Progressives for AI
New York put $10 million into AI jobs training
Issue 33 · November 3, 2026
Quick Take · News · Put AI to Work · Looking Ahead
In this issue
- 🏙️ New York put $10 million of public money into an AI jobs hub in Queens. A nonprofit runs it.
- ✊ The AFL-CIO is writing its own federal AI bill and calls it its "highest priority."
- 🗳️ Ohio's election office worked with AI companies to fix wrong election answers.
- 🤝 Better Together lets people's AI agents report spam calls and texts as a group.
- 🛠️ Put AI to Work: try an AI agent on one small, low-risk job.
🔎 Quick Take
This week, people decided who AI should work for and put money and rules behind it.
New York is paying a nonprofit to train New Yorkers for AI jobs. The AFL-CIO is writing its own AI bill. And a small project lets people's AI agents report spam together.
Each of these started with people who organized.
Let's get into it.
📰 AI News Roundup
🏙️ Lead: New York is paying to train up to 40,000 people for AI jobs
What happened: On October 22, Governor Kathy Hochul announced the AI Jobs Institute, a new training hub in Long Island City, Queens. It has $10 million in public money behind it. That includes $3.06 million from Empire State Development, the state's economic development agency.
Pursuit runs the institute. This New York nonprofit has spent over a decade moving people "from low-wage work into six-figure, high-growth tech careers," the governor's office said. The goal is to train up to 40,000 New Yorkers by 2032.
The institute will also run pilots with small businesses and nonprofits, and publish research to guide workforce policy. Google.org, OpenAI, Anthropic and Wells Fargo are among its partners.
Why this matters: The state says the hub is for New Yorkers "too often left out of the tech economy." That is exactly who should get the first shot at AI jobs. It also puts a nonprofit with a track record in charge. Other states can copy the model.
What you can do
Ask your governor's office or workforce board one question: who in our state is getting trained for AI jobs, and who runs it? If nobody can answer, point them to New York's model. Source: Office of the Governor of New York, October 22, 2026
✊ Labor is writing its own AI bill
What happened: The AFL-CIO is drafting what it calls "gold-standard" AI legislation and hopes the next Congress will pass it, Semafor reported on October 29. AFL-CIO President Liz Shuler said the bill will cover "worker protections and privacy and data protections" and "ideas around economic impacts." She called it the federation's "highest priority."
Semafor also reported that Shuler has sought to use AI to reach voters this election cycle. On data centers, she was direct. "Data centers will be built," she said. "It's a matter of if they're built with good union jobs and a high-standard approach."
Why this matters: Labor is writing AI rules of its own. Shuler treats AI as something that's coming either way, and the bill asks who shares in what it builds.
What you can do
If you're in a union or work with one, ask your local whether it will weigh in on the AFL-CIO bill. Worker stories about AI at work, good and bad, can help shape what goes in it. Source: Semafor, October 29, 2026
🗳️ In brief: Ohio worked with AI companies on election answers
On October 26, Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose said his office worked with AI companies to fix wrong answers about Ohio elections. The office says the work covers ChatGPT, Claude and Grok, and that it will continue. Voters who get a wrong answer from an AI tool can send the office a screenshot.
Source: Ohio Secretary of State, October 26, 2026
🧺 In brief: a test for everyday AI help
OpenAI introduced LifeVal on November 2. It's a test of how well AI helps with everyday jobs like finding childcare, building a household budget and filling out government forms. OpenAI says it built the test from studies of how people spend their time, plus its own survey of 3,995 people. OpenAI hasn't released the full test, so outside groups can't reproduce the scores yet.
Source: OpenAI, November 2, 2026
🏆 Progressive AI win
AI agents that report spam together
Better Together is a new project that lets people's AI agents team up. Its first job is spam calls and texts.
Your agent spots spam in the messages it can read and, after checking with you, reports it. Then the project compares reports across everyone who joined, looking for the same message, link or callback number. A person reviews any pattern before anyone is contacted.
It's a small experiment, and it says so. A report "isn't a complaint to any agency," and it "can't promise compensation or an end to spam." It shows what AI can do when people use it together. One spam text tells you little. The same link reported by many people is a pattern a person can act on.
🛠️ Put AI to Work
Practical ways progressives can use AI this week
Give an AI agent one small job
An AI agent is an assistant that can act for you. It can send you a morning briefing, research a purchase, or book a train ticket. Jeremy Caplan of Wonder Tools has been testing a dozen of them.
His advice for a first try: start a free trial and assign "a few research, summarization, and shopping tasks." Then judge it by how useful the answers are, how much time it saves and how easy it is to use.
Where to start: Caplan says Thine, Hark and Town "guide you through setup" in plain language. All three are free to start. Paid plans run $15 a month for Thine, $20 for Hark and $49 for Town.
Good first jobs for a small organization:
- Research three vendors for something you need to buy, and compare prices.
- Summarize a long report before a meeting.
- Send you a morning note with what's on today's calendar.
One caution, in Caplan's words: "Before connecting your accounts, check on ongoing costs and how each service uses your data." Keep donor and member data out until you know the answer.
Source: Wonder Tools, October 24, 2026
From our friends
Your org deserves its own AI. Not Big Tech's.
Change Agent is a private AI platform built for nonprofits, unions, and advocacy orgs. Your data stays yours, it plugs into tools you already use (Google Drive, Slack, ActBlue), and it handles the tedious stuff so your team can focus on the mission. Starts at $35/month. Small nonprofits under $1M can apply for discounted pricing.
Learn more🔭 Looking Ahead
City AI grants close November 29. The Rockefeller Foundation and the OpenAI Foundation are giving $50 million to help cities use AI for public services. Nonprofits that partner with a city government can apply for $500,000 to $2 million. (Rockefeller Foundation)
The AFL-CIO bill. The federation is aiming at the next Congress. Watch for the text.
Something to think about: Ethan Mollick counted the AI models that now beat GPT-4 as it was when it launched. There are 180, and "Nineteen of them can run on a modern smartphone." Good AI is getting cheap and easy to reach. That's good news for small groups with small budgets. (One Useful Thing, October 20)
Until next time,
Jordan
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