a midsize city in a state with larger cities that often get more of the attention,” she said.She worked for the state’s public health department before becoming a senior public policy director for a public health non-profit. In recent years, Cofer served on several city committees and was a visible presence in Sacramento politics before she decided to run for office.She faced a crowded field with well-known and high-profile candidates, including two former state lawmakers, vying for the role and arguing they were best equipped to address the problems ailing the city.Sacramento has changed considerably in recent years with the redevelopment of its downtown, growing population and a seemingly ever worsening housing shortage.Homelessness has been the defining issue in city politics in recent years. The capital is in the midst of a growing emergency as the number of unhoused residents climbed almost 70% from 2019 to 2022.At least 9,278 people in the county are estimated to be without a home, the majority of whom sleep outdoors or in vehicles. Encampments have developed on levees, near schools and next to busy roads, while advocates have said the city has failed to create meaningful solutions to match the scale of the massive problem.“I think one of the things that we’re already in agreement on is that what we’re doing right now is not working,” she said. The crisis is affecting everyone in the community, she said, from unhoused people who say they are being harassed and targeted without receiving the support they need to business owners who say people don’t want to go downtown.The city can create change “if we do right by the people who are experiencing homelessness, and we actually make sure people have a place to go, instead of just moving them block to block without a clear destination, and we make sure that they have the facilities and things that they need, like showers and bathrooms”, she said.“There’s data to show us that these things can work. Instead, it seems like we are insistent upon trying to do things expediently that don’t work and that make the problem worse.”Cofer has backed greater protections for renters as well as managed encampments. She has also advocated cutting $70m from the police budget and redirecting that funding to hire trained workers who can respond to calls about mental health and homelessness while police prioritize violent crime.She wants to invest in programs from non-profits and community groups that have a track record of reducing violence in the city – pointing to the city’s investment in similar initiatives that led to a two-year period with zero youth homicides before that funding was cut.“That’s the kind of thing that you can feel in a community when you’re not worried about being shot, when your young people aren’t worried about it, when nobody is in the active stage of grieving and hanging up RIP banners on their high schools,” she said.“I’m looking at what will save us money, what will save us lives, and will allow us all to be able to experience safety, not just the performance of safety.”Despite the so-called backlash against progressive policies in other parts of the state, Cofer’s message appears to have won over voters across the city. Her campaign knocked on 30,000 doors, she said, and she engages directly with voters on Twitter, even those who are frequently critical of her.She saw support from all income levels, but particularly in the lowest-income neighborhoods in the city, according to an analysis from the Sacramento Bee.“Our message resonates,” Cofer said. “We’re talking about people who have largely not felt seen, heard and represented. When we change the narrative, invite people into the conversation, they see things differently and they’re hopeful in a different way and they’re reaching out in a different way.”She was endorsed by the Sacramento Bee’s editorial board, which described her agenda as “[in] some ways fiscally conservative and in other ways socially and economically progressive”.“She has the most potential to dramatically transform the Sacramento political landscape in the next four years, and that landscape desperately needs transformation,” the board wrote.In November, Sacramento voters will choose between Cofer and Kevin McCarty, a Democratic state lawmaker. Some political analysts have argued Cofer faces long odds with votes no longer divided among multiple candidates, but Cofer remains hopeful about her candidacy and the progressive movement in the city.“Sacramento is in a different position than some of the other places where we haven’t actually had an opportunity to try these progressive ideas out here,” she said. “We have the benefit of having watched what did and did not work in places in the Bay Area and southern California and to really learn from that.” More

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      3 Alameda Officers Face Charges in Death of Mario Gonzalez

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      The officers, all with the Alameda Police Department at the time, were charged with involuntary manslaughter after the district attorney reopened the case.Three years after police officers in Northern California pinned a man face down for about five minutes as he begged for relief, prosecutors announced that the officers would face charges of involuntary manslaughter in the man’s death.The charges against Eric McKinley, James Fisher and Cameron Leahy, all with the Alameda Police Department at the time, in the death of Mario Gonzalez, 26, were announced on Thursday, after a review by the Alameda County district attorney’s Public Accountability Unit.The county’s previous district attorney closed the investigation into the officers in 2022, saying that the evidence did not justify criminal charges. But Pamela Price, who was elected district attorney later that year, reopened the case a year ago.The new charges were announced just days after the county’s Registrar of Voters announced that a recall campaign against Ms. Price had submitted enough signatures to proceed.The incident that ended in Mr. Gonzalez’s death began when the officers responded to a call that a man was loitering and behaving strangely in a public park on April 19, 2021.Mr. Gonzalez was wandering at the edge of the park, near a row of houses. Body camera footage captured Officer McKinley approaching Mr. Gonzalez in a friendly manner, asking him if he was OK. Mr. Gonzalez spoke incoherently, standing near two shopping baskets of liquor bottles.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Prince Harry Now Officially Resident in U.S., Documents Show

