The Brief

Liza Colón-Zayas and Jeff Hiller presented the nominees on Wednesday morning. Winners will be announced at the 78th Emmy Awards on September 14. Read analysis below or click here for the list of nominees.

The nominations look familiar — up to a point. There are plenty of expected names in the list of nominees for the 2026 Emmy Awards: The Pitt led all shows with 25 nominations, followed closely by the final season of Hacks with 24. But not far behind are the 19 nominations for the new, offbeat horror comedy Widow's Bay, including for outstanding comedy series and six actors, including lead actor Matthew Rhys. Just behind that, with 18 nominations, is the first season of Pluribus, creator Vince Gilligan's follow-up to Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul, led by nominated lead actress Rhea Seehorn.

The hottest competition isn't where it used to be. There was a time when the limited or anthology series categories were where the most closely-watched races were happening. But this year, the nominees for outstanding program in that category are not the shows of the year. The second season of Beef was fine, Love Story: John F. Kennedy and Carolyn Bessette was very similar to other work under Ryan Murphy's umbrella, and Sarah Snook was fabulous in All Her Fault. But are these limited series the really interesting shows out there, the way they were in 2021, when The Queen's Gambit beat out Mare of Easttown, I May Destroy You, The Underground Railroad and WandaVision? They are not.

As always, the first-timers are an interesting mix. Just from The Pitt, Gerran Howell (who plays Whittaker), Taylor Dearden (Mel), Patrick Ball, (Langdon), Fiona Dourif (McKay), Sepideh Moafi (Al-Hashimi), Jeff Kober (Duke), Tal Anderson (Becca) and Ernest Harden Jr. (Louie) got their first Emmy nominations. But so did Carey Mulligan, who's a three-time Oscar nominee, recognized here for Beef. Leslie Bibb, whose TV work goes all the way back to Popular on the WB in 1999, got her first Emmy nod for a guest spot on Hacks. Heated Rivalry wasn't eligible because it's Canadian, but Connor Storrie still got his first nomination for his guest appearance on Saturday Night Live.

Not all shows seeming to be awards magnets work out that way. Half Man, Richard Gadd's follow-up to the highly acclaimed series Baby Reindeer, received only a nomination for Gadd's acting. The second season of Apple's Your Friends & Neighbors, starring Mad Men's Jon Hamm (nominated eight times for Mad Men, where he won once) was nominated for outstanding drama series, but that's it. The Lowdown, the exceptional FX series starring Ethan Hawke as an Oklahoma journalist, was shut out entirely. Sometimes it's a relief and sometimes a disappointment, but things with plenty of energy behind them do miss out.

2026 Emmy nominees

Outstanding comedy series

Abbott Elementary
The Bear
Nobody Wants This
Hacks
Margo's Got Money Troubles
Only Murders in the Building
Shrinking
Widow's Bay

Outstanding lead actress in a comedy series

Quinta Brunson, Abbott Elementary
Ayo Edebiri, The Bear
Elle Fanning, Margo's Got Money Troubles
Lisa Kudrow, The Comeback
Jean Smart, Hacks

Outstanding lead actor in a comedy series

Yahya Abdul Mateen II, Wonder Man
Steve Carell, Rooster
Matthew Rhys, Widow's Bay
Jason Segel, Shrinking
Martin Short, Only Murders in the Building

Outstanding supporting actor in a comedy series

Colman Domingo, The Four Seasons
Paul W. Downs, Hacks
Nick Offerman, Margo's Got Money Troubles
Stephen Root, Widow's Bay
Michael Urie, Shrinking
Tyler James Williams, Abbott Elementary

Outstanding supporting actress in a comedy series

Dale Dickey, Widow's Bay
Hannah Einbinder, Hacks
Janelle James, Abbott Elementary
Kate O'Flynn, Widow's Bay
Michelle Pfeiffer, Margo's Got Money Troubles
Megan Stalter, Hacks
Jessica Williams, Shrinking

Outstanding drama series

The Diplomat
The Gilded Age
A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms
Paradise
The Pitt
Pluribus
Slow Horses
Your Friends and Neighbors

