Good morning. It’s Thursday, May 23.
- The turbulent personal life of Nicole Shanahan.
- Nvidia surge signals the staying power of AI.
- And blue whales show up along California coast.
Statewide
1.
State lawmakers have been holding marathon sessions this week ahead of a Friday deadline for bills to pass in their house of origin, or die. Notable measures that have advanced:
- No voter ID (SB 1174): All local governments would be barred from requiring identification at the ballot box. The measure was inspired by Huntington Beach’s voter ID law, approved by voters in March. Courthouse News
- No “reusable” plastic bags (SB 1053): A 2016 ban on single-use plastic bags backfired when grocery stores instead handed out thicker “reusable” bags that made pollution worse. A new measure would ban those too. Mercury News
- Speed limit warnings (SB 961): New cars would be required to have devices that beep when you’re going 10 mph over the speed limit. They are common in Europe but opposed by critics of government overreach. A.P.
- Also approved: mandatory kindergarten, Amsterdam-style cannabis cafes, age verification on porn sites, a ban on legacy college admissions, and help for Arizona abortion-seekers.
Northern California
2.
The New York Times did a deep dive on the personal life of Nicole Shanahan, the Bay Area lawyer and running mate of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. It detailed two pivotal episodes:
- Weeks before Shanahan’s marriage to tech investor Jeremy Kranz in 2014, she had an affair with Sergey Brin, a Google founder, sources said. When Kranz found out days after their wedding, he filed to annul the marriage. While negotiating the split, she threatened to harm herself, sources said.
- While married to Brin, Shanahan and Elon Musk took ketamine at a party in Miami in 2021 then disappeared together for several hours. She later told Brin she had sex with Musk, sources said. Brin sought a divorce. Again, she was said to threaten to harm herself.
3.
Nvidia, the Santa Clara chipmaker and artificial intelligence darling, announced a tripling of sales and sevenfold jump in profit from a year ago on Wednesday, surpassing predictions and signaling the staying power of the AI boom. At one point Wednesday, Nvidia was trading with a market capitalization of more than $2.5 trillion, more than the entire German stock market. CEO Jensen Huang stoked the excitement. “This is the beginning of a new industrial revolution,” he said. Wall Street Journal | Bloomberg
4.
The head of the Aquarium of the Bay in San Francisco, George Jacob, resigned Wednesday after being accused of lavish spending even as the charity struggled financially. Using the company credit card, Jacob flew business class and stayed at top hotels, spending about $286,000 on travel last year, documents showed. At the time, the organization was behind on its rent. The board took action after staffers reported getting daily calls from collection agencies. S.F. Chronicle
5.
Oakland announced a surprise deal to sell its 50% ownership stake in the Coliseum to a Black-led group of developers. The African American Sports & Entertainment Group, founded in Oakland in 2020, is expected to pay a minimum of $105 million, a windfall for the city as it faces a steep budget deficit. Financial analysts criticized the move as short-sighted. “Good elected officials of all stripes know that you should not sell off capital assets,” said David Crane, a public policy lecturer at Stanford. Mercury News
6.
More than 30 volunteer stylists from across California gathered at a retreat center in San Juan Bautista over the weekend to treat farmworkers to free makeovers. They called it the Glam Squad. Blanca Garibay has labored in Watsonville’s blackberry fields for 25 years. “To me, it is almost magic,” she said in Spanish after getting her makeover. “The farmworker wasn’t valued like any other worker and now, I love that they are valuing our work, because it really is hard.” The Mercury News has pictures.
7.
On Wednesday, neighbors rose up to support Terry Williams, a black dog walker targeted by racist threats, a day after his home went up in flames near San Francisco’s Alamo Square. The boarded-up exterior of his house was covered in taped notes wishing him well. “We love you and stand with you,” read one. More concretely, two GoFundMe campaigns had collected more than $160,000 by early Thursday. Williams said he was shocked by the numbers. SF Standard
Southern California
8.
Like many colleges, Cal State Los Angeles has hosted a “Free Gaza” encampment on its campus for several weeks. But it has lacked the size and raucousness of protests across town at UCLA and USC. The difference may have something to do with the working-class character of Cal State’s students, many of whom are juggling jobs and responsibilities at home. “I can’t spend days sleeping on a campus,” said Brian Hernandez, an information systems major. “I got a job, I got class.” L.A. Times
- UCLA’s police chief was removed from his post after criticism of his department’s failure to intervene during the April 30 attack on a pro-Palestinian encampment. “If you’re waiting while people are getting hit in the head, there is something wrong with the system,” a UC source said. L.A. Times | A.P.
9.
The Justice Department is expected to sue Live Nation on Thursday, accusing the Beverly Hills-based parent of Ticketmaster of monopolizing the live-entertainment industry, reports said. The government plans to argue that Live Nation used its sprawling footprint as as a concert promoter, venue owner, and ticket seller to box out rivals and raise prices for consumers. Sources told Bloomberg that the lawsuit will seek to break the company up. N.Y. Times | Bloomberg
10.
A battery facility near San Diego was burning for a sixth straight day on Tuesday, highlighting the dangers of lithium-ion batteries as California rapidly scales up its energy storage capacity. A San Diego fire captain said it could be weeks before the fire at the Gateway Energy Storage facility in Otay Mesa, sparked on May 15, is fully contained. State policymakers have conceded there is a fire problem with lithium batteries, which ignite when overheated and resist containment because they generate their own oxygen. FOX 5 | S.D. Union-Tribune
11.
The New York Times Style Magazine wrote about Glendale’s Moonlight Rollerway, which has been hosting some of the region’s best roller-skate parties for more than 60 years:
“We live in the endless scroll of our screens, but here on the floor — two and a quarter inches of maple wood, all tongue-and-groove boards, nary a nail — that’s simply not possible. Another rule: no hoodies. That’s so the floor guards in striped referee jerseys, expertly weaving through the swirling crowd, can make sure people aren’t wearing earbuds.”
12.
Southern California whale watchers have been reporting the first blue whale sightings of the season. The world’s largest animal spends winters off Central America, then migrates north to feed on krill off California during the summer. Last week, a drone operator captured magnificent video of a specimen off Los Angeles. @empty_drone
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