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      For years, Harry and his wife, Meghan, have considered California home. This week, he updated his residency in a corporate filing.The document filed on Wednesday at Britain’s corporate registrar, Companies House, was just a few lines long. But its purpose was to formally update the country of residency for one “Prince Henry Charles Albert David Duke of Sussex” — otherwise known as Prince Harry.For years, Harry and his American wife, Meghan, have considered California home. The document updated the residency of the British royal to the United States for official paperwork for his business Travalyst Limited, a nonprofit sustainable travel initiative.The paperwork was just a bureaucratic formality. But it underscores just how far Harry, 39, has come from his days as a central member of the royal family in the country of his birth, to a very different life with his wife and children in California. It also comes at a time of turmoil for the House of Windsor.Harry and Meghan moved to Montecito, Calif., after stepping back from royal duties in 2020, amid a rift with the royal family.Prince Harry said in February that he had considered becoming a U.S. citizen, telling ABC’s “Good Morning America,” “It’s a thought that has crossed my mind but it’s not a high priority for me right now.”But there had been little in the way of official confirmation of Harry’s residency status until this week. The filing indicates the change of residency dates to June 29, 2023, the day that Buckingham Palace confirmed the couple had vacated Frogmore Cottage, their British home. Queen Elizabeth II had offered the home to the couple when they were married in 2018.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Battle lines drawn as US states take on big tech with online child safety bills

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      On 6 April, Maryland became the first state in the US to pass a “Kids Code” bill, which aims to prevent tech companies from collecting predatory data from children and using design features that could cause them harm. Vermont’s legislature held its final hearing before a full vote on its Kids Code bill on 11 April. The measures are the latest in a salvo of proposed policies that, in the absence of federal rules, have made state capitols a major battlefield in the war between parents and child advocates, who lament that there are too few protections for minors online, and Silicon Valley tech companies, who protest that the recommended restrictions would hobble both business and free speech.Known as Age-Appropriate Design Code or Kids Code bills, these measures call for special data safeguards for underage users online as well as blanket prohibitions on children under certain ages using social media. Maryland’s measure passed with unanimous votes in its house and senate.In all, nine states across the country – Maryland, Vermont, Minnesota, Hawaii, Illinois, New Mexico, South Carolina, New Mexico and Nevada – have introduced and are now hashing out bills aimed at improving online child safety. Minnesota’s bill passed the house committee in February.Lawmakers in multiple states have accused lobbyists for tech firms of deception during public hearings. Tech companies have also spent a quarter of a million dollars lobbying against the Maryland bill to no avail.Carl Szabo, vice-president and general counsel of the tech trade association NetChoice, spoke against the Maryland bill at a state senate finance committee meeting in mid-2023 as a “lifelong Maryland resident, parent, [spouse] of a child therapist”.Later in the hearing, a Maryland state senator asked: “Who are you, sir? … I don’t believe it was revealed at the introduction of your commentary that you work for NetChoice. All I heard was that you were here testifying as a dad. I didn’t hear you had a direct tie as an employee and representative of big tech.”For the past two years, technology giants have been directly lobbying in some states looking to pass online safety bills. In Maryland alone, tech giants racked up more than $243,000 in lobbying fees in 2023, the year the bill was introduced. Google spent $93,076, Amazon $88,886, and Apple $133,449 last year, according to state disclosure forms.Amazon, Apple, Google and Meta hired in-state lobbyists in Minnesota and sent employees to lobby directly in 2023. In 2022, the four companies also spent a combined $384,000 on lobbying in Minnesota, the highest total up to that point, according to the Minnesota campaign finance and public disclosure board.The bills require tech companies to undergo a series of steps aimed at safeguarding children’s experiences on their websites and assessing their “data protection impact”. Companies must configure all default privacy settings provided to children by online products to offer a high level of privacy, “unless the covered entity can demonstrate a compelling reason that a different setting is in the best interests of children”. Another requirement is to provide privacy information and terms of service in clear, understandable language for children and provide responsive tools to help children or their parents or guardians exercise their privacy rights and report concerns.The legislation leaves it to tech companies to determine whether users are underage but does not require verification by documents such as a driver’s license. Determining age could come from data profiles companies have on a user, or self-declaration, where users must enter their birth date, known as “age-gating”.Critics argue the process of tech companies guessing a child’s age may lead to privacy invasions.“Generally, this is how it will work: to determine whether a user in a state is under a specific age and whether the adult verifying a minor over that designated age is truly that child’s parent or guardian, online services will need to conduct identity verification,” said a spokesperson for NetChoice.The bills’ supporters argue that users of social media should not be required to upload identity documents since the companies already know their age.