Outstanding lead actor in a drama series

Sterling K. Brown, Paradise
Gary Oldman, Slow Horses
Mark Ruffalo, Task
Rufus Sewell, The Diplomat
Noah Wyle, The Pitt

Outstanding lead actress in a drama series

Carrie Coon, The Gilded Age
Chase Infiniti, The Testaments
Keri Russell, The Diplomat
Rhea Seahorn, Pluribus
Zendaya, Euphoria

Outstanding supporting actor in a drama series

Patrick Ball, The Pitt
Billy Crudup, The Morning Show
Shawn Hatosy, The Pitt
Gerran Howell, The Pitt
Jack Lowden, Slow Horses
Tom Pelphrey, Task
Carlos Manuel-Vesga, Pluribus

Outstanding supporting actress in a drama series

Taylor Dearden, The Pitt
Fiona Dourif, The Pitt
Allison Janney, The Diplomat
Katherine LaNasa, The Pitt
Sepideh Moafi, The Pitt
Julianne Nicholson, Paradise
Karolina Wydra, Pluribus

Outstanding limited or anthology series

All Her Fault
The Beast In Me
Beef
DTF St. Louis
Love Story

Outstanding lead actress in a limited or anthology series or movie

Claire Danes, The Beast In Me
Sally Field, Remarkably Bright Creatures
Carey Mulligan, Beef
Sarah Pidgeon, Love Story
Sarah Snook, All Her Fault

Outstanding lead actor in a limited or anthology series or movie

Riz Ahmed, Bait
Jason Bateman, Black Rabbit
Charlie Hunnam, Monster: The Ed Gein Story
Oscar Isaac, Beef
Matthew Rhys, The Beast In Me

Outstanding supporting actress in a limited or anthology series or movie

Linda Cardellini, DTF St. Louis
Dakota Fanning, All Her Fault
Laurie Metcalf, Monster: The Ed Gein Story
Joy Sunday, DTF St. Louis
Youn Yuh-jung, Beef
Constance Zimmer, Love Story: John F. Kennedy Jr. & Carolyn Bessette

Outstanding supporting actor in a limited or anthology series or movie

Jason Bateman, DTF St. Louis
Richard Gadd, Half Man
David Harbour, DTF St. Louis
Richard Jenkins, DTF St. Louis
Charles Melton, Beef
Nick Offerman, Death by Lightning

Outstanding reality competition program

Dancing With the Stars
RuPaul's Drag Race
Survivor
Top Chef
The Traitors

Outstanding variety series

The Daily Show
Jimmy Kimmel Live!
Last Week Tonight With John Oliver
The Late Show With Stephen Colbert
Saturday Night Live

See the full list of nominees. Winners will be announced at the 78th Emmy Awards ceremony, hosted by Mariska Hargitay on Monday, Sept. 14 in Los Angeles.

Copyright 2026 NPR

As Los Angeles revels in the World Cup, advocates who operate an ICE rapid-response hotline say they've seen an uptick in calls for help.

In June, Immigrant Defenders Law Center reported that its emergency phone line offering legal resources received nearly 900 calls — the second-highest number of calls in a single month this year. Sarah Houston, the attorney who oversees responses to that hotline, said July was on track to potentially be even higher.

The increase comes after months of concern over how ICE might interfere with the tournament. Despite fears, so far there have not been reports of immigration activity at the stadium or fan events. Immigration agents have been spotted outside SoFi Stadium during the matches hosted in L.A., but their presence has not appeared to include enforcement.

Instead, Houston said the daily drumbeat of arrests has continued across Los Angeles.

"I'm so happy that ICE hasn't ruined the World Cup by doing these mass raids, but they are still doing them piecemeal and one by one," she said. " In the background, the administration is still there, and these things are still happening. They're just not happening at SoFi Stadium."

Houston said recent reports that her office has received included a father who was arrested at a routine immigration check in in downtown Los Angeles in front of his wife and child and a man who was injured and later hospitalized after ICE arrested him in Burbank.

Meanwhile, immigrant arrests are up nationwide. The New York Times reported last week that immigration agents had detained more than 10,000 people in the span of five days, a sharp increase from earlier this year.

Minky Worden, director of Global Initiatives for Human Rights Watch, said the spike taints the celebrations of the World Cup around the country, where communities have welcomed fans and teams from around the globe.

