California ballot measures that appear aimed at OpenAI were filed by stepbrother of employee at rival Anthropic | Latest Tech News
A push in California to clamp down on AI giants has taken a weird twist – after ballot measures that appear to be aimed at Sam Altman’s OpenAI were filed by the stepbrother of an government at archrival Anthropic, The Post has realized.
In December, a California resident named Alexander Oldham filed a pair of ballot measures that would empower the state to crack down on major AI companies, in half by placing a particular focus on policing “public benefit corporations” – the company construction that OpenAI not too long ago transformed its for-profit arm into.
“I think these are all reasonably common sense measures to take but background wise I’m a nobody,” Oldham told Politico, including that AI regulation was “just something I find interesting.”
Dario Amodei, CEO and co-founder of Anthropic, attends the annual assembly of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, Jan. 23, 2025. AP
As it seems, Oldham is the stepbrother of Zoe Blumenfeld, who since 2024 has been head of inner communications of Anthropic – the fast-growing AI giant that has been squaring off against OpenAI for dominance in the sector, according to public information and social media accounts reviewed by The Post.
Oldham has strenuously denied that his familial relationship with Blumenfeld had any affect on his determination to suggest the ballot measure. Anthropic has moreover denied that it or Zoe Blumenfeld has performed any function in the ballot measures. Blumenfeld declined to remark.
“Anthropic has had no involvement in, coordination with, or knowledge of any ballot proposals filed by Alexander Oldham, and the company does not support either proposal,” a company spokesperson said in a assertion.
Meanwhile, Oldham also has ties to tech entrepreneur Guy Ravine, best recognized for his bitter legal battle with OpenAI over who got here up with the thought for the company, sources with information of the scenario said.
The ballot proposals, which obtained a title and abstract from the California attorney normal’s workplace last week, call for the creation of state-appointed our bodies that would have energy over AI corporations – one of which might have the facility to approve or reject actions by AI corporations that restructure as public benefit firms.
While OpenAI will not be explicitly named, the measure is “clearly” focused at Altman, according to Perry Metzger, chairman of Alliance for the Future, a Washington, DC-based AI coverage group.
“This is the ‘Be Nasty To Sam Altman Because I Don’t Like You Act,’” Metzger told The Post. “Anyone reading this who knows anything about the players immediately knows that OpenAI is the company that the first one is aimed at.”
Anthropic is also a public benefit company and has been one since it was based in 2021, while OpenAI was initially structured in 2015 as a nonprofit. Experts say Anthropic would seemingly have an simpler time complying with a safety-focused commission than OpenAI, which only accomplished its restructuring in October and whose critics have long accused of prioritizing speedy innovation over humanity’s well-being.
Anthropic denied any involvement in the ballot proposals and said it doesn’t assist them. AFP via Getty Images
In fact, Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei and his sister Daniela cofounded Anthropic after leaving OpenAI over considerations Altman was not centered enough on security.
The filings sparked chatter in Silicon Valley – in large half because Oldham has not donated to any California political causes and doesn’t appear to have beforehand labored on AI coverage. Politico has described Oldham as a “mystery to many in the AI policy space.”
“Let me make this very clear: Neither Guy Ravine nor Zoe Blumenfeld are involved in this initiative,” Oldham told The Post in a written assertion. “I haven’t been in touch with Guy Ravine in nearly a decade and I have not been in touch with Zoe in more than two years. This initiative was filed, created, and funded by me.”
In response to a detailed checklist of questions, Oldham said he had used AI chatbots to craft the ballot proposals and was not suggested by attorneys. He also insisted that the measures were not meant to goal a particular company.
“I spearheaded this initiative because I have been interested in AI safety since 2023,” he added. “I wanted to create a public document to spark a necessary debate on AI regulation and get the public thinking about these ideas.”
Oldham is listed as a resident of Point Richmond, Calif. Based on social media accounts, Oldham seems to have labored for years at Passage Nautical, a yacht chartering business based and run by his mom, Deborah Reynolds – who was sentenced to a yr in state prison and had to repay $1.3 million after pleading guilty to tax evasion in 2022.
Zoe Blumenfeld is a senior communications employee at Anthropic. LinkedIn/Zoe Blumenfeld
A 2006 obituary in the San Francisco Chronicle for Michael Blumenfeld calls him the “beloved father of Zoe” and “beloved stepfather of Alexander.” In his will, Zoe is listed as one of his three organic youngsters. Oldham’s mom, Deborah Reynolds, was Blumenfeld’s spouse.
Ravine vehemently denied that he had colluded with Oldham in any approach or had any foreknowledge about the ballot measures, a sentiment echoed by Oldham.
