WhatMatters

Can artificial intelligence replicate one of the most complex human art forms — dancing — and is it a threat to dancers and their profession? CalMatters reporters set out to answer those questions by first testing four commercially-available AI video-generation models: OpenAI’s Sora, Google’s Veo, MiniMax’s Hailou and Kuaishou’s Kling. The models were prompted to […]

More than a year after the Eaton Fire ripped through Los Angeles County’s Altadena neighborhood, small businesses in the area still face various hurdles as they struggle to recover from a disaster that killed at least 19 people. As CalMatters’ Levi Sumagaysay explains, the wildfire destroyed more than 9,000 structures, wiping out about half of […]

Scheduling note: WhatMatters is taking Monday off to honor Martin Luther King Jr. and will be back in your inboxes Tuesday. In 2024, California and Google made a deal to spend $175 million over five years on local journalism. This deal came after Google spent $11 million lobbying against two bills that would have required […]

“@grok put her in a bikini” Writing nothing but a short prompt, users on the social media platform X can quickly generate nonconsensual and sexually explicit images of women and children — a disturbing trend that has prompted California to launch a probe into X’s artificial intelligence tool. As CalMatters’ Khari Johnson explains, California Attorney […]

Riding the momentum of a handful of successful pro-housing bills last year, some Democratic lawmakers are advancing a $10 billion bond proposal that aims to ease California’s housing crunch, writes CalMatters’ Yue Stella Yu. Last week the Senate Housing Committee progressed a bill that would place the housing bond before voters during this year’s primary […]

From CalMatters politics reporter Maya C. Miller: State lawmakers are already taking legislative steps to “Trump-proof” California’s elections, starting with a bill designed to keep President Donald Trump off of California’s ballot in 2028. The bill from Sen. Tom Umberg, a Santa Ana Democrat and chairperson of the Senate Judiciary Committee, would make it illegal […]

Days after a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer shot and killed a U.S. citizen in Minneapolis, Californians across the state took to the streets to voice their opposition against federal immigration enforcement tactics and President Donald Trump’s mass deportation campaign. Over the weekend thousands of demonstrators gathered in Sacramento, San Francisco and the Bay […]

Gov. Gavin Newsom will deliver his preliminary state spending plan today — his final budget proposal as California’s governor. On his plate: A projected $18 billion budget gap for 2026-27; the loss of some federal funding; and continued economic uncertainty under President Donald Trump. During his State of the State address Thursday, the governor dropped […]

From CalMatters local news fellow Cayla Mihalovich: California Democrats passed a batch of bills in 2025 to push back against President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown, and new ones are in the works at the start of this year. On Tuesday Sen. Eloise Gómez Reyes, a Democrat from San Bernardino, introduced legislation to prevent federal immigration […]

One year ago today, the Palisades and Eaton wildfires erupted in Los Angeles County. Together they burned more than 58 square miles of land — destroying over 16,000 structures, displacing thousands of households and claiming at least 31 lives. As one of the costliest wildfires in history, the estimated economic losses caused by the blazes […]