"We have to look at the full context of these events. The soccer could be great. Your favorite team could be winning. The Mexico jerseys were just the best. … But what's happening behind the scenes?" she said. "Is the beautiful game covering up an ugly escalation of ICE arrests?"

Human Rights Watch had called for an "ICE Truce" after reports that Immigration and Customs Enforcement would play a key role in tournament security, but FIFA and the federal government made no guarantees.

In a statement provided by the Department of Homeland Security, acting assistant secretary Lauren Bis confirmed that the department was involved in policing the World Cup.

“The safety and security of the American people and the millions of visitors attending these events remain our highest priority," Bis said in a statement. “International visitors who legally come to the United States for the World Cup have nothing to worry about. What makes someone a target for immigration enforcement is whether or not they are illegally in the U.S. — full stop."

SoFi Stadium's food and beverage workers had threatened to strike over ICE's presence at the World Cup and made a deal with their employer averting the labor action just before the tournament started. Their new contract includes the right to walk off the job over safety concerns, including the presence of immigration agents at the workplace.

So far, workers have felt safe on the job, despite spotting ICE and Homeland Security agents on the stadium's perimeter, according to Kurt Petersen, co-president of their union, Unite Here Local 11.

But outside of the stadium, he said many of them have been affected by immigration enforcement in Los Angeles since the immigration raids that started last summer. Petersen said one union member was recently released from a detention center after being arrested on the street in front of his family.

" Raids are continuing, right? People are being kidnapped off the streets," Petersen said. " This is by no means something that has ended."

The final World Cup match in Los Angeles is this Friday.

For many public colleges and universities in California, keeping their campuses safe includes owning military-grade weaponry — AR-15s, stun grenades designed to cause temporary blindness and sonic weapons that resonate so loudly they are known in the armed forces as the voice of God.

According to state law, campus police can only own military equipment if the college believes there is no other way to uphold civilian safety.

That law, which passed in 2021, also requires police to make all their equipment dealings exceedingly clear to the public. However, not every college follows every part of the law, according to an investigation by CalMatters into all 148 public campuses in the California Community Colleges, University of California, and California State University systems.

Each campus’s state or district governing board — which gives permission for police to procure such items — has to annually re-approve a use policy, a chronicle of when the equipment has been used and an inventory. Once the report is approved and published online, campus police have 30 days to hold a conveniently located and “well-publicized” forum for the public to learn about and give feedback on the equipment, according to state law.

CalMatters attempted to compile the 2025 annual reports and use policies from every public higher education police department in the state that owns military equipment. Here is what we found.

Questions prompt campuses to act

Several campus police departments created reports after CalMatters’ inquiries, though the law requires the documents to be posted online as long as the equipment is usable. Not all reports or policies contained the details mandated by the 2021 law; in many cases campuses left out information, including manufacturers’ product descriptions, up-to-date inventories and equipment quantities. The University of California Board of Regents approved UC Berkeley’s annual report last September, but university police only published their equipment list on April 7, after four CalMatters inquiries.

According to their own reports, San Jose State University and San Francisco State University own AR-15s even though Cal State’s policy does not authorize it. Cal State spokesperson Amy Bentley-Smith said these AR-15s are standard issue, which would exempt them from the reporting requirement, even though San Jose’s report classifies them as specialized firearms and university police departments determine what equipment is standard issue. San Francisco’s semi automatic rifles are standard issue and won’t be listed in the annual report going forward, university spokesperson Robert King said.

Campus police also must submit their yearly report to their district or state governing boards. Chico State and Cal State Northridge police said their reports are sent to the Cal State chancellor’s office, which the systemwide policy requires. But Klarissa Garcia, executive assistant to the chief of police at Cal State Dominguez Hills, said her department does not submit its report to any governing body.

University of California campus police officers talk amongst each other while a San Diego Sheriff’s officer holds a weapon behind them during a pro-Palestinian protest at UC San Diego in San Diego on May 6, 2024.

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Adriana Heldiz

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CalMatters

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Multiple police departments said they did not hold a campus forum in 2025, including Cal Poly Humboldt and Cal State Sonoma, nor did they respond to inquiries about when the required public meeting was held. Many departments said they held meetings, but did not answer questions about how they publicized them, or said they posted announcements on social media without any record of it on their accounts.