“I have had no involvement in his initiative,” Ravine said. “I have not been in contact with Alex Oldham in approximately 10 years. My only connection to him is that his mother was an investor in a company I was involved with over a decade ago – a tenuous link at best.” He also famous that he “not have the financial resources to fund ballot initiatives.”
The Post has not seen any evidence that Ravine was concerned in the ballot initiative.
US District Judge Yvonne Rogers granted OpenAI a abstract judgement in the case last July, ruling that Ravine had infringement on its trademark and even “copied” the company by launching a chatbot and image generator months after OpenAI did.
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman attends an event to pitch AI for companies in Tokyo on Feb. 3, 2025. REUTERS
Buried in a little-noticed footnote in the ruling, Rogers references none other than Deborah Reynolds – Oldham’s mom. Reynolds, the decide wrote, was “Ravine’s ‘friend’ who hosted Ravine on more than 50 occasions and invested $450,000” into one of Ravine’s corporations.
In fact, Ravine, Reynolds and Oldham were once half of the same social circles, a source close to the scenario said. The Post obtained a photograph of the three sitting together at what appeared to be a household social gathering in April 2014.
“Neither Alex or I have seen Guy in decades,” Reynolds said in a textual content message. “I have not seen Guy in over a decade. I have talked to him since 2014 a few times. Zoe and Alex have no relationship. There’s no connection to his initiative.”
Oldham’s aren’t the first California AI ballot measures to spark controversy. OpenAI has formally accused a nonprofit called Coalition for AI Nonprofit Integrity (CANI), which publicly challenged its restructuring plans, of being a entrance for Elon Musk, who is presently suing OpenAI for abandoning its nonprofit mission.
CANI, which has confronted questions about its funding, is backing a separate ballot proposal filed by Poornima Ramarao, the mom of an ex-OpenAI employee-turned-whistleblower who was ruled to have died by suicide. Ramarao’s proposal explicitly goals to reverse OpenAI’s restructuring.
Oldham’s proposals would apply to OpenAI and other tech corporations. NurPhoto via Getty Images
In a 2023 lawsuit, OpenAI alleged that Ravine, who acquired the new-defunct area title “open.ai” in March 2015, tried to register a trademark for “Open AI” a day after the company launched to “sow consumer confusion.”
It also submitted a 2022 e-mail in which Ravine told Altman he would give up the web site if the company donated thousands and thousands of {dollars} to an “academic collaboration.”
Ravine countersued, making the sensational declare that Sam Altman had “hijacked” the thought that grew to become OpenAI from him and stolen his “recipe” for the pursuit of superior AI. His countersuit earned him a splashy Bloomberg profile titled “Why OpenAI is at war with an obscure idea man.”
One ballot measure launched by Oldham, dubbed the “California Public Benefit AI Accountability Act,” would create an “independent body” of state officers to oversee public benefit firms.
Oldham said he has “decided to abandon” that proposal because it was “not properly formulated” – though the state AG has already cleared it for circulation.
The second measure, titled the “California AI Worker Protection Act,” would equally set up an “AI Safety Commission” that would set guidelines on AI companies to defend staff. It would have the facility to impose penalties, conduct audits and even deny how far the “frontier AI” system can advance technologically.
If accepted, the measure would empower the state to implement “distributed decision-making authority” and “board independence” to stop “dangerous concentration of control over AI capabilities” – the main allegation that OpenAI’s board levied at Altman prior to his notorious 2023 firing.
Anthropic emblem is seen in this illustration taken May 20, 2024. REUTERS
Oldham said the second initiative “is not going to get on the ballot because I don’t have the funding” to pursue a signature-gathering marketing campaign.
“If someone wants to fund it, I would welcome it, but this was not the point,” Oldham said.
In California, ballot proposals need to secure the almost 550,000 signatures to qualify for the ballot by June. Experts said such signature-gathering campaigns can price tens of thousands and thousands of {dollars}.
Meanwhile, some insiders were skeptical about Oldham’s rationalization for his actions.
“That’s obviously bulls—t. You do not just casually file a ballot measure in California because it’s a topic you’re interested in,” a veteran California tech coverage advisor who reviewed the ballot measures opined to The Post.
Both of Oldham’s ballot proposals are drafted in a approach that would enable state-appointed regulators to single out particular corporations quite than set industry-wide requirements, according to a legal analysis performed by CALinnovates.
“If you read the language of the measures, you have to squint, tilt your head, and look at this completely cockeyed, to not see how this is aimed at just about anyone other than OpenAI,” said Mike Montgomery, CEO of the tech coverage advisory group CALinnovates.
Oldham said any assertion that his proposals were meant to goal a particular company is “ridiculous and false.”
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