“They’ve collected so many data points on users that they are advertising to kids because they know the user is a kid,” said a spokesperson for the advocacy group the Tech Oversight Project. “Social media companies’ business models are based on knowing who their users are.”NetChoice – and by extension, the tech industry – has several alternative proposals for improving child safety online. They include digital literacy and safety education in the classroom for children to form “an understanding of healthy online practices in a classroom environment to better prepare them for modern challenges”.At a meeting in February to debate a proposed bill aimed at online child safety, NetChoice’s director, Amy Bos, argued that parental safety controls introduced by social media companies and parental interventions such as parents taking away children’s phones when they have racked up too much screen time were better courses of action than regulation. Asking parents to opt into protecting their children often fails to achieve wide adoption, though. Snapchat and Discord told the US Senate in February that fewer than 1% of under-18 users on either social network had parents who monitor their online behavior using parental controls.Bos also ardently argued that the proposed bill breached first amendment rights. Her testimony prompted a Vermont state senator to ask: “You said, ‘We represent eBay and Etsy.’ Why would you mention those before TikTok and X in relation to a bill about social media platforms and teenagers?”NetChoice is also promoting the bipartisan Invest in Child Safety Act, which is aimed at giving “cops the needed resources to put predators behind bars”, it says, highlighting that less than 1% of reported child sexual abuse material (CSAM) violations are investigated by law enforcement due to a lack of resources and capacity.However, critics of NetChoice’s stance argue that more needs to be done proactively to prevent children from harm in the first place and that tech companies should take responsibility for ensuring safety rather than placing it on the shoulders of parents and children.“Big Tech and NetChoice are mistaken if they think they’re still fooling anybody with this ‘look there not here’ act,” said Sacha Haworth, executive director of the Tech Oversight Project. “The latest list of alleged ‘solutions’ they propose is just another feint to avoid any responsibility and kick the can down the road while continuing to profit off our kids.”All the state bills have faced opposition by tech companies in the form of strenuous statements or in-person lobbying by representatives of these firms.Other tech lobbyists needed similar prompting to Bos and Szabo to disclose their relevant tech patrons during their testimonies at hearings on child safety bills, if they notified legislators at all. A registered Amazon lobbyist who has spoken at two hearings on New Mexico’s version of the Kids Code bill said he represented the Albuquerque Hispano Chamber of Commerce and the New Mexico Hospitality Association. He never mentioned the e-commerce giant. A representative of another tech trade group did not disclose his organization’s backing from Meta at the same Vermont hearing that saw Bos’s motives and affiliations questioned – arguably the company that would be most affected by the bill’s stipulations.The bills’ supporters say these speakers are deliberately concealing who they work for to better convince lawmakers of their messaging.“We see a clear and accelerating pattern of deception in anti-Kids Code lobbying,” said Haworth of the Tech Oversight Project, which supports the bills. “Big tech companies that profit billions a year off kids refuse to face outraged citizens and bereaved parents themselves in all these states, instead sending front-group lobbyists in their place to oppose this legislation.”NetChoice denied the accusations. In a statement, a spokesperson for the group said: “We are a technology trade association. The claim that we are trying to conceal our affiliation with the tech industry is ludicrous.”These state-level bills follow attempts in California to introduce regulations aimed at protecting children’s privacy online. The California Age-Appropriate Design Code Act is based on similar legislation from the UK that became law in October. The California bill, however, was blocked from being passed into law in late 2023 by a federal judge, who granted NetChoice a preliminary injunction, citing potential threats to the first amendment. Rights groups such as the American Civil Liberties Union also opposed the bill. Supporters in other states say they have learned from the fight in California. They point out that language in the eight other states’ bills has been updated to address concerns raised in the Golden state.The online safety bills come amid increasing scrutiny of Meta’s products for their alleged roles in facilitating harm against children. Mark Zuckerberg, its CEO, was told he had “blood on his hands” at a January US Senate judiciary committee hearing on digital sexual exploitation. Zuckerberg turned and apologized to a group of assembled parents. In December, the New Mexico attorney general’s office filed a lawsuit against Meta for allegedly allowing its platforms to become a marketplace for child predators. The suit follows a 2023 Guardian investigation that revealed how child traffickers were using Meta platforms, including Instagram, to buy and sell children into sexual exploitation.“In time, as Meta’s scandals have piled up, their brand has become toxic to public policy debates,” said Jason Kint, CEO of Digital Content Next, a trade association focused on the digital content industry. “NetChoice leading with Apple, but then burying that Meta and TikTok are members in a hearing focused on social media harms sort of says it all.”A Meta spokesperson said the company wanted teens to have age-appropriate experiences online and that the company has developed more than 30 child safety tools.“We support clear, consistent legislation that makes it simple for parents to manage their teens’ online experiences,” said the spokesperson. “While some laws align with solutions we support, we have been open about our concerns over state legislation that holds apps to different standards in different states. Instead, parents should approve their teen’s app downloads, and we support legislation that requires app stores to get parents’ approval whenever their teens under 16 download apps.” More