The Cal State Board of Trustees has not reviewed the systemwide equipment policy at a public meeting since 2022, though the policy is supposed to be renewed at least annually. Under the policy the board adopted, the trustees only need to check the policy again if the university system wants to authorize new types of equipment, Bentley-Smith told CalMatters. She added that Cal State will re-examine the policy to ensure it follows the law.

Bentley-Smith also said that the AR-15s at Cal State’s San Jose and San Francisco campuses are standard issue, which would exempt them from the reporting requirement, even though San Jose’s report classifies them as specialized firearms.

Several community colleges were missing military equipment policies and reports when questioned by CalMatters. The college system’s chancellor’s office does not track whether colleges follow the transparency law, according to its communications specialist Melissa Villarin.

CalMatters used annual reports to create a mass inventory of the equipment found at California higher education institutions, which includes hundreds of semi-automatic rifles, thousands of munitions containing the same chemical as chili peppers, and hundreds of thousands of rifle munitions. Some reports did not list quantities despite the legal requirement, so CalMatters sourced other documents posted to campus websites or directly asked for those figures.

The military equipment law, written by former Democratic Assemblymember David Chiu, now the city attorney of San Francisco, only applies to campus police departments with sworn police officers. Campus safety or security departments with unsworn personnel do not have to report their equipment. Over 40 community colleges told CalMatters they did not file a report.

It’s not just police using military-grade tools. The Cal State Monterey Bay 2025 report states its Emergency Management team owns three camera drones, which, being remotely piloted aircrafts, are classified as military equipment under state law. The Emergency Management team reports to the campus chief of police but is not itself made up of sworn officers, according to interim police chief Yvonne Gordon.

Following CalMatters’ inquiries, several campuses — as well as the Cal State system — said they are hereafter committed to following the military equipment transparency law in its entirety. In addition, some are downsizing their inventory.

Defense-style weaponry in schools

Military equipment forums held at universities are often sparsely attended, according to several police departments. But some students are impassioned about the issue. At a rally outside a UC Board of Regents meeting in January, UCLA’s chapter of the UC Divest Coalition, an anti-imperialism and anti-militarism student group, criticized the regents for spending tuition money on military equipment while the board convened yards away in a school ballroom.

UCLA police use long-range acoustic devices — which emit focused beams of high-volume sound — as giant loudspeakers to broadcast announcements to large crowds. In the 2024-25 school year, the department deployed these “voice of God” tools 71 times, all during crowd management situations, defined by the university as assemblies, protests and demonstrations. Police at UC Santa Cruz used a similar acoustic device to give dispersal orders during the 2024 pro-Palestine student encampments.

UCLA does not use the acoustic devices to produce high-pitched tones, which they are also capable of emitting, said Richard Mejia, the director of emergency communications and information for the university’s campus safety office. But pitch differs from loudness, which is measured in decibels: a long-range acoustic device can produce 160 decibels, and sounds over 120 can cause permanent hearing damage even during a short exposure. The university said it doesn’t prescribe a fixed decibel output, adding that it follows federal and scientific exposure regulations, including those from the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, which permits sudden noises up to 140 decibels. For reference, a bulldozer emits about 95.

A helicopter flies over a pro-Palestinian encampment at UCLA on May 1, 2024. Groups of student protesters gathered at the encampment.

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Ted Soqui

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CalMatters

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Not all inventoried equipment is approved for use by district or state governing boards. An October 2025 memo from San Jose State University states its police department owns 33 tear gas grenades, which burst into clouds of choking chemicals when released and, for some brands, cause “psychological and physiological effects.” The Cal State military equipment policy does not authorize using grenades to deploy tear gas or oleoresin capsicum, the chili pepper irritant.

These grenades have “always been in our armory,” Captain Jermaine Thomas said. “We will never use them.” He added that the department plans to destroy them, along with the university’s submachine gun, which is also not authorized under Cal State policy.

Bentley-Smith told CalMatters that the submachine gun was never added to the systemwide policy manual because the university never used or requested permission to use it.

Campus forums vary in scope

A promotional website for San Jose State’s 2025 community forum says the event covers current police initiatives without specifically mentioning military equipment, but Thomas said that subject was indeed discussed.

About 21,500 students attend El Camino College in Los Angeles County, which announced its 2025 meeting, held in a gymnasium, during four other meetings held on campus: the College Public Safety and Security Committee, the Academic Senate, the College Council and the President’s Meeting. Police Chief Matthew Vander Horck said about 30 people attended. Meanwhile, Captain Jeffrey Chobanian of the UCLA Police Department, which serves about 49,000 students, said the department used social media to promote its 2025 forum, held on Zoom, but nobody attended.

Some of the forums become question and answer sessions, like the ones held by San Bernardino Community College District police, according to their chief Blake Bonnet. Students and faculty come prepared, read the policy — which includes when and where the equipment can be used — to the officers and press them directly on how it will be enforced, Bonnet said.

Bonnet said he publicizes the annual meeting through the police department’s online newsletter, Just the Facts, which contains crime logs and topical safety tips and is sent to students and staff every month.

“People ask questions and seek clarification,” Bonnet said. “If you don’t understand the police world — which some people do, some people don’t — if you have a question, I would rather you ask so that we can understand your concern.”

At UC Davis’ annual forum, meeting participants have asked about when and why officers can deploy weapons, which necessitates at least annual trainings, and how the equipment is shared with others — since the school has lent drones to other UC campuses for use in crowd control and can borrow equipment from other campuses in preparation for “major” protests and demonstrations. Last year, an attendee asked if other police forces can bring unauthorized military equipment to campus, according to meeting minutes. Captain Mark Brunet responded that they can.

Rage against assault rifles 

In February 2025, a Mt. San Antonio College police advisory committee composed of college and police personnel and two students met to discuss adding AR-15s to the department’s arsenal. Before long, other students caught wind of the plans. Student César Tlatoāni Alvarado said fellow students, especially veterans and students of color, were not comfortable with their campus becoming militarized.

“The entire campus was talking about it,” said Tlatoāni Alvarado, who studies political science and world languages and global studies. They also served as the campus’s student trustee for two terms, from 2023 to 2025.

By CalMatters’ count, over 25 public colleges own semi-automatic rifles, which shoot with more precision, accuracy and distance than handguns, according to several school policies.

Tlatoāni Alvarado said they were fearful of the impact of a militarized police force on the campus protesting scene, which they said is active but peaceful.

“I knew for a fact that this was being done to silence dissent on our campus,” Tlatoāni Alvarado said.

University of Sourthern California Public Safety officers tape off an area of Alumni Park during a pro-Palestinian protest on campus in Los Angeles on April 24, 2024.

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Jules Hotz

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CalMatters

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The student led a coalition of campus clubs to demonstrate against the proposed purchases and vehemently protest at multiple police town halls. That April, nearly 20 students, faculty and alumni condemned the plan to buy AR-15s at the college district’s board of trustees’ monthly meeting. The protestors included the student trustee, who said several hundred students were involved in the overall effort.

“There were so many students that were yelling,” Tlatoāni Alvarado said. “They were screaming at the administration. They were upset, they were frustrated. They felt betrayed.”

As of June 2026, the college does not own semi-automatic rifles. “The discussion is still ongoing” on whether the college will seek them in the future, according to campus police chief Kelli Florman.

Still, Tlatoāni Alvarado considers the students’ work a success.

“It was a lot of work,” they said. “I was one of the students that had led the way in that campaign. But I couldn’t have done it alone. There were so many of us.”

Fast track to compliance

Compton College President Keith Curry said a February inquiry from CalMatters put the military equipment law on his radar for the first time. Campus police had issued semi-automatic rifles to patrol officers for over seven years, arguing that standard-issue pistols did not effectively protect civilians and officers during the 1997 North Hollywood bank robbery and shootout. The campus police department also owns incapacitating tasers and a submachine gun, the latter of which the college reports is for potentially lethal situations and to shoot through barriers. However, after some research, Curry realized his college never adopted an equipment use policy.

“Once I understood that it was not implemented correctly, I went into action mode,” Curry said. “I was calling around, I was calling a police chief that I know, I looked on different websites. I had to dissect the bill to understand it, myself, about what’s going on.”

Ultimately, Curry and Compton’s attorney wrote up a Corrective Action Plan that his district’s board of trustees unanimously approved on March 16. In accordance with the plan, the college approved an official policy in April, held a community engagement meeting in May, reviewed an annual use report in June and will update the police policy manual by September.

The compliance review served as a general reminder to build transparency between campus police and their constituents, Curry said. In April, he announced the establishment of three new forms of oversight for campus police: a student committee, a community advisory committee, and a task force reviewing police procedures and policies.

“As a leader, you have to understand what mistakes are made. You have to fix the mistakes,” Curry said.

After a CalMatters inquiry, Chaffey College officials also discovered they had no policy, which Chief Steven Griffin amended by writing a policy that his college board then passed in April. Cal State Monterey Bay updated its website with an equipment policy. Southwestern College modified its annual report with munition quantities. And San Joaquin Delta College, Cuesta College, and the Riverside Community College District all said they are unsure whether their past documentation follows the law, but are working to ensure future compliance.

Other college officials said adjusting their documentation to conform to state law made them reconsider the tools they have. After taking “immediate steps” to update MiraCosta College’s report, public and governmental relations director Kristen Gonzales said the campus police chief plans to “responsibly reduce (munition) inventory to a level that aligns with our actual operational needs and best practices.”

Tlatoāni Alvarado said that while campus militarization is deeply concerning, he’s witnessing a growing trend of students resisting it.

“College campuses are a focal point for where our activism can translate into real-world change,” they said. “Colleges are trying to quash that dissent. But what they need to know, and they need to be made aware of, is that there’s many more of us than there are of them.”

Phoebe Huss is a contributor with the College Journalism Network, a collaboration between CalMatters and student journalists from across California. CalMatters higher education coverage is supported by a grant from the College Futures Foundation.

This article was originally published on CalMatters and was republished under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives license.

Santa Ana’s Measure X — a 1.5% sales tax — is scheduled to decrease starting in 2029, meaning the city could lose out on $30 million in revenue. Voters will decide in November whether to let that happen or make the tax permanent.

The City Council approved bringing a ballot measure to voters at Tuesday night’s meeting. Councilmembers Jessie Lopez and David Penaloza voted against the proposal.

The tax measure was approved by voters in 2018 with plans to reduce the rate to 1% by 2029, then eliminate it in 2039. Money from the tax has helped the city fund street maintenance, public safety, youth services and homelessness services.

Santa Ana, like most Southern California cities, is dealing with a tight budget. The tax provides more than $80 million annually, according to the city. Officials warned the council that the tax accounts for about 20% of the general fund. If it were to sunset, major cuts to services would be necessary, they said.

“By allowing voters to decide in 2026, we will have three years to pivot, if needed,” Kathryn Downs, assistant city manager, said. “If Measure X were to be made permanent, we should expect to have a fairly small structural gap to address each year, less than 2%.”

At Tuesday’s meeting, Mayor Valerie Amezcua called the timeline placed on the tax measure in 2018 ridiculous. And if the measure doesn’t pass in November, she said, “Whoever's sitting up here in 2029 … Good luck, because I don't know how you'll keep the lights on.”

“Do you like the QOLT (Quality of Life) teams? Do you like your graffiti removed? Do you like your fire department responding? Do you like your potholes filled? Do you like the services that you're seeing? Do you like the new parks?” Amezcua added. “Because the conversation will be then, where do we cut and who do we cut?”

Lopez said that in 2018, Measure X was presented to voters as temporary.

“I strongly feel like I can’t break that deal with our constituents,” Lopez said.

Councilmember Phil Bacerra said he reluctantly supported leaving it to voters but that the city can’t continue to rely on Measure X.

“Measure X is not going to be enough for us to continue to provide even just the current level of services in the future,” Bacerra said. “To have to cut 20% services across the board. I don't want to have to do that … but we've got to do more. This is not going to be enough.”

The city has until early August to file official ballot language with the Registrar of Voters.

A bill to allow insurance companies to monitor California drivers’ behavior in exchange for potential discounts on their premiums would change the state’s longstanding insurance law, drawing opposition from the Insurance Department as well as consumer and privacy advocates.

Assembly Bill 311 would let insurance companies use telematics — technology installed in vehicles that allows them to transmit information such as location, speed, braking force, swerving and more — when setting rates for drivers who choose to allow themselves to be tracked.

California is the only state in the nation that does not allow insurers to use telematics in setting rates. State law requires insurers to prioritize safety record, miles driven and driving experience as the main factors when they set drivers’ premiums. The bill would let drivers choose to use telematics data to establish their driving records in addition to what their Department of Motor Vehicles records show. Telematics data is collected by smartphone app, systems embedded in vehicles or other connected technology.

Supporters say the legislation would make streets and highways safer by encouraging better driving, while opponents worry about privacy, lack of transparency and possible bias in insurance pricing.

Kellie Montalvo, a parent whose son died after a distracted driver hit him, testified before the Senate Standing Committee on Insurance on June 24. She said her son Benjamin, 21, was riding his bike in 2020 when he was hit by a driver who had been texting while driving. She said the driver had a record of “speeding tickets, prior crashes and this was her fourth hit-and-run.”

“I spend many sleepless nights wondering if she had been stopped at any point prior to that horrific night, would my beautiful son be here today,” Montalvo said, her voice breaking. She urged lawmakers to pass the bill, saying it will save lives.

Other witnesses, also clearly emotional, expressed support for the bill as they carried enlarged photos of the loved ones they’ve lost because of crashes.

The bill’s author, Assemblymember Tina McKinnor, a Democrat from Inglewood, said at the committee hearing that she has lost three friends in vehicle crashes in the past several years. She called telematics a tool to help make streets safer, saying her bill would “incentivize safer, good driving behavior.”

Safer Streets for Everyone, a nonprofit organization advocating for road safety, co-sponsored the legislation. The group’s founder and executive director, Damian Kevitt, is a cyclist who was hit by a car and lost his leg. He testified before the committee, citing a couple of studies that show drivers improved their behavior — including reducing their use of mobile phones — while behind the wheel when financial rewards were involved.

Both studies were backed by the insurance industry. None of the proponents who testified recently before two Senate committees advanced the bill mentioned any independent studies around whether telematics has helped improve safety.

Other supporters of the bill include several road-safety coalitions and bicycle associations from around the state.

Insurance department’s concerns

The state’s insurance department is opposed to the bill, saying the legislation is not compatible with California insurance law, Proposition 103. The law came out of a ballot proposition written by Harvey Rosenfield, the founder of consumer advocacy group Consumer Watchdog, in response to rising car and home insurance premiums almost four decades ago. It was approved by 51% of the state’s voters in 1988 and includes a mandate for insurance companies to give “good drivers” 20% discounts. (Some drivers also receive discounts for low mileage — it’s a form of monitoring that’s OK under Prop. 103 because miles driven is an allowed factor in rate-setting.)

“The bill creates broad liability loopholes, dilutes regulator oversight, and allows insurance companies to shift core regulatory responsibilities to unregulated third-party telematics vendors, among other concerns,” wrote Josephine Figueroa, deputy insurance commissioner and legislative director for the department, to Sen. Steve Padilla, chairperson of the Senate insurance committee, on June 20.

Figueroa wrote that the bill contains vague language about how insurance companies are supposed to do “due diligence” around third-party telematics providers, and using telematics data as part of drivers’ records. She said the insurance department has documented cases “where facially neutral criteria produce disparate impacts, such as the use of census-tract voter registration rates as a proxy for race or citizenship.”

In addition, she said “consumer savings also remain generally unproven and varied.” She cited data from the Maryland Insurance Administration, which showed that in 2023, 31% of that state’s drivers enrolled in their insurers’ telematics program saw their rates drop; 24% actually experienced an increase; and 45% saw no change in their premiums.

Maryland’s research also showed that the telematics systems collected a lot of data that included trip route, days driven, G-force, unsafe following, aggressive turning and many more driver behaviors. Most insurers outsourced the collection of that data to third parties.

California’s Senate insurance committee passed the bill four days after Figueroa’s letter.

The insurance department is meeting with McKinnor’s staff about its concerns, according to Michael Soller, spokesperson for the department. McKinnor and her staff would not answer CalMatters’ questions about the bill.

Some of the insurance department’s concerns about the legislation align with those of Consumer Watchdog.

“In California, auto insurance has to be rated in a driver's actual driving history, not the product of an unverified algorithm or (artificial intelligence) system predicting future driving,” said Carmen Balber, executive director of Consumer Watchdog, in testimony before the Senate insurance committee.

In an interview with CalMatters, Balber wondered why the legislation — a “gut-and-amend,” a bill that has been substantially reworked or rewritten, has missed the introduction deadline and is meant to be fast-tracked, often because it’s controversial — is bypassing the typical hearing process. The new language was submitted to the Senate June 10; Balber said her group had less than a week’s notice that it was coming up for discussion.

That worry, too, is in line with that of the insurance department. Figueroa wrote in her letter to Padilla that she was concerned that the bill, as gutted and amended, contains language the department had reviewed and expressed reservations about several months ago.

The list of the bill’s supporters includes insurance industry groups that have long pushed for telematics use in California. One group in particular, the Personal Insurance Federation of California, has given about $1,000 worth of dinner and travel to McKinnor several times over the past few years, according to CalMatters’ Digital Democracy database. She has also received campaign contributions from the group, as well as other insurance industry groups and employees, totaling $38,000 since 2022, state campaign finance records show.

Padilla, a Democrat from the San Diego area who chairs the Senate insurance committee, was unavailable to respond to CalMatters’ questions about the concerns the insurance department raised in the letter it sent him, spokesperson Cameron Sutherland said. Padilla also is on the Senate Standing Committee on Privacy, Digital Technologies and Consumer Protection, which passed the bill a few days after the insurance committee did and referred it to the appropriations committee.

Padilla has received about the same amount of campaign contributions from the insurance industry since 2022, according to campaign finance records.

The insurance department sent the chairperson of the privacy committee, Sen. Christopher Cabaldon, a Democrat from Napa, a similar letter with its concerns about the bill, according to Soller. Cabaldon's office did not immediately respond to CalMatters' request to talk about the letter.

Cabaldon showed strong support for the bill, saying during his committee hearing that consumers should have the choice to use their driving data how they want and that he believed in the technology’s potential. He has also received campaign contributions from the insurance industry — about $27,000 going back to when he ran for the state Assembly in 2008, campaign finance records show.

The numbers, or lack thereof

California has some of the highest rates for full auto insurance coverage in the nation, according to at least one analysis, by MarketWatch, a news publication with an arm that publishes commerce guides. Another analysis, by insurance-comparison site Insurify, says California’s car insurance rates have been rising for the past couple of years and are projected to increase 1% this year.

Maryland’s research on the effects of telematics is the first by a state insurance regulator, according to Consumer Federation of America, a national association of consumer nonprofit organizations. The group is urging other state regulators to follow suit.

“You can’t trust companies to do this without oversight,” Michael DeLong, research and advocacy associate for the group, told CalMatters. He said companies can collect a lot of information about drivers and use it to make money; an example of that is a recent settlement between the California Justice Department and General Motors, penalizing the automaker for selling driver data associated with its OnStar emergency roadside and navigation service.

DeLong said the group plans to write a letter criticizing AB 311.

At least one other independent survey, by Consumer Reports in 2024, has shown that telematics can help reduce drivers’ premiums. The survey found a median annual savings of $120 — including higher savings for Black and Latino drivers than for white and Asian drivers — but also found that some drivers’ insurance costs rose.

Consumer and privacy advocates, including ACLU California Action, Consumer Federation of California and TechEquity Action, worry that some drivers will feel like they have no choice but to give up their privacy in exchange for possibly saving money. In doing so, they could also open themselves up to bias depending on where they live, work and drive.

The bill “would authorize an opaque surveillance pricing infrastructure for a product Californians are legally required to purchase,” Becca Cramer, speaking for Privacy Rights Clearinghouse, told both the Senate insurance committee and privacy committee. “Californians have a constitutional right to privacy and not have to choose between exercising that right and affording a mandatory product.”

Cramer also cited the Consumer Reports survey and said telematics companies score drivers based on “factors that correlate strongly with race and income."

This article was originally published on CalMatters and was republished